German investigators found a video on the mobile phone inside the minivan the suspect used to drive into a crowd at the Berlin Pride festival on July 25, according to a statement from the German Federal Prosecutor's Office on Tuesday (July 28).
The video was recorded on Saturday, the same day as the attack that killed a 65-year-old Polish woman and injured 31 people. In the video, a masked person pledges allegiance to ISIL. Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said in a television interview that authorities believe the person was the suspect, 21-year-old Abdul Ballout.
Ballout, a German citizen of Lebanese origin, was shot dead by police on Sunday after attacking officers with a bladed weapon. Investigators also found a scabbard for a machete that the suspect is believed to have used to attack more people after leaving the vehicle, which crashed into a tree in the Tiergarten park in central Berlin.
Ballout was known to the criminal justice system. Berlin prosecutors said he traveled to Lebanon in 2025 with the aim of entering Syria to join ISIL and had contact with several people believed to be members of the group. A Lebanese judicial source said Ballout had been sentenced to three months in prison there for belonging to ISIL.
After returning to Germany, Ballout was arrested and in May was convicted by a juvenile court of "planning a serious violent subversive act," but received only a suspended sentence of one year and 10 months. Minister Dobrindt added that data storage devices found at Ballout's home also had "links to IS."
