The Communist Party of Israel (CPI) condemned Wednesday evening, October 9, the shooting attack near a synagogue in the eastern German city of Halle, in which the assailant killed two people in the vicinity after he failed to break into the Jewish house of worship. The two mortally wounded victims were 40-year-old Jana Lange and 20-year-old Kevin S., who was shot at a nearby Kebab restaurant.

The 27-year-old neo-Nazi Stephan Balliet, recorded by a security camera on a street in the city of Halle in eastern Germany as he fires on passersby after he was unsuccessful in his attempt to break into a nearby synagogue with the intent of massacring worshipers there on the holiday of Yom Kippur, Wednesday, October 9 (Footage: German TV)

The terrorist attack, carried out by a 27-year-old neo-Nazi German citizen, Stephan Balliet, after he failed to enter the synagogue where worshipers were attending Yom Kippur prayers, was most likely motivated by anti-Semitic ideology, according to German officials.

In response to the heinous crime, the head of the Joint List, MK Ayman Odeh (Hadash), tweeted in English: “Anti-Semitism and Islamophobia are strongly connected. All those who believe in democracy, from all religious backgrounds, must unite to send vile neo-Nazis back to the history books.”

Odeh’s fellow Hadash MK, Ofer Cassif, was more biting in his condemnation, saying it was “impossible to ignore the international racist alliance that is forming in front of our eyes… Yet, instead of Israel being the first to condemn and boycott neo-fascist governments around the world, it trades with them and makes them stronger,” the Communist MK added. “For the occupation, we made a pact with the devil.”