A terrorist — he reportedly shouted “Allahu Akbar as he murdered two police officers and a civilian — was shot and killed by police today in the Belgian city of Liege.
After carrying out three brutal murders this morning, the attacker took a female cleaner hostage in a nearby high school.
The footage shows him running out of the school with two guns blazing before he was shot dead in the street. Several officers were injured in the gun battle.
Belgian authorities knew full well that the attacker was a risk. He was, after all, on a terrorist watch list after it was determined that he had been radicalized while in prison. Where he’d been since 2003. Which makes you wonder who thought letting a so-called “known wolf” out to roam freely in polite society was a good idea.
The man, who is understood to have been on a day release from a nearby prison, had approached the female officers at around 10.30am, slashed their throats and stabbed them several times from behind, before disarming them.
He has been named as 36-year-old Benjamin Herman. A lawmaker tonight revealed Belgian national Herman was on an anti-terror police watchlist after being radicalised in jail. He appeared indirectly in security reports on radicalised people and was a multiple repeat offender incarcerated since 2003 who was on day release when he attacked.
According to Belgian broadcaster RTBF, Herman was a violent drug dealer with additional convictions for both robbery and assault, who had been let out on day-release from a local prison on Monday.
RTBF claimed investigators are looking into whether he had converted to Islam, with sources within the prison service saying he had been close to radicalised inmates and had wanted to ‘carry out attacks when released’.
And yet he was allowed out on his own recognizance. During a prison term. Reportedly, to “seek work.” But it’s OK, because . . .
(Justice Minister Koen Geens) told the National Security Council the perpetrator was was on his 14th two-day release breaks after a successful 13.
Belgium has some of the toughest gun laws in Europe. So armed self defense isn’t a practical option for most Belgians. Yet they live in a permissive society in which violent multiple offenders who are believed to have been radicalized are allowed to wander free on two-day vacations. What could possibly go wrong? Oh wait…it already has.