Berlin rainbow bench commemorating Pride attack victims vandalised

A rainbow-coloured bench installed at the site of a deadly jihadist attack which targeted revellers at Berlin's Pride march in July has been vandalised, police said Tuesday.

Police were called to Berlin's Tiergarten park "regarding a rainbow bench installed as a place of remembrance, because it was severely damaged," police said, before the debris was removed.

The vehicle ramming and machete attack left a 65-year-old Polish woman dead and wounded around 30 people.

The presumed attacker, Abdul Rahman Ballout, a 21-year-old German man of Lebanese origin, was killed the next day by Berlin police after an intensive manhunt.

Prosecutors later said he had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group in a video on the day of the attack.

The city's Mitte district council had installed the bench and planted a maple tree in early August to encourage reflection and solidarity with the queer community.

Police said Tuesday that wooden slats from the bench were torn from the frame with "considerable physical violence".

An investigation has been opened into vandalism, said police, who noted that other benches nearby had been left intact.

Mitte district council pledged to quickly rebuild the bench.

"This bench stands for our freedom and for solidarity with the queer community," said Mitte's district mayor Stefanie Remlinger.

"Whoever has destroyed it wants to make a statement against these values -- our basic values are not up for debate."

July's attack was one of several which have shaken Germany in recent years. The deadliest, on a Magdeburg Christmas market in 2024, killed six people and wounded more than 300, and was committed by a Saudi anti-Islam activist and adherent of right-wing conspiracy theories.

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