Muslim teens confess plan to attack Austrian middle school, 'shoot all the Christians'
Two Muslim teenagers in Austria shared in a court testimony that they conspired to kill as many Christian people as they could in a planned attack on a school that one of them attended.
The boys, ages 15 and 16 from Bruck an der Mur, who already have existing criminal records, testified in Leoben Regional Court on July 16 to answer for charges of being part of a terrorist organization and criminal organization, according to regional Austrian news outlets.
According to the newspaper Kleine Zeitung, authorities say that the youths participated in a radical chat group, stating that they were in the "final phase of making explosives" and that they had access to guns, swords and knives.
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The 16-year-old is an Austrian automotive apprentice while the 15-year-old is of Chechnyan descent. The 16-year-old reportedly said in the group chat that he is "angry with the West" and they must "re-establish the caliphate." When questioned about the chats, the accused reportedly admitted that they planned to attack a middle school attended by the 15-year-old in the Styria city of Bruck an der Mur.
They claimed they wanted to "shoot all the Christians in the class!" Additionally, the teens had a friend who tried and failed to obtain his father's submachine gun for the teens to use. The teens were also reportedly saving up to buy their own guns.
The boys admitted they would have surrendered if police intervened and stressed that God would forgive them because "Killing Christians takes us to paradise."
Austria's largest newspaper, Kronen Zeitung, reports that the teens made it clear on their platforms that they weren't interested in carrying out "boring knife attacks" and wanted to use explosives to kill as many people as possible.
Austrian law enforcement was tipped off about the plans by Dutch investigators who sent over the online chat logs.
The court sentenced both boys to two years in prison for "criminal conspiracy" but they are expected to only serve roughly eight months behind bars.
According to the broadcast outlet ORF Steiermark, the court also sentenced the boys to probation, deradicalization training and anti-violence training. The maximum penalty that juveniles in Austria can face is up to five years behind bars.
Kleine Zeitung reports that the father of the 16-year-old was surprised by the allegations against his son, while the 15-year-old's mother didn't appear phased by the verdict.
A Kronen Zeitung report detailed that the 15-year-old also set fire to a university building in Bruck in May 2022 while the school was closed.
Raymond Ibrahim, the distinguished senior shillman fellow at the Gatestone Institute think tank, recently wrote that "Austria appears to be sitting on a time bomb" regarding Islamic extremism.
"Even though authorities managed to thwart what could have been a tragic massacre of schoolchildren — as they thwarted an earlier one in 2020 — Muslim hostility in Austria continues to grow, suggesting that it might only be a matter of time before a severe terrorist attack or worse overwhelms that nation," Ibrahim wrote.
"Along with generic Muslim criminality in Austria seems to be, sadly, an ideologically-driven hatred for 'disbelievers' and especially Christians and Jews," he added.
"There are now more Muslim students than Catholics in the schools of Austrian cities, including Vienna, the capital, and Linz."
Nicole Alcindor is a reporter for The Christian Post.
