Abdul B.’s attack resulted in a major police operation – and a manhunt.Image: keystone
The day after the attack on the CSD in Berlin, the suspect’s home was searched. Neighbors remember him – and are shocked.
July 26, 2026, 10:40 p.mJuly 26, 2026, 10:44 p.m
Leonie Lang / t-online
The street in front of the five-story building is long and narrow. The windows of an upstairs apartment can be seen from the sidewalk, but they provide little insight. Below is the entrance to the house, which only residents and officials have access to.
The family of the suspected CSD attacker is said to live here: A man drove a white van into the crowd celebrating Berlin’s Christopher Street Day (CSD) late on Saturday evening. According to the police, 29 people were injured and one person died. The suspect is 21-year-old Abdul Ballout.
There is a gaming room to the left of the entrance to the house. The lettering lights up, but the door is closed. A few people are standing around. Not many. Just neighbors who greet each other and talk, smoke and sometimes disappear back into the house. “I have lived here for 11 years,” says a resident of the house who wishes to remain anonymous. “We know each other as neighbors. But there was no indication that I would say that he would carry out such an attack.” He was shocked because it happened in the neighborhood.
Wedding reception in front of the house
A red Smart drives up. The driver, a young man, has to identify himself as a local resident and is then allowed to park there. Hamza is 22 and knows Abdul Ballout from “back in school”. He also knows his family from the house and has close contact with his mother and sisters: “We say hello to each other. The sisters go to school as normal.” Abdul Ballout himself suddenly disappeared about four to five years ago.
A few months ago he resurfaced and was seen irregularly. Hamza didn’t talk to him, but he still remembers that he got married at that time: “After that, he always came to visit, but I don’t think he lives here.” The celebration took place here in the street in front of the gray and beige house.
A loud bang and a stairwell full of smoke
A few minutes later, several officers, some of whom were masked, emerged from the building. They carry a box labeled “Spusi paper bags” to a car. Then they drive off. A police officer confirms that there are still officers in the apartment building and in the apartment, but he cannot provide any more information at the moment. A sniffer dog is led down the street and disappears into the stairwell with some officers. Later he can be seen sniffing through the dusty windows of the apartment.
A loud bang was heard around 1:30 a.m., almost everyone living on the street reports when they remember last night. Hamza also remembers what he did after the loud noise: “I was one of the first in the stairwell. There was smoke everywhere, it was difficult for me to breathe. You could hear the helicopter and the police calling from the stairwell.” It cannot be confirmed on site whether the police used smoke bombs. The bang must have been so loud that even neighbors in the house next door heard it.
“We had no idea what was going on at first.”
A resident of the neighboring house and her boyfriend had themselves Christopher Street Day took part and celebrated there since the morning. When they heard the loud bang, they had already been home for a few hours. They describe the night in English: “At first we had no idea what was going on. But then the cars came.” They report how shortly afterwards the street was full of emergency vehicles and the police entered the house.
There is still movement in front of the house. The sniffer dog is brought back to the emergency vehicle. When asked whether the dog should sniff out explosives, the police officer replied: “Negative.” There is no answer as to whether it involves snooping on data storage media. Small groups of people stand together in the street. Some smoke, they talk, others walk with their children to the playground further back.
The resident from the neighboring house continues to talk about the day at the CSD and about the exuberant atmosphere in which many people from all over the world celebrated together. But then suddenly everything changed. «We didn’t expect something like this to happen. It’s sad and bad.”