Knife-wielding woman screaming ‘slaughter all Jews’ attacks rabbi in Vienna

  • A woman aged around 50 kicked a rabbi and ripped off his kippah yesterday
  • She fled after pulling a knife out of her handbag and yelling anti-Semitic insults
  • The case has been taken over by the agency that investigates acts of terrorism
  • It comes weeks after a gunman killed four people near the city's main synagogue

By JOE DAVIES FOR MAILONLINE

PUBLISHED: | UPDATED: 

A knife-wielding woman screaming 'slaughter all Jews' attacked a rabbi and ripped off his kippah in Vienna. 

The attack occurred Thursday afternoon when the woman, described as about 50 years old and wearing a grey coat, suddenly approached the rabbi and pulled the knife from her handbag.

She kicked the rabbi in the leg, knocked his hat from his head, then tore off his kippah and yelled an anti-Semitic insult before fleeing, police in the Austrian capital said today. 

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The attack comes just weeks after a gunman killed four people in Vienna near the city's main synagogue, which was closed at the time.

A knife-wielding woman screaming 'slaughter all Jews' attacked a rabbi and ripped off his kippah in Vienna, Austria, yesterday. Pictured: Stadttempel (City Prayer House), the main synagogue of Vienna, where ISIS-sympathiser Kujtim Fejzulai, 20, began a four-person killing spree on November 2
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A knife-wielding woman screaming 'slaughter all Jews' attacked a rabbi and ripped off his kippah in Vienna, Austria, yesterday. Pictured: Stadttempel (City Prayer House), the main synagogue of Vienna, where ISIS-sympathiser Kujtim Fejzulai, 20, began a four-person killing spree on November 2

ISIS-sympathiser Kujtim Fejzulai, 20, shot and killed muslim Nexhip Vrenezi, 21, Li Qiang, 39, Vanessa Preger-McGillivray, 24, and a 44-year-old Austrian woman in the horrific attack on November 2.

Vienna's main Jewish organisation told Austrian broadcaster ORF the woman screamed 'slaughter all Jews' in the attack yesterday.

Police searched the area but were unable to find the woman.

Austria's top security official, Interior Minister Karl Nehammer, condemned the crime as an 'attack on Jewish life in Vienna' and the case has been taken over by the agency that investigates acts of extremism and terrorism.

The attack comes just weeks after a gunman killed four people in Vienna near the city's main synagogue, which was closed at the time
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The attack comes just weeks after a gunman killed four people in Vienna near the city's main synagogue, which was closed at the time 

Shots fired outside Vienna synagogue as man seen holding weapon
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Nehammer said: 'In addition to the increased protection of synagogues that has already been ordered, all measures are being taken to quickly clear up this apparently anti-Semitic attack. 

'There is no tolerance for anti-Semitism, no matter whether it's politically or religiously motivated.'

Police said the rabbi told first responders he had suffered no physical injuries.

The attack comes as Vienna continues to mourn the loss of four victims to the terror attack that began outside Stadttempel (City Prayer House), the city's main synagogue, earlier this month.

Kujtim Fejzulai, 20, posted the photograph on his Instagram account showing him holding the three weapons he would use in the attack and pledging his allegiance to ISIS leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi
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Kujtim Fejzulai, 20, posted the photograph on his Instagram account showing him holding the three weapons he would use in the attack and pledging his allegiance to ISIS leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi

Gunman Kujtim Fejzulai, 22, was armed with an automatic rifle, pistol and machete during his attack on the Austrian capital. 

He marauded through the streets wearing a fake explosives belt and injured 22 people as he fired at random before being shot dead by police at 8.09pm.

Oskar Deutsch, the head of the Jewish community in Vienna, said the shooting took place in the street where the city's main synagogue is located but it later emerged it had not been targeted.

The synagogue was closed at the time of the shooting, he added. Candles were left outside the place of worship to mourn the victims after the attack.  

All synagogues, Jewish schools, institutions of the Jewish Community of Vienna, and kosher restaurants and supermarkets were closed the following day as a precaution. 

A 28-year-old Swiss national who allegedly sliced a shopper's neck and tried to choke another at the Manor department store (pictured) in Lugano, Switzerland, yesterday before being stopped by shoppers had formed a relationship online with a jihadi in Syria and had tried to travel there
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A 28-year-old Swiss national who allegedly sliced a shopper's neck and tried to choke another at the Manor department store (pictured) in Lugano, Switzerland, yesterday before being stopped by shoppers had formed a relationship online with a jihadi in Syria and had tried to travel there

On Wednesday, a 28-year-old Swiss woman was arrested after injuring two women during an attack in a department store in the southern city of Lugano yesterday.

The knife-wielding suspect allegedly sliced a shopper's neck and tried to choke another with her hands. 

One of the female victims suffered a serious injury, while the other had minor injuries and neither were in a life-threatening condition, police said.

The woman, who had been investigated for 'jihadist terrorism' in 2017, had formed an online relationship with a jihadi in Syria and had attempted to travel there, police announced yesterday.