Bulgarian police discover secret Hamas arsenal

Photo: Weapons discovered by Bulgarian police

Bulgarian police have discovered a weapons cache linked to four Hamas suspects arrested in Germany and the Netherlands last December, German media and AFP sources reported.

Three alleged members of the group were arrested in Germany on December 14 on suspicion of plotting terrorist attacks against Jewish organizations in Europe. A fourth suspect was arrested in the Netherlands.

German prosecutors said the four suspects were collecting weapons to “keep them on alert for possible terrorist attacks on Jewish institutions in Europe.”

On Wednesday, Der Spiegel magazine reported that police found photographs of firearms and ammunition on the mobile phone of one of the suspects. According to the publication, the photographs led investigators to a cache of weapons buried under a pine tree in southern Bulgaria. German sources confirmed to AFP that the weapons cache was found in Bulgaria. The Bulgarian prosecutor's office and the Bulgarian Ministry of Internal Affairs refused to confirm this report.

In December, German prosecutors said that four suspects – one Egyptian, two Lebanese and one Dutch citizen – were “long-time members of Hamas.”

One of the suspects, identified as Abdelhamid Al A., was tasked by the organization's leaders to find “an arms cache in Europe that it had secretly set up there in the past,” it said. prosecutor's office.

"The weapons were to be delivered to Berlin and kept in a state of readiness in connection with possible terrorist attacks on Jewish institutions in Europe", – prosecutors explained, adding that members of the group “went from Berlin several times to search for weapons.”

Prepared by: Sergei Daga