A chilling morning rush-hour stabbing at Switzerland’s Winterthur main railway station left three people injured on Thursday, with regional officials quickly classifying the assault as a confirmed terrorist act. The 31-year-old attacker, identified as Swiss-Turkish national Nesip Dedeler, was taken into custody by police within five minutes of the first emergency call, bringing a swift end to the incident that sparked widespread panic among commuters.
Witnesses recount the attacker shouting the phrase “Allahu akbar” as he launched his stabbing spree in the busy transit hub, located just 25 kilometers northeast of Zurich in Switzerland’s sixth-largest city. Officials confirmed the attacker had a well-documented history of psychological instability, alongside previous connections to extremist ideology. More than a decade ago, Dedeler faced formal charges for violating Swiss laws banning the spread of Islamic State propaganda. Just two days before the attack, he had been admitted to a local psychiatric hospital after showing up at a nearby police station speaking incoherently. However, psychiatric staff cleared him for discharge on Wednesday, assessing he posed no threat to himself or the public – an assessment now confirmed to be fatally incorrect. “Why that decision was made is beyond our knowledge, but the assessment was obviously wrong,” stated Mario Fehr, the security chief for the canton of Zurich, during an immediate press briefing.
Fehr made an explicit public designation of the incident as a terrorist attack, a position echoed by regional police commander Marius Weyermann. Weyermann told reporters that “it was clear from the scene that the motive for this act must be sought in the realm of radicalisation and extremism.”
First responders received the initial emergency call at 8:28 a.m. local time (06:28 GMT), and officers had apprehended Dedeler by 8:33 a.m. All three of the attacker’s victims were men: aged 28, 43, and 52. The oldest victim suffered life-threatening stab wounds to the thigh and required urgent emergency surgery, while the 28-year-old sustained a leg wound and the 43-year-old was stabbed in the neck. Both younger victims have already been released from hospital, Weyermann confirmed.
Mobile phone footage and witness accounts captured the chaotic scene that unfolded as commuters scattered for safety. The attacker, captured in distant footage wearing a black T-shirt and shorts, ran past a group of young schoolchildren on a group trip without stopping, adding to the shock of the incident. 65-year-old taxi driver Turhan Muslu, one of the first witnesses to the attack, told local Swiss daily Blick that he saw Dedeler rush down a station ramp and attempt to stab a commuter, who fought back aggressively until station security officers arrived to subdue the attacker. “It all happened so fast. If those security guards hadn’t arrived so quickly, I don’t know what would have happened,” Muslu said. Another anonymous witness told the outlet that the attacker shouted “Allahu akbar” five or six times in a visibly agitated state, sending children and bystanders fleeing across the main road in panic. “I still have goosebumps,” the witness added.
Random targeted attacks on civilian passersby remain extremely rare in Switzerland, a fact that has amplified public shock across the small Alpine nation. Local residents and workers in Winterthur expressed widespread dismay at the violence that upended a routine Thursday morning. “This is not OK. We want peace,” Basharat Iqbal, a taxi driver who arrived at the station shortly after the attack, told AFP. “I was shocked.”