Germany's main Jewish community group has accused police of "negligence" after a gunman killed two people while attacking an East German synagogue.
The head of the Central Council of Jews said it was "scandalous" that police were not protecting the synagogue in Halle on the Jewish Yom Kippur holiday. The German police union (GdP) said police were too thinly spread for 24-hour protection of places of worship. The suspected gunman, named only as Stephan B, was arrested.
About 2,200 people watched a live stream he allegedly posted on the internet gaming platform Twitch. "If police had been stationed outside the synagogue, then this man could have been disarmed before he could attack the others," said the council's president Josef Schuster on Deutschlandfunk public radio.
In a tweet, Schuster added that it was "a miracle that there were no further casualties" during the incident at the city's synagogue. About 60 worshippers were at a Yom Kippur service at the time. German authorities say the suspect is a German national. The video - which has been removed from Twitch - showed him making anti-Semitic and misogynistic comments to camera before driving to the synagogue and shooting at its door.
-BBC