The terrorist attack on the Christmas market in Germany, a few days before the festive season, brought back the specter of terrorism over the Old Continent.
shook Europe, which saw the awakening of memories from an era it thought it had left behind.
At a time when the extreme right is on the rise in a number of EU countries, the returning climate of fear can have catalytic effects in shaping political developments.
Several far-right parties have already tried to take advantage of the situation, investing politically in the feeling of insecurity of the citizens, at a time when its largest economy is in pre-election period. On the same wavelength and the Dutch far-right leader, Geert Wilders, who described the attack on the Magdeburg Christmas market as “barbaric”, while arguing that Europe’s borders should be closed immediately.
At the same time, it creates conditions for new terrorist attacks, with Israeli embassies and synagogues in all major European metropolises under draconian security measures.
But this is not the first time that Europe has experienced the danger of terrorism. On the contrary, there were not a few moments in the past when there were deadly attacks, which spread chaos and terror in the European metropolises.
The biggest terrorist attacks in Europe
The nightmare of the Bataclan
It was 2015, specifically November 13, when the planet was shocked to see the city of light, Paris, experience the worst terrorist attack that has taken place on European soil in the 21st century.
In reality, it was a barrage of attacks with three separate explosions and six mass shootings. , where gunmen held rock concertgoers hostage and battled police until 1 a.m. on November 14. The total death toll from the attacks was 130, including about 90 at the Bataclan theater.
It formally claimed responsibility for the attacks on the morning of 14 November, praising their “eight brothers” for the deaths of “at least 200 crusaders” and claiming that “this was only the beginning of the storm”.
Indeed, the phenomenon of Islamic terrorism in Europe experienced an upsurge in the years 2015-2017, with those killed in those years surpassing the total killed up to that point in total.
Pan Am Flight 103
But the worst terrorist attack in Europe, in terms of casualties, remains that of Pan Am Flight 103, which has become known as the Lockerbie bombing.
Specifically, Pan Am Flight 103 was a regularly scheduled transatlantic flight from Frankfurt to Detroit, with stopovers in London and New York. The transatlantic leg of the route was operated by Clipper Maid of the Seas, a Boeing 747-121 registered as N739PA. Shortly after 19:00 on 21 December 1988, while flying over the Scottish town of Lockerbie, it was destroyed by an in-flight bomb, killing all 243 passengers and 16 crew members.
Large parts of the plane actually crashed into a residential street in Lockerbie, killing 11 residents.
Of particular interest is the fact that no terrorist organization claimed responsibility for the attack, while the only person convicted in the case was Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, a Libyan intelligence officer.
Several years later, in 2003, Gaddafi accepted Libyan responsibility for the Lockerbie bombing and paid compensation to the victims’ families, although he maintained that he had never ordered the attack himself.
The bombings in Madrid
The bombings that took place in Madrid on March 11, 2004, were nearly simultaneous, coordinated attacks on the city’s commuter rail system. These explosions killed 191 people and injured another 1,800.
The investigation that followed the strike revealed that 13 improvised explosive devices had been planted on the trains, with pyrotechnicians deactivating two more with controlled explosions, while the third was later found in the luggage of one of the trains.
The attacks actually took place just three days before national elections in the country, with the then centre-right Prime Minister José María Athnar blaming the Basque separatist terrorist group ETA for the attacks. ETA, however, never took responsibility. Instead, the investigations moved in the direction of Islamic terrorism and on March 14, 2004, al-Qaeda member Abu Dujana al-Afghani claimed responsibility for the attacks in a video message.
According to his words, the attacks were retaliation for the participation of Spanish troops in the Iraq war. Although no evidence was ever found of al-Qaeda’s involvement in the attacks, the terrorist organization itself, in August 2007, said it was “proud” of the attack.
The terrorist attack in Nice
It was July 14, 2016, the day the French celebrate their biggest national holiday, the fall of the Bastille, and at 10:40 p.m., when a truck full of weapons and grenades plowed into the crowd of people gathered on the boulevard Promenade des Angles to watch the fireworks.
The tragic toll was 84 dead and 65 injured. The driver of the truck, Mohamed Lahouaez Bouhlel, aged 31, a Frenchman of Tunisian origin, drove spreading death for two whole kilometers, constantly deliberately deviating from his course, i.e. zigzagging, aiming for the maximum possible number of victims.
Shortly after, the terrorist was killed in the exchange of fire with the police. British, Spanish, Swiss and American citizens were identified among the dead. The responsibility for the terrorist attack was claimed by the Islamic State.
The Bologna Massacre
Before the Islamic terrorism, however, Europe was faced with another kind of terrorism, that with a political sign. The costliest hit in human lives occurred on August 2, 1980, in Bologna, Italy.
Specifically, 85 people died and more than 200 were injured when a time bomb exploded at the city’s train station.
The explosion collapsed the roof of the waiting room, which was full of people, and also hit the train that at that time was waiting at the platform before starting its journey.
Although no organization has ever officially claimed responsibility, several members of the neo-fascist organization Nuclei Armati Rivoluzionari (Revolutionary Armed Nuclei) have been convicted of the attack.
