Man charged with stabbing Frankfurt rabbi-police

BERLIN: A 22-year-old man of Afghan descent has been arrested and charged with attempted murder and assault for the stabbing of a rabbi in Germany's financial district in Frankfurt a week ago, police said on Friday.   

A police statement said the man had admitted the attack.   

The man, born in Frankfurt to Afghan parents, was due to appear before an investigative judge later on Friday. Police said a lead on an Internet chat forum had led to his arrest.   

The 42-year-old rabbi managed to get to a nearby hospital after the attack last Friday. He underwent surgery for a stab wound to the abdomen but his injuries were not critical.   

The rabbi, a member of the local Jewish community, had been approached on a street in Frankfurt's upmarket Westend quarter by a man he believed was speaking Arabic, police said.   

When he asked the man what he wanted, the assailant pulled out a pocket knife, uttered a death threat in German and stabbed him in the abdomen.   

Such knife attacks on streets in Germany are exceptionally rare, although there have been some isolated incidents of Jews being assaulted in Berlin in recent years.