The New York Times reports:

Hanau, a small city in western Germany, considered itself a melting pot, an island of tolerance. That was before a racist extremist opened fire at a hookah bar Wednesday night, killing nine mostly young people in Germany’s worst attack in recent memory.

A working-class community just outside Frankfurt, Hanau was ethnically diverse long before the issue of immigration began tearing apart German politics with the arrival of nearly a million asylum seekers five years ago.

“We have lived very peacefully together,” said Metin Kan, a 43-year-old of Turkish descent, who said he was a friend of one of the victims, the owner of the Midnight bar.

The attack Wednesday did more than shock Germany. It drove home the realization that no one, and no part of the country, is now immune to the potential for violence that has been unleashed with rise of a far right angered by Germany’s changing society. [Continue reading…]