BERLIN — Until this week, Germany had mostly been spared from the large-scale devastating jihadist attacks that have struck fear in neighbouring France and Belgium, but this changed early yesterday as a truck rammed into shoppers at a packed Christmas market, killing 12 people and wounding almost 50, in what German officials said was a suspected terror attack.

Along the way, authorities went on high alert and were able to foil several low-intensity attacks. In some cases, the Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility. But these were merely warning signs and the country was bound to be hit sooner rather than later.

Just last Friday, German prosecutors said they were investigating a case in which a 12-year-old boy allegedly tried to detonate a homemade nail bomb at a Christmas market in the western city of Ludwigshafen.

Last month, a German working in intelligence was exposed as being “a suspect Islamist”, said the domestic security agency, following reports he was planning an attack on its headquarters. In October, police said they foiled a plot by a Syrian refugee to bomb a Berlin airport, having initially wanted to target trains in Germany.

When commandos raided the apartment of Jaber Albakr, they found 1.5kg of TATP, the homemade explosive used by jihadists in deadly attacks in Paris and Brussels. Albakr committed suicide in prison.

More than one million migrants from war-torn countries such as Syria and Iraq have entered Germany, fuelling concern about social integration. This has been exacerbated by how hundreds have been killed in terror attacks in Paris, Brussels and Nice over the last year carried out by immigrants. There are also concerns that the new immigrants may pose a great financial burden on the German economy.

When German authorities have not been able to prevent the attacks, it was fortunate that the damage done was limited.

On July 18, a 17-year-old asylum seeker, wielding an axe and a knife, attacked passengers on a Bavarian train. The assailant, who is believed to be Afghan, injured five people, four of them tourists from Hong Kong. He was shot dead by the police. The IS group released a video purportedly featuring the attacker announcing he would carry out an “operation” in Germany, and presenting himself as a “soldier of the caliphate”.

Later in the month on July 22, David Ali Sonboly, 18, shot dead nine people at a Munich shopping mall before turning the gun on himself, having spent a year planning the rampage.

Police say the German-Iranian was “obsessed” with mass murderers like Norwegian right-wing fanatic Anders Behring Breivik and had no links to the IS group.

Two days later, a failed Syrian asylum seeker blew himself up near an open-air music festival in the southern city of Ansbach, wounding 15 people.

The Bavarian Interior Minister said the man, 27, had “pledged allegiance” to IS, while the jihadist-linked Amaq news agency said he was a “soldier” of the group.

Earlier in the year, on Feb 27, a 16-year-old German-Moroccan girl stabbed a police officer in the neck with a kitchen knife, wounding him badly. The assault was allegedly “ordered” by the IS but the militant group did not claim the attack. AGENCIES