ISIS on the Assembly Line: Volkswagen Ordered to Rehire Suspected Militant Who Threatened Co-workers

By Ronnie Schreiber on March 16, 2018  

In 2016, Volkswagen’s Wolfsburg factory fired an employee named Samir B. He had been working for the automaker for 8 years, mounting tires, but after the company said he began threatening co-workers and telling them of his pledge to join Islamist ISIS fighters in Syria, they had to let him go.

VW felt the threats were serious and worried he might stage a terror attack during a stockholders’ meeting at the company’s Wolfsburg headquarters. Now, a German court has ordered Volkswagen to reinstate him.

On the face of things, it seems VW had ample reason to be concerned about Samir B. In 2014, two of his known associates travelled to Syria to join ISIS, where they were later killed fighting to establish an Islamic caliphate, the Daily Mail reports. In December of that same year, Samir B. was stopped before boarding a flight for Istanbul, Turkey at the Hanover airport. He was carrying 9,350 Euros (roughly $11,500 USD) in cash and a drone. German authorities wouldn’t let him board the plane and confiscated his passport.

After threatening his co-workers at VW, saying they would “all die,” the company fired him. He sued for unlawful dismissal at the Hanover State Employment Court. In the company’s defense, VW’s attorneys told the court that it was proven that Samir B. “was involved in the recruitment and support of Islamic fighters from Wolfsburg,” giving the company no choice but to terminate him.

To avoid a judgment forcing them to put their employees at risk, VW offered a 65,000 Euro cash settlement, but Samir B.’s lawyers declined, according to Bild. While the court accepted Volkswagen’s contention that Samir B. had tried to join ISIS and threatened his co-workers, the judge ruled that VW had not proven that the “operational peace” of the factory had been “specifically disturbed.”

Volkswagen has a month to rehire him, but it’s likely the automaker will instead appeal the case to a higher court.