Three people were killed and four were seriously wounded in an attack on Friday at a festival in the western German city of Solingen, police said, according to The Associated Press.

The attack occurred when a man stabbed people with a knife.

Bild reported that the incident occurred at around 9:45 p.m. local time. Eyewitnesses said the perpetrator was an “Arab-looking man”.

According to the reports, security forces are pursuing the attacker, who has not yet been caught.

The attack occurred during the “Festival of Diversity,” marking the city’s 650th anniversary, which began on Friday and was supposed to run through Sunday, with several stages in central streets offering attractions such as live music, cabaret and acrobatics.

The festival has been temporarily suspended, according to a report in Deutsche Welle.

The incident took place at Fronhof, a marketplace in the center of the city, where a stage had been set up for live music, according to the report.

Local newspaper Solinger Tageblatt reported that authorities had asked residents to leave the city center.

The motive for the stabbing is unclear at this time but police are not ruling out that it was terror-related.

Germany has been on high alert for possible Islamist attacks for several years and especially since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war on October 7.

The country's domestic intelligence chief warned that the risk of such assaults is "real and higher than it has been for a long time".

In late October, police in the western German city of Essen arrested a man who plotted to attack a pro-Israel demonstration.

In December, a 15-year-old boy was arrested in western Germany on suspicion of planning a possible attack on a Christmas market.

Weeks later German police arrested three people over an alleged attack plot targeting the cathedral in Cologne on New Year's Eve.

In late May, German authorities arrested two men suspected of plotting a knife attack on worshippers at a synagogue in the southwestern city of Heidelberg.

In June, an Iraqi man who is accused of standing by to carry out attacks for the Islamic State (ISIS) group after he arrived in Germany in 2022 was arrested in Esslingen, near Stuttgart.

(Israel National News' North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)