Was the Krakow attacker a radical leftist, as David Ondrej claimed?

The attack took place in central Krakow on Saturday, November 7, 2026, when 24-year-old Michał O. opened fire with an automatic weapon after driving onto the Main Market Square. Polish officials said at least six people were killed and 16 injured, among them two police officers and the attacker, who was shot by police. The attacker was later identified as coming from Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski, and officials said a criminal investigation was continuing into his motives, possible inspiration, and whether he had acted with anyone else.

At a Saturday evening press conference, Interior Minister Marcin Kierwiński said the attacker had acted alone and had very radical views. He said, "Everything indicates he was fascinated by extreme right-wing ideologies" and described a preliminary analysis as pointing to ultra-nationalist views. Crucially, he qualified that assessment, saying it would be verified in the investigation and that he did not want to say too much before facts were established. That qualification is central to assessing whether calling him a liar is justified.

Reporting since that press conference has both repeated Kierwiński's remarks and questioned their basis. WPolityce.pl noted that he did not explain what indicated the alleged ultra-nationalist views. Dorzeczy.pl reported on November 8 that lawmaker Dariusz Matecki had filed a formal interpellation demanding Kierwiński's resignation and asking for his source and evidence. That report also cited Super Express, which said service-related sources found the attacker belonged to no extreme right-wing organisation, had no connection with right-wing parties, and that there was no trace confirming the minister's claim. The far-right attribution itself therefore remains disputed and unsettled.

Ondrej posted his reply to Kierwiński on November 8, asserting that the attacker was a radical leftist. None of the reporting reviewed describes the attacker as a leftist, links him to a left-wing organisation, or presents evidence of left-wing ideology. The available evidence instead consists of a preliminary official assessment in the opposite political direction, followed by a challenge to the evidence behind that assessment. There is no evidence in the reviewed reporting for a radical-leftist affiliation.

Because the investigation was still under way, Kierwiński had called his view preliminary, and later reporting questioned the evidence behind it. The evidence is therefore too conflicting to settle the attacker's ideology conclusively. It is enough to say the leftist claim is unsupported, but not enough to establish what his ideology actually was. The central claim is therefore unverified rather than supported or conclusively disproved, and the added accusation that Kierwiński was lying is also not established by the evidence.