The German work 'Stern' can be and is applied to almost anything that has a shape resembling a starfish or asterisk (both called, not coincidentally, Stern) -- i.e. having several arms extending from a common centre. This usage is very common among German mechanical engineers.

IMO that this is a mounting bracket that holds the fan motor and fan (assuming an electrically powered fan, which is common on a lot of small cars now, particularly front-end drive models) with several arms extending from a central housing or mounting plate.

The traditional English term for this is 'spider', but it is doubtless being displaced by 'star' as a result of translations from German.

refs:

Der Lüfter wird mittels Bajonettverschluss in die runde Aussparung eingedreht und über den Lüfterstern mit zwei selbst schneidenden Schrauben fixiert. Somit trägt er zur Versteifung der gesamten Vorderwand bei.
http://tinyurl.com/6a5col

fan spider = Gebläsestern
www.ds-translations.at/glosen/f.htm

http://tinyurl.com/6rqbmz
(German patent document; retrieve the PDF version and see the descrioption on PDF p. 12 with reference to the Lüfterstern (28) and the Sternformige Armen 32, along with the drawing on p.18)

A sheet metal fan construction for a radiator cooling system, the fan construction being of the type including a fan spider defined by a central disc having integral,radially outward extending arms, the disc adapted to rotate about an axis passing centrally and orthogonally therethrough...
www.patentgenius.com/patent/4172693.html