The teacher Samuel Paty (47) received threats before being beheaded

The teacher Samuel Paty (47), who had his throat slit in a suburb northwest of Paris, taught on freedom of expression and showed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad.

The 47-year-old was a high school history teacher and discussed the cartoons of Muhammad in teaching, for which he received threats.

On Saturday morning, the hashtag #JeSuisSamuel (I’m Samuel) was trending on social media.

I was threatened

French senator Bruno Retailleau told Europe 1 that the professor had received threats for several days and that he had no police protection.

According to French media, the school also received threats prior to the incident.

According to Le Figaro, the teacher had been reported to the police and the principal had been asked to fire him.

Nine people, including minors, have been questioned after the murder, which is being investigated as a terrorist attack. The 17-year-old brother, parents and grandfather of the attacker have been arrested and are now being questioned, the French prosecutor for anti-terrorist states.

Two of those arrested are said to be the parents of one of the students where the teacher taught, Reuters reports. According to Le Parisien, dissatisfaction has been expressed with the professor by showing a cartoon of Muhammad.

– Islamo-fascism

The perpetrator is an 18-year-old Chechen born in Moscow. According to Europe 1, he received a residence permit in March 2020, when he came of age.

Eva Joly, a former presidential candidate in France and a hunter of corruption, describes the gruesome beheading of the teacher as dramatic and outrageous.

– It is a new step for a history teacher to be killed on sight. The fight against Islamofascism continues, Eva Joly tells TV 2.

The term “Islamofascism” draws a parallel between certain variants of Islam and the European fascist movements of the last century.

– You attack a history teacher because he teaches what it means to have freedom of expression, says Joly.

– Cowardly attack

Residents of the Conflans-Sainte-Honorine suburb, where the crime occurred, are shocked.

– A friend of mine passed by the place and warned that we had to be careful, says a father who lives about a hundred meters from the school in Europe 1.

– One of our compatriots was killed because he taught, because he taught his students about freedom of expression, the freedom to believe or not believe. Our compatriot was cowardly attacked and was the victim of an Islamist terrorist attack, French President Emmanuel Macron said Friday night.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg condemns the attack and writes on Twitter that NATO supports France in the fight against terrorism.

– People are completely shocked.

The news of the murder comes at the same time that a trial takes place in the wake of the terrorist attack on the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris in 2015, in which twelve people died.

The reason Charlie Hebdo became the target of the attack was that the satire magazine had published cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad several times.

– People are completely shocked. This may affect them even more because it was a schoolmaster who was beheaded in this cruel way. Not long ago we had an attack in what was thought to be the Charlie Hebdo offices, where two were seriously injured for the same reason. Now the level of terrorism is extremely high in France, journalist Vibeke Knoop Rachline tells TV 2.

Foreign Minister Ine Eriksen Søreide (H) and Prime Minister Erna Solberg (H) also reacted strongly to the assassination.

– Serious and cruel news about the terrorist act in France. We must unite against attacks on freedom of thought and enlightenment. My thoughts go out to the victim’s loved ones, colleagues and students, they write on Twitter.

(TV 2 / NTB)