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PARIS: A French teacher who had recently shown students cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad was beheaded outside his school on Friday (October 16), in what President Emmanuel Macron called an “Islamist terrorist attack.”
Macron visited the school where the teacher worked in the town of Conflans-Saint-Honorine and met with staff after the murder.
“One of our compatriots was killed today because he taught … the freedom to believe or not to believe,” Macron said.
He said the attack should not divide France because that is what the extremists want. “We must all be together as citizens,” he said.
Four people, including a minor, have been detained, a judicial source told AFP early Saturday morning.
The detainees were relatives of the attacker, who was shot by the police while trying to arrest him and later died from his injuries.
The attacker shouted “Allahu Akbar” (“God is greater”) when the police confronted him, a cry often heard in jihadist attacks, a police source said.
France has witnessed a wave of Islamist violence since the 2015 terrorist attacks against the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and a Jewish supermarket in the capital.
French counterterrorism prosecutors said they were treating the assault as “a murder linked to a terrorist organization.”
The attack occurred on the outskirts of Paris around 5 p.m. (11 p.m. Singapore time) near the secondary school where the teacher worked in Conflans Saint-Honorine, a northwestern suburb about 30 km from the center of the French capital. .
Police officers block access after a history teacher who opened a discussion with students about cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad of Islam was beheaded on a French street on Friday and the alleged killer was shot dead by police on Friday, October 16, 2020. in Conflans-Saint-Honorine, north of Paris. (Photo: AP / Michel Euler)
French police officers stand outside a high school after a history teacher who opened a discussion with students about cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad of Islam was beheaded on Friday, Oct. 16, 2020, in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, north from Paris. (Photo: AP / Michel Euler)
“SUPER NICE, SUPER FRIENDLY”
The victim was a history teacher who recently showed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad as part of a class discussion on freedom of expression, police said.
A parent of a student at the school said the teacher may have caused “controversy” by asking Muslim students to leave the room before showing the cartoons.
“According to my son, he was super nice, super nice, super nice,” the mother, Nordine Chaouadi, told AFPTV.
The teacher “simply told the Muslim children, ‘Go away, I don’t want it to hurt your feelings.’ That is what my son told me,” he said.
Police said they were investigating a tweet posted from an account that recently featured a head photo of the teacher and has since been closed.
It was unclear if the attacker had posted the message, which contained a threat against Macron, described as “the leader of the infidels,” they said.
French police officers gather outside a high school after a history teacher who opened a discussion with students about cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad of Islam was beheaded on Friday, October 16, 2020, in Conflans-Saint-Honorine, north from Paris. Police shot and killed the alleged killer. (Photo: AP / Michel Euler)
“NOTHING HAPPENS HERE”
Residents in the generally quiet neighborhood said they were surprised when the school’s students, some accompanied by their parents, gathered on the street checking their phones for updates.
“Nothing ever happens here,” said Mohand Amara, who lives nearby, as she walked her dog not far from the school.
“It saddens me, beheaded, that’s shocking,” said Virginie, 15, who used to be the student of the slain teacher and said she had “good memories” of him.
Police arrived at the scene after receiving a call about a suspicious individual loitering near the school, a police source said.
They discovered the dead man and soon saw the suspect, armed with a sword, who threatened them while they tried to arrest him.
They opened fire and seriously wounded him. The man later died from his injuries, a judicial source said.
French police officers gather after a history teacher who opened a discussion with students about cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad of Islam was beheaded on a French street on Friday and the suspected killer was shot dead by police on Friday, October 16, 2020 at Conflans-Saint-Honorine. north of Paris. (Photo: AP / Michel Euler)
“ABOMINABLE”
The scene was cordoned off and a bomb disposal unit dispatched due to the alleged presence of an explosive vest, a police source said.
The French parliament suspended the debate on Friday after the news of the beheading, and the chair of the session, Hugues Renson, visibly shaken, called the attack “abominable”.
Parliamentarians rose to their feet as Renson said that “on behalf of all of us, I want to honor the memory of the victim.”
Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer tweeted: “The Republic is under attack.”
The murder comes as security forces have been on high alert during the ongoing trial of alleged accomplices of attackers in the January 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris, which also saw a policewoman shot dead in the street. .
It also comes just days after a supporter of the Islamic State militant group who attacked a police officer with a hammer in front of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris was sentenced to 28 years in prison.
And last month, charges were brought against a 25-year-old Pakistani man after he wounded two people with a butcher knife to avenge Charlie Hebdo’s publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad, which allegedly led to the 2015 killings.
Seventeen people were killed in the three-day spree that heralded a wave of Islamist violence in France that has so far claimed more than 250 lives.
