Kim Willsher - France in shock again after Isis murder of priest in Normandy // Jon Henley - The terror just seems to keep coming – how can we make sense of it?
NB: Terror attacks are acquiring increasing frequency. It is time for those of us who still idealise violence as a means or 'resistance', who see armed and self-proclaimed fighters for this or that 'sacred' cause as avatars of Bhagat Singh or Che Guevara to think again. Look at these crazed and suicidal young persons, a 26 year-old Japanese man murders 19 disabled people in a care centre, a teenager slits the throat of an 85 year old French priest in church. Is it realistic to keep pointing fingers at the state while ignoring the role of civil society, and the numerous arguments we hear every day on behalf of vigilantism and militarism? And the impact of the continuing fascination with violent revolution that remains entrenched in 'radical' discourse of all hues from 'left' to 'right'? How do we understand this growing spiral of violence? How do we respond to it? The answers are difficult, but we can no longer avoid engagement with the normalisation of violence within state institutions and the heart of civil society - DS
Tobias Stone - History tells us what will happen next with Brexit & Trump
France was plunged into profound horror and shock for the second time in 12 days when two men slit the throat of a priest as he was celebrating mass in a Normandy church on Tuesday morning.
Tobias Stone - History tells us what will happen next with Brexit & Trump
France was plunged into profound horror and shock for the second time in 12 days when two men slit the throat of a priest as he was celebrating mass in a Normandy church on Tuesday morning.
A nun who witnessed
the murder described how the men forced Father Jacques Hamel to his knees
before killing him and filmed themselves preaching in Arabic by the altar. They
also tried to cut the throat of a parishioner, leaving him for dead.
The gruesome attack took place less than two weeks after a Tunisian man drove at high speed into a Bastille day crowd in the Riviera city of Nice, killing 84 people and injuring hundreds more.
Tuesday’s attack was
described by the French president, François Hollande, as an act of terrorism
carried out by two followers of Islamic State. The two men
were shot dead by police as they came out of the church. Sister Danielle was in
the church at Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray, near Rouen, at 9.43am local time during
morning mass, when the men entered and took five hostages: the priest, two nuns
and two parishioners.
She fled as they
killed Hamel, 85. “Everyone was shouting ‘stop, stop you don’t know what you’re
doing’. They forced him to his knees; he wanted to defend himself and that’s
when the drama began,” she said. Sister Danielle said
she had run out of the church while the men cut the priest’s throat.
Investigators said the assailants also tried to slit the throat of the other
victim, who was described as being seriously injured and between life and death. She told BFMTV, a TV
news channel, that the two men filmed their attack. “They didn’t see me leave.
They were busy occupied with their knives … and they were filming it. They
filmed themselves preaching in Arabic in front of the altar. It was a horror. Jacques
was an extraordinary priest. He was a great man, Father Jacques.”
French police and
rapid intervention forces were quickly at the scene. One person has been
detained in the investigation into the attack, the Paris prosecutor’s office
said. On Tuesday evening,
Paris prosecutor, François Molins, said one of the attackers had been
identified as Adel Kermiche, 19, who had tried several times to travel to Syria
using the passports of family members. Relatives had reported his disappearance
to the authorities.
Kermiche disappeared
the first time in March 2015, but was picked up by the German authorities and
accused of trying to get to Syria using his brother’s passport. He was returned
to France, but was given conditional parole awaiting trial. He disappeared two
months later trying to enter Syria from Turkey using his cousin’s identity
papers. Sent back again to France he was put under official investigation in
May 2015, but released on 18 March 2016 on certain conditions including being
fitted with an electronic tag allowing authorities to monitor his movements, to
live at his parents’ home and to only go out between 8.30am and 12.30pm.
Molins said the two
men had cried Allahu Akhbar (God is Great) as they left the church with three
of the hostages. One man had a fake suicide belt made of aluminium and three
knives, the other was carrying a backpack made to look like a bomb and a kitchen
timer. Molins said police had
tried to negotiate with the two men through a “small window opening on to the
sacristie”. The prosecutor adde that police had tried to enter the church and
end the siege, but the two men had placed three of their hostages as a human
shield.
Hollande, speaking
after he arrived in Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray, described the incident as “a vile
terrorist attack” by two supporters of Isis. The group, which claimed
responsibility via its affiliated Amaq news agency, “has declared war on us,”
Hollande said, adding that it was a war France would have to fight by remaining
united. On Tuesday afternoon,
police carried out raids on a house near the church where one of the attackers
was reported to live with his parents.
Pierre Henry Brandet,
an interior ministry spokesman, said the church was rapidly surrounded by
France’s anti-gang police (Brigade de Recherche et d’Intervention, or
BRI) who shot the attackers as they came out. Hollande met members
of the brigade, who wore black balaclavas to mask their identities, and praised
them for the speed of their intervention, which he said “prevented a much
higher toll and saved the lives of hostages … I have met with the family of the
priest and I have spoken to the people kept hostage who expressed their pain
and sadness as well as a wish to comprehend what has happened.”
The prime minister, Manuel Valls, said the “barbaric” attack was a blow to the Catholic community and the whole of France. The murdered priest had worked in the parish for more than 10 years. He should have retired at 75 but wanted to continue serving the church and community, local residents said. Federico Lombardi, spokesman for the Vatican, said Pope Francis “shares the pain and horror of this absurd violence” adding that the attack created “immense pain and worry”.
The prime minister, Manuel Valls, said the “barbaric” attack was a blow to the Catholic community and the whole of France. The murdered priest had worked in the parish for more than 10 years. He should have retired at 75 but wanted to continue serving the church and community, local residents said. Federico Lombardi, spokesman for the Vatican, said Pope Francis “shares the pain and horror of this absurd violence” adding that the attack created “immense pain and worry”.
Francis issued “the
most severe condemnation of all forms of hatred” and said he was appalled
“because this horrific violence took place in a church, a sacred place” and
involved the “barbaric” killing of a priest. A woman who worshipped
at the church described Hamel as “a man who fulfilled his role to the end. He
was elderly but was always available for whoever. He was a good priest … He has
been here for a long time and many parishioners knew him well. He lived in the
rectory at Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray.” Father Philippe
Maheut, vicar general of the Rouen diocese, said everyone was shocked that the
priest had been killed while celebrating mass. “We ask ourselves how we have
arrived at this point,” he told BFMTV.
“My message would be
that we have to continue to meet, to know each other, understand each other, support
each other. Perhaps the death of this poor man will produce an electroshock,
will be such a strong symbol that people will say we have to do something, but
we have said that before.
Hervé Morin, president
of the region, said: “This man was a good man, he always had a kind word for
everyone. He served at this church for 30 years. Everyone is shocked. This was
not just the killing of a man, it was the cutting of the throat of a priest …
an act sufficiently thought out to further destabilise French society … and
that’s the risk. French society is in danger.” France remains on high
alert nearly two weeks after a man ploughed a
truck into a crowd of people celebrating Bastille Day in Nice.
The incident was the
third major attack on France in 18 months and was claimed by Isis. Two attacks
in Germany claimed by Isis since then have heightened the tension in Europe. Hollande told
reporters near the scene of Tuesday’s killings: “The people of France should
know that they are under threat but they are not the only country, there is
Germany and others, and that their strength lies in their solidarity.” Analysts said while
the threat was everywhere, the attack marked a new stage in Isis action,
demonstrating that even in a small town of 27,000 inhabitants, “even in church”
the French were not safe.
After the attack in
Nice, France extended a state of emergency for a further six months. The
measure gives police extra powers to carry out searches and place suspects
under house arrest. It was the fourth time the security measures have been
extended since Isis followers staged a mass attack in Paris in November, killing
130 people in the Bataclan concert hall, the national stadium and city
centre bars and restaurants.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jul/26/france-shock-second-isis-attack-12-days
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