Thursday, 19th September 2024

Three killed in another beheading incident that outraged France

Thursday, 29th October 2020

A knife-wielding attacker screaming “Allahu Akbar” beheaded a woman and killed two other people in a suspected terrorist act at a church in the French city of Nice on Thursday, while a man swinging a gun was shot dead by policemen in a separate occurrence.

Within hours of this crime, police shot dead a man who had terrorised passersby with a handgun in Montfavet, just near the south French city of Avignon. He was also screaming “Allahu Akbar” (God is Greatest).

Meanwhile, in Saudi Arabia, the state television reported that a Saudi man was arrested in the Red Sea city of Jeddah after attacking and injuring a guard at the Frenc consulate there. Soon after the French Embassy declared that the injured guard was getting treated at the hospital and is out of danger.

The mayor of Nicer- Christian Estrosi compared the incident with the recent beheading of a teacher with similar means. The beheaded teacher was killed for showing cartoons of Prophet Mohammad in a civics class.

This recent attack which occurred on the birthday of Prophet Mohammad came in light of growing Muslim anger towards France's defence of the right to publish the sketches and demonstrators denounced France in several street rallies occurring in Muslim majority nations.

France's security alert has been set to its highest levels by Prime Minister Jean Castex. He also asserted that the government's response to this incident would be firm and implacable.

The city's mayor claimed that the attacker had repeatedly shouted "Allahu Akbar" even while being arrested by the French police.

One of the persons killed inside the church was assumed to be the churchwarden, Estrosi announced, continuing that one woman had run away from inside the church into a bar opposite the 19th-century neo-Gothic building.

“The speculated knife assailant was shot by police while being arrested. He is on his way to the hospital, he is alive,” Estrosi informed reporters.