He is said to have pulled a gun from the cab of his lorry in the premeditated attack before being shot dead by police, with people fleeing into the sea in a bid to escape.
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An Islamic State-run media outlet says the man who barreled his truck into a crowd in the French coastal city of Nice is a “soldier” of the group.
French Justice Minister Jean-Jacques Urvoas said Bouhlel has a criminal record that includes a conviction related to throwing a wood pallet at a motorist.
Bouhlel was divorced and had three children.
The Irish embassy is in ongoing contact with the French authorities.
ISIS claimed on Saturday responsibility for the attack.
A security source told AFP that they were also planning an attack on Nice’s carnival, the third biggest in the world after Venice and Rio.
French President Francois Hollande, Government Spokesman Stephane Le Foll, Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve and Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian leave the Elysee Palace in Paris, following a cabinet meeting two day after the Bastille Day truck attack in Nice.
“We can not give in to fear or turn on each other or sacrifice our way of life”, Obama told a gathering of diplomats at the White House attended by French Ambassador Gerard Araud. We will not relent. Following the attack, Hollande passed a law giving more power to investigators and created a homeland security force of 10,000 personnel.
He reiterated that France is also bolstering its presence in Iraq and Syria, where he said earlier that military advisers would be on the ground to help Iraqis take back the Islamic State stronghold of Mosul. “We’re going to keep standing with our partners from Africa to Afghanistan, and we are going to destroy this vile terrorist organization”.
Thousands of men, women and children had gathered at the French Riviera to watch the Bastille Day fireworks, a national holiday to celebrate the memory of the French revolution and the birth of democracy.
Tora Hakausson, from Norway owns a flat in Nice, and was dining in a beach restaurant when the attack took place.
The veracity of the group’s claim couldn’t immediately be determined, but what is known so far about Bouhlel thus far suggests a troubled, angry man with little interest in the group’s ultra-puritanical brand of Islam.
Fellow Tunisians in Nice said they hoped the attack wouldn’t reflect badly on them. Shaqki Allam, the grand mufti of Egypt, the country’s highest Muslim religious authority, called the attack “despicable” and said Islamic teachings “never called for bloodshed or the killing of innocents regardless of their beliefs and faith”.
He said: “We went to Nice and to the promenade for every Bastille Day when we were living in the South of France”. A French parliamentary investigation into the 2015 Paris attack unfortunately found considerable weaknesses in France’s security agencies.
U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said the attack made her “sick at heart”. Two U.S. citizens were confirmed killed in the attack. The truck’s windshield was riddled with bullets.
The lobby of a nearby luxury hotel was transformed into an emergency treatment center for the shocked and injured, and all hospitals in the Nice area were put on alert to receive the injured.
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“All of France is under the threat of Islamic terrorists”, Mr Hollande said.
