A teenager wielding a machete attacked a Jewish teacher on Monday in the southern French city of Marseille, injuring him slightly in one hand and the back, police said.
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The 15-year-old ethnic Kurd assailant rushed the victim from behind and stabbed him in the shoulder, then chased after him for a few metres (yards) until he fell, Robin said.
Brice Robin, the Marseille prosecutor, says the boy told officers he planned to stab police next. For the prosecutor, “this is clearly an anti-Semitic assault” with a “form of premeditation”.
Cazeneuve decried the attack on social media, expressing his “support for the victim of this revolting anti-Semitic aggression in Marseille”.
The prosecutor said the teenager’s family was unaware of his radicalization and that he was a “good student”.
While the Paris prosecutor did not take up the investigation, the prosecutor of Marseilles has asked for “his indictment for attempted murder by religious affiliation and for the advocacy of terrorism”.
The teacher, who was wearing a skull cap, was on his way to work at the Franco-Hebraic Institute when he was attacked.
France has the highest Jewish and the Muslim populations in Europe.
The three men who attacked the teacher uttered anti-Semitic remarks during the incident, AFP reported.
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The incidents point to heightened religious tensions in France less than two months after attacks by Islamic extremists in Paris left 130 people dead and hundreds injured.
