The 31-year-old suspect in the Nice attack also had a record of violence and weapons offenses, and the truck he used in the attack was rented only several days ago.
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After a husband and wife killed 14 people in San Bernardino in December, the Amaq News Agency described them as “two supporters”, making it clear that the Islamic State had not directed their actions.
That brings the total number of people arrested in connection with the driver to seven.
Health Minister Marisol Touraine said Sunday that one hospitalized person remains unidentified. An additional 50 children were injured – some are listed in critical condition, according to hospital officials.
The image of a religious extremist is at odds with the portrait that neighbors and family members initially painted of a man who ignored even the most basic rules of Islam, eating pork, drinking alcohol and shunning the mosque.
This took place only eight months after the devastating November 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris which killed 130 people.
He prayed that God “disperse every plan for terror and for death, so that no man dare spill more blood of his brother”.
Francis then offered “a paternal and fraternal embrace for all of Nice’s inhabitants and all of France”, and invited those in the square to join him in silent prayer for the 84 Nice victims and their families.
The IS claim of responsibility came after the French authorities said Bouhlel had no known links with terrorists, unlike those behind previous attacks in Paris. “I don’t want this to change how we feel about France”, she said as she wiped away a tear from under her sunglasses.
Ahead of the claim by Islamic State, the militant Islamist group which grabbed control of swathes of Iraq and Syria but which is now under military pressure from forces opposed to it, French officials had not disclosed any direct evidence linking Bouhlel with jihadism. Valls said only that authorities “now know that the killer radicalized very quickly”.
In a pessimistic interview with the Journal du Dimanche, Manual Valls, the French Prime Minister, has warned that terrorism will be a part of the country’s daily life for a long time.
Detectives investigating the Bastille Day lorry attack have arrested two further people, as tourists return to the French promenade where scores of people were mown down.
The message prepared by the local prefecture was ready to go at about 23:15, but a technical glitch prevented the app designed by French company Deveryware to send out the warning, Les Echos newspaper said, citing government sources.
The Islamic State group claimed responsibility on Saturday for an attack in which a Tunisian drove a truck through a crowd in Nice, killing 84, prompting hard questions in France over security failures.
French news reports said the Paris prosecutor’s office, which handles major terrorism cases, had been put in charge of the investigation.
The five people previously detained are understood to remain in custody.
“I saw his face”, Lambert told The Associated Press. Approximately 2300: The driver is shot dead by police 300 metres (yards) after he fired three shots from a 765 mm pistol. He was killed by police after ramming his truck through crowds on Nice’s famed seafront after a holiday fireworks display Thursday night.
People take a moment of silence to pay tribute to the victims of the Bastille Day truck attack in Nice, at Spanish parliament in Madrid, Spain, July 15, 2016. Some spots are still identifiable by bloodstains.
Joggers, bikers and sunbathers on Sunday cruised along the pedestrian walkway along the glistening Mediterranean Sea, where well-wishers placed flowers, French flags, stuffed animals and candles.
The site is also becoming a platform for anger at the attacker.
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Despite a claim by Isil that it ordered the attack, describing Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel as a “soldier of Islam”, a source close to the investigation told the Telegraph that he may have been “a suicide case who decided to make his suicide look like an Islamist attack”.
