French President Francois Hollande is suggesting that the Islamic State group is behind an attack on a church that left an 84-year-old priest dead.
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Police conduct a search in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray following an attack on a church that left a priest dead.
One of the two attackers who killed a priest in a church in France has been identified as Adel Kermich. Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet said the wounded person is “between life and death”.
The horrific assault stunned a nation already shaken to its core after a massacre in the French Riviera city of Nice less than two weeks ago that was claimed by ISIS. “You have seen us [in Syria] chopping off the heads of those carrying the cross [and now] we will fight you altogether”, a masked fighter with a North American accent stated in gruesome video featuring waves of blood flowing northwards into the Mediterranean.
Enda Kenny says the killing of a priest by knife-wielding attackers in France’s Normandy region is especially bad because “terror and murder have been visited upon innocent people at a time when they have been so physically vulnerable and so spiritually hopeful”.
Together with two nuns and two parishioners, Fr. Hamel had been being taken hostage by two men who reportedly shouted “Daesh” (a synonym for the Islamist terror group ISIS) when storming into the church.
The news of the violence came as a shock to the church leaders and thousands of young people from around the globe gathered in Krakow, in southern Poland, ahead of the arrival of Pope Francis for World Youth Day, a major gathering of Catholics that runs through Sunday.
Islamic State has called for its supporters to take action with any available weapons targeting countries that it has been fighting.
One of the terrorists, a 19-year-old Frenchman who lived close to the church, is said to have tried to leave for Syria twice to try and join Islamic State, but he was arrested.
It was the first known attack inside a French church in recent times. “He still felt strong”, said Moanda-Phuati, who, according to French press reports, is Congolese.
A police official said one of the attackers had been turned back after trying to go to Syria. “We convey our deepest sympathies and thoughts to the victim’s family, to the Catholic community in France and to the French people”.
The imam of the mosque in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray said he was “appalled by the death of my friend”, according to the French newspaper Le Figaro.
The attack is the latest in a series of deadly attacks in Europe, including the one in Nice on Bastille Day that killed 84 people.
General view of the church where the priest was killed in today’s attack.
He had been under surveillance following two failed attempts to get to Syria previous year, according to France’s anti-terror prosecutor.
Police checked the church for explosives or booby-traps and forensic officers are taking fingerprints and DNA evidence, he also said.
“I cry out to God, with all men of good will. And I invite all non-believers to unite with this cry”, he said in a statement.
Fr Troy said those impacted by the attack “deserve our prayers”.
French Prime Minister Manuel Valls tweeted his horror at the “barbaric attack” on the church and vowed a defiant response. “The Catholic Church has no other arms besides prayer and fraternity between men”.
A police cordon has been set up around the scene in the town, about 108 kilometers (67 miles) northwest of Paris.
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“When a priest is attacked, it is all of France that has been hurt”, France President Francois Hollande said in a statement.
