Denis Charlet Agence France-Presse French people reflect in the aftermath of the death of teacher Dominique Bernard killed during a knife attack on October 13.
The alleged murderer of a professor in Arras, in the north of France, had posted a demand video on behalf of the armed group Islamic State (IS) and mentioned in a “very marginal” way the conflict between Israel and Hamas, before to take action, we learned on Tuesday from a source close to the case.
The author, Mohammed Mogouchkov, 20 years old, of Russian nationality and originally from Ingushetia, in the north Caucasus was listed for radicalism.
He must be presented to an anti-terrorism investigating judge on Tuesday, four days after his attack which plunged France back into fear in the face of jihadist attacks, further fueled by another attack Monday evening in Brussels which left two dead. /p>
Mohammed Mogouchkov claimed responsibility for his actions on behalf of the Islamic State jihadist group in a video posted before the attack, we learned on Tuesday from a source close to the matter.
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He also makes a “very marginal” allusion to Hamas attack in Israel, according to this source.
Friday morning, armed with a knife, he went to his former school in Arras, where he fatally stabbed Dominique Bernard, a 57-year-old French teacher, then injured three other people before being arrested by a police patrol.
Mohammed Mogouchkov was followed by the DGSI (internal security) “since the end of July”, according to the Minister of the Interior Gérald Darmanin, by wiretapping and surveillance measures physics.
He had been checked on Thursday, the day before the events, without “any offense being able to be accused of him”, according to an intelligence source.
During his police custody, he “did not is not explained,” said a police source.
This attack, committed three years after the assassination by a radicalized Islamist who had slit the throat of professor Samuel Paty in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, in the Paris region, has once again struck fear, particularly among teachers.
France was immediately placed in an “emergency attack” situation, the highest level of the Vigipirate vigilance and protection system.
“All European states are vulnerable” in the face of the return of “Islamist terrorism,” Emmanuel Macron declared on Tuesday.
Other countries fear terrorist acts, particularly in response to the war between Israel and the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas.
Two Swedes were killed Monday evening in the street in Brussels during an attack whose alleged perpetrator, a radicalized Tunisian residing illegally in Belgium, was fatally injured on Tuesday by the police.
Two of the brothers of the Arras attacker were also taken into custody: his youngest, aged 17, who was near another school in the city, but without a weapon, and his eldest, currently incarcerated .
The latter was sentenced to five years of imprisonment, in 2023, for not having denounced a planned attack in Paris near the Élysée presidential palace. He was then convicted of advocating terrorism.
Mohammed Mogouchkov, born in the predominantly Muslim Russian Republic of Ingushetia, arrived in France in 2008. He was the subject of surveillance by the services of information because of his links with his older brother.
The father of the attacker, deported in 2018, “was a supporter of radical Islam” and listed as such by the police, according to the Minister of the Interior.
Depicted as “violent”
His sister, whose custody was lifted on Monday, “is horrified by the actions of her brothers” and “she does not understand why her brother attacked this college”, told AFP Mikaël Benillouche, her lawyer, contacted by AFP.
In front of investigators, she said she had “seen her brother Mohammed becoming more and more harsh in his practice of Islam” and portrayed him as “violent”, according to his counsel.
On Friday, quickly after the events, the national anti-terrorism prosecutor's office opened an investigation for assassination and attempted assassination in relationship with a terrorist enterprise and criminal terrorist association.
President Emmanuel Macron promised Monday that the school would remain a “bulwark against obscurantism”. On Tuesday, he said he had not seen any “failures” in the French security services.
He will attend the funeral of Dominique Bernard at Arras Cathedral on Thursday.
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