ARRAS, France (AP) — A man of Chechen origin who was under surveillance by French security services over suspected Islamic radicalization stabbed a teacher to death at his former high school and critically wounded three other people Friday in norther
The attack was being investigated by anti-terror prosecutors amid soaring global tensions over the war between Israel and Hamas. It also happened almost three years after another teacher, Samuel Paty, was beheaded by a radicalized Chechen near a Paris area school.
The suspected assailant in Arras was arrested, and several others are also in custody, national counterterrorism prosecutor Jean-Francois Ricard said. “I’m extremely shocked by what I saw," the officer said."It was a horrible thing to see this poor man who was killed on the job by a lunatic.” The suspected assailant's telephone conversations in recent days gave no indication of an impending attack, leading intelligence officers to conclude that the assailant decided suddenly on Friday to act, intelligence services told the AP.An older brother was arrested in the summer of 2019 by the DGSI -- France’s counter-terrorism intelligence service -- on suspicion of being involved in the planning of an attack that was thwarted, and is in jail, French intelligence said.
Martin Doussau, a philosophy teacher at Gambetta-Carnot, said the assailant was armed with two knives and appeared to be hunting specifically for a history teacher. Paty taught history and geography.