Three years after the beheading of Professor Samuel Paty, terror returns to schools in France: a young Chechen killed a teacher in French in Arras, stabbing him in the throat. He shouted "Allah Akbar" and injured a school cafeteria worker and a gym teacher, who were serious but out of danger. He had attended that school, he was radicalized and registered as such, guarded and with his phone under control. But he passed through the tight meshes of controls and managed to plunge France back into the terrorist spiral.
It was large Anglo-Saxon law firms, yesterday, filmed by French groups, to spread the news of an imminent attack alert in Paris and more generally in France. Many employees had been asked to stay home working remotely. The threat materialized in the north, in Arras, in themiddle school and high school 'Gambetta', with the twenty-year-old Chechen Mohammed Mogouchkov who showed up in front of the school with a gray t-shirt and two knives in his hand. It was 11 o'clock and he took advantage of the end of the lessons and the opening of the doors to allow the boys to go to the canteen. In the videos he is seen trying to enter, blocked by the teacher of French of the second grade, Dominique Bernard, 57 years old. He protected his students, stood in front of the terrorist who repeatedly hit him in the throat. Reached by the knife to the carotid artery, he died in front of the eyes of his boys while Megouchkov shouted "Allah Akbar". Then the Chechen entered the courtyard and attacked some people, in particular a canteen worker, who defended himself by holding a chair, but was also stabbed.
According to witnesses, he was frantically looking for "the history teacher." Together with a gym teacher, they were seriously injured but are out of danger. Professor Bernard, married to an English teacher, had three daughters, all students, and lived on a renovated farm. The killer was stopped and arrested 4 minutes later by the police, who made use of a taser, the electric gun. The emotion that spread from Arras to the whole country was enormous. To strike was, once again, a person known for his radicalization, for this filed and stopped for checks even yesterday. At school he had given evidence of his aggressiveness, his hostility to the environment and to classmates. Among his 5 brothers, one was arrested a few minutes after him while wandering in front of another school. The eldest, Mosvar, is in prison, convicted of participating in a plan to attack the Elysée Palace and for repeated messages on the Internet supporting ISIS and apologia for terrorism. The father, also radicalized and accused of marital violence, was deported to Russia, from where the family had arrived in France in 2005.
The controversy is already sweeping the government and the predecessors of the Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, for not having expelled the whole family, largely radicalized. Experts explain that the law prohibits the deportation of those who entered France before being 13 years old. But the far-right Marine Le Pen is calling for the resignation of the interior minister.
Macron, Darmanin and the Minister of Education, Gabriel Attal, rushed to Arras. The president, visibly moved, spoke of "France hit once again by the barbarity of Islamic terrorism". And he confirmed that, in the suburbs of Paris, in Limay, "another attack was foiled": a 24-year-old man, armed with a knife, just out of a prayer room, was about to enter the 'Condorcet' school. Guarded as he was also registered S (radicalized), he was arrested.
France is in shock, a security crisis summit met at the Elysée Palace and raised the anti-terrorism alert. The decision, according to sources close to Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne, consists in "raising the Vigipirate device to the level of emergency attacks". This is a level that can be activated immediately after an attack or in the event that an identified and unlocated terrorist group goes into action.
Although there have been no Jewish targets in the crosshairs of today's terrorism, the link to the war between Israel and Hamas is evident. On several occasions, from Macron to government ministers, the appeal has been made in recent days to "not import the conflict in France". But the tension, which has risen even after Darmanin's ban on any demonstration of support for the Palestinians, seems destined to explode.
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