Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray (France) (AFP) – The Islamic State group said Tuesday that two of its “soldiers” stormed a French church and slit a priest’s throat, the latest attack in a country shaken to its core by repeated terror strikes.
The hostage drama in the Normandy town of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray comes less than two weeks after the truck massacre in the French Riviera city of Nice, which killed 84 people and was also claimed by IS.
Two attackers entered the centuries-old stone St-Etienne church, situated on a calm square in the working-class town of about 30,000 people, during morning mass.
Sister Danielle, a nun who was in the church at the time, said elderly priest Jaques Hamel was wearing his white cloaks and was at the foot of the altar when “they forced him to get on his knees and not move”.
“He tried to struggle, he tried,” she told local radio RMC. “He knew what was happening.”
She said the men were speaking Arabic and shouting and had “recorded” the attack. She managed to run away and alert the police.
French President Francois Hollande said the men had claimed they were acting on behalf of the Islamic State group before being shot dead by police.
Shortly afterwards the IS-linked Amaq news agency, citing a “security source”, said the perpetrators were “soldiers of the Islamic State who carried out the attack in response to calls to target countries of the Crusader coalition”.
It was the fourth attack claimed by IS in Europe in two weeks, carried out by a mixed bag of assailants more or less inspired by the group from afar, some of whom are reported to have suffered mental illness.
This murky profile is creating a nightmare for security services unable to stop the attacks.
The French interior ministry said that of the five people taken hostage in the church, three were released unharmed and another was in a critical condition.
A source close to the investigation said the attackers were armed with knives, an old pistol which did not work, and a “fake package” that appeared as if it contained explosives.
The archbishop of the nearby city of Rouen, Dominique Lebrun, named the priest as Hamel, who is in his eighties.
The local imam Mohammed Karabila said he was “stunned by the death of my friend. He was someone who gave his life to others. We are dumbfounded at the mosque.”
– Terror hits small-town France –
Grey clouds hung over the town, near-deserted as stores shuttered for the day after the attack. Forensic police were combing the site for clues.
An AFP reporter saw police carrying out two raids and at least one person taken into custody.
Joanna Torrent, a 22-year-old store employee, was stunned to see terror hit her small town, far from bustling tourist hubs like Paris and Nice.
“I thought it would only be in big cities, that it couldn’t reach here,” she said.
Pope Francis voiced his “pain and horror” at the “barbaric killing” of the priest.
France has been on high alert after three major attacks in 18 months.
When Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel ploughed a truck into crowds celebrating Bastille Day in Nice on July 14, a bitter political spat erupted over alleged security failings, with authorities accused of not doing enough to protect people.
Hollande appealed for “unity” and warned that “the threat remains very high.”
“We are confronted with a group, Daesh, which has declared war on us,” Hollande said, using an alternative name for IS.
“The Catholic community has been hit, but it is all of the French public which is concerned,” he added.
Hollande called Pope Francis to express his sorrow at the attack, his office said.
The United States condemned the “horrific terrorist attack”, US National Security Council spokesman Ned Price said in a statement.
The two attackers have not yet been formally identified, but sources close to the investigation said one of the men is believed to be known to anti-terror investigators.
They believe he went to Syria in 2015 and was charged on his return with association with a terrorist group and released from detention with an electronic monitoring bracelet.
France has been a prime target of IS, which regularly calls for supporters to launch attacks against the country, a member of the international coalition carrying out air strikes against the jihadist group in Iraq and Syria.
After Nice, France extended a state of emergency for the fourth time since IS jihadists struck Paris in November, killing 130 people.
Valls had warned earlier this week that France will face more attacks as it struggles to handle extremists returning from jihad in Iraq and Syria and those radicalised at home through the internet.