Jul. 26, 2016 Priest murdered during Mass in terror attack on Catholic church in France Two knif

Jul. 26, 2016

اقتباس :

اقتباس :: Priest murdered during Mass in terror attack on Catholic church in France

اقتباس :: Two knife-wielding attackers who had pledged allegiance to ISIS, shouting "Allahu Akbar," slit the throat of an 85-year-old priest and critically wounded at least one other person during a Tuesday morning terror attack on a Catholic church near the Normandy city of Rouen, officials said.
The terrorists, who were later shot and killed by police, forced priest Jacques Hamel to kneel before they slaughtered him, and the Islamist attackers captured the bloody episode on film, according to a nun who escaped the assault.

Priest Jacques Hamel was killed in a terror attack on a France church.
"They forced him to his knees. He wanted to defend himself. And that's when the tragedy happened," said the nun, identified as Sister Danielle.
"They recorded themselves. They did a sort of sermon around the altar, in Arabic. It's a horror," she told BFM television.

The church is in the French region of Normandy.
ISIS' Amaq news agency said the France attack was carried out by two Islamic State "soldiers," Reuters reported.
"[ISIS] has declared war on us," French President Francois Hollande said Tuesday. "We must fight this war by all means, while respecting the rule of law -- what makes us a democracy."
The priest, identified by Sky News as Hamel, was dead at the scene, and another person, was clinging to life, Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet said.
"Everyone knew him very well," Claude-Albert Seguin, 68, said of Hamel. "He was very loved in the community and a kind man."
The Bishops' Conference said Hamel was ordained a priest on June 30, 1958 and had been serving in the parish of Saint-Etienne-de-Rouvray since 2005.
The killing Tuesday inside the church, in the small northwestern town of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray, "is obviously a drama for the Catholic community, for the Christian community," Brandet told reporters.
The church was reportedly on a "hit list" discovered at the residence of a would-be ISIS attacker in April 2015, The Sun reported. Sid Ghlam was believed to be planning "imminent attacks" in France when investigators arrested him. Officials allegedly uncovered an arsenal of weapons and found that Ghlam was talking with someone in Syria who had ordered him to strike specific churches -- including the one in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray.
One of Tuesday's attackers was on the radar of French police and had traveled to Turkey, said Mohammed Karabila, president of the Regional Council of the Muslim Faith for Haute-Normandie.
"The person that did this odious act is known, and he has been followed by the police for at least a year and a half," he told the AP.
Karabila said the attacker "went to Turkey and security services were alerted after this."
One of the assailants was identified as Adel Kermich, according to Sky News, citing sources. The other man was not immediately named.
The attackers entered through the back door of the church and took the priest, two nuns and two parishioners hostage during morning Mass, police said. The men had a fake gun and fake explosives on them in addition to the knives, a source told Le Figaro.
Police responded and later confirmed that the attackers had been "neutralized," Sky News reported. Three hostages were rescued in good condition, while another was taken away on a stretcher, according to reports.
French prosecutors said one person had been detained in connection with the assault. That person, however, was not named and any possible role in the attack wasn't revealed.
Hollande and Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve were heading to the northwestern town of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray where the hostage-taking took place, Brandet said.
Brandet, speaking later on BFM TV, said the RAID special intervention force was searching the church and its perimeter for possible explosives. Terrorism investigators had been summoned, he said.
Vatican Spokesperson Greg Burke told Fox News, Pope Francis was "shocked" especially because the attack "happened in a house of worship." He added the Pope was "…praying for the victims of the attack."
France is currently on high alert after an attack in Nice on Bastille Day — July 14 — that killed 84 people and a string of deadly attacks last year claimed by ISIS that killed 147 victims.

FoxNews.com