Stop in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray

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Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray
Saint-Etienne church

The attack in Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray was an Islamist attack , in which two assassinated the priest Jacques Hamel during mass on July 26, 2016 in the town of Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray in the French region of Normandy, not far from Rouen murdered. Both assassins committed themselves to the terrorist organization Islamic State (IS).

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Two assassins broke into the church through a back entrance on July 26, 2016 at around 9:45 am, where the 85-year-old priest Jacques Hamel was "holding mass with five other believers [...] , including three Vincentian women ." When the perpetrators appeared, an 84-year-old nun was able to flee unnoticed into the sacristy , ran from there into the street and stopped a car whose driver called the police. The assassins took the other four hostage, cut the priest's throat and severely injured a man with knife cuts in the neck; he was at times in mortal danger.

When the assassins left the church with three hostages, they were shot dead by police officers from the Brigade de recherche et d'intervention (BRI) of the Ministère de l'Intérieur . The police explosives group then searched the church for possible bombs.

Three of the hostages, the married couple Guy and Janine Copenot and the nun Sr. Danielle Delafosse, spoke in an interview with the Catholic magazine Famille Chrétienne and told of their impressions and thoughts during the attack.

The assassins had given Guy Copenot "three stab wounds on the arm, back and neck" with the knife, handed him a video camera and told him: "Grandpa, you are filming". Copenot did not dare to oppose and had to film the pastor's murder.

The priest was murdered by having his throat cut in front of the church altar. According to Sr. Danielle, just before his throat was cut, Father Jacques shouted twice, “ Get rid of you, Satan .” Then Guy Copenot was stabbed.

Janine Coponet was horrified and assumed that her husband would be killed in front of her eyes on his 87th birthday. One of the assassins put a gun in the neck of her (she only found out later that it was a dummy) “and pushed me to the exit of the church. I turned around to take one last look at my guy when I see one of his legs moving! I said, 'He's alive. Oh Lord, thank you! '"

After the murder of the priest, the murderers appeared calmer, Sr. Danielle continues. For example, the assassin Kermiche sat next to Sr. Helen, who belongs to the same order as Sr. Danielle, and asked her if she was afraid of dying? She replied, 'No'. 'Why aren't you afraid?' 'Because I believe in God and I know that I will be happy'. Sr. Danielle said there was no way of knowing whether those words reached the assassin. In any case, he whispered: "I also believe in God and am not afraid of death." Then he announced: "Jesus is a man, not God!"

Sr. Danielle escaped and was taken in by a helpful neighbor after she escaped.

Janine Copenot was so exhausted that she asked Kermiche for permission to sit down, she reported. “He politely replied, 'Yes, Madame, have a seat'. Sister Helene, who was also very exhausted, asked him for her walking stick and he brought it to her. The church bells rang at 10.30 a.m. My guy has been playing dead for 45 minutes ... They're driving us outside. The sirens wail, it goes through a door. Policemen take us at the reception. The killers go out and shout ' Allahu akbar '. The police are shooting. The two young men die immediately. A policewoman pulls me behind a car. She cries. It's bizarre: she's crying and I haven't cried since my pastor's death ... "

Perpetrator, motive and investigation

The police national anti-terrorist service SDAP and the Paris public prosecutor took over the investigation. Both assassins were known to the security authorities, their files were marked with an "S" ("State Security").

One of the perpetrators, 19-year-old Adel Kermiche, was the youngest of five children of a Franco-Algerian family, a behavioral and violent pupil since primary school. During his childhood, teachers sent him several times to the school psychologist . At the age of twelve he received psychiatric treatment, first internally in Rouen, then to day care in his hometown of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray. He dropped out of school at the age of 16, and security authorities first became aware of him at the age of 17.

Kermiche tried twice to travel to Syria. During the first attempt on March 23, 2015, German border guards in Munich noticed him and arrested him on board a coach headed for Bulgaria.

He made the second attempt in May 2015, when he was sent back to France by the Turkish authorities. There he came into custody . His father described him to the investigators as a religious fanatic . His older sister spoke of being brainwashed ; within two months religion had come before everything else. After ten months of sitting in a cell with a Saudi Islamist and a returnees from Syria, the judge granted Kermiche's request for release, although his parents and the responsible public prosecutor had opposed it. His parents told the judge that they would rather see their son safe in a prison than at large; he is uncontrollable. The police put an electronic handcuff on him when he was released in March 2016 . He was only allowed to leave his parents' house between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m.

The second perpetrator, Malik Petitjean, was 19 years old. He came from the eastern French Vosges and last lived in Aix-les-Bais on the edge of the French Alps. The Frenchman with Algerian roots had no criminal record, but was added to a dangerous list at the end of June 2016.

The IS propaganda spokesman Amaq reported that the attackers were "soldiers of the Islamic State". The French President Hollande said in a first statement that the perpetrators had acted on behalf of IS.

After the attack

President Hollande and Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve arrived a few hours after the hostage-taking. Hollande said afterwards that not only the Catholic Christians were affected, but all of France.

The attack triggered numerous reactions. Many politicians responded with public expressions of sympathy and condemnation. Pope Francis condemned the hostage-taking as "an act of absurd violence" and wrote:

“We are particularly affected by this terrible act because it was done in a church, a holy place where the love of God is proclaimed. We are close to the Church in France , the Archdiocese of Rouen , the community concerned and the French people. "

One day after the attack, President Hollande met the six members of the Conférence des représentants des cultes en France in the Elysée Palace . The conference consists of six leading representatives of the major religious communities in France: the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Paris and Cardinal André Vingt-Trois , the Rector of the Great Mosque of Paris Dalil Boubakeur , the President of the Consistoire central israélite Joël Mergui , the President of the French Evangelical Confederation of Churches François Clavairoly , the President of the Union bouddhiste de France Olivier Wang-Genh and the Greek Orthodox Vicar General Grigorios Ioannidis . In a joint statement, they condemned the attack:

«Nous ne pouvons pas nous laisser entraîner dans le jeu politique de Daech qui veut dresser les uns contre les autres les enfants d'une même famille. »

"We must not allow ourselves to be drawn into the political game of Daesch , who wants to turn children of the same family against each other."

- Joint declaration by the religious representatives on July 27, 2016

On July 31, the funeral service for Hamel took place in Rouen Cathedral . Over 2,000 people, including over 100 Muslims, took part.

The alleged commissioner of the attack, Rachid Kassim , was also in contact with three women who wanted to detonate a gas cylinder car bomb at Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris. French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said that French authorities observed "around 15,000 people because they are in the process of radicalization". Previously, this number was given as "about 10,000".

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Kilian Martin: A priest to the last breath. Katholisch.de , July 27, 2016, accessed July 28, 2016 .
  2. ↑ Islamists kill priests: attack in church was terrorist attack. tagesschau.de , July 26, 2016, accessed on July 26, 2016 .
  3. ↑ Numerous media initially wrote "86". Hamel was born on November 30, 1930.
  4. ↑ The murdered priest was “committed and attentive” . kath.net , July 27, 2016, accessed on July 28, 2016.
    Les religieuses racontent leur face à face avec les terroristes: Attentat de Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray - Prêtre assassiné . La Dépêche du Midi , July 31, 2016, accessed August 2, 2016 (French).
  5. ↑ a b c Service in Rouen: Christians and Muslims mourn together for murdered priests . FAZ.net , July 31, 2016, accessed on August 2, 2016.
  6. ↑ Martin Franke: Assassination attempt in northern France He still wanted to talk to his murderers . Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung (FAS) , July 31, 2016.
  7. ↑ a b c d e Michaela Wiegel: How the priest's murderer deceived the judiciary. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung , July 27, 2016, accessed on July 27, 2016 .
  8. ↑ Hostage-taking in church: 84-year-old priest murdered, assassin dead.kurier.at , July 26, 2016, accessed on July 26, 2016 .
  9. ↑ Victim of the IS attack: "There was no regret in me, only love, peace" kath.net , October 5, 2016, accessed October 5, 2016 .
  10. ↑ Juliette Duclos: “Paumé”, “saoulé par la France” et déterminé à rejoindre la Syrie: what is Adel Kermiche, l'un des tueurs de Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray? francetvinfo.fr , July 27, 2016, accessed on July 28, 2016 (French).
  11. ↑ Details from: Sophie Roselli: Un jeune Français radicalisé a été arrêté à l'aéroport de Genève . Tribune de Genève , May 21, 2015, accessed July 28, 2016 (French).
  12. ^ Assassination in Saint-Étienne-du-Rouvray: le deuxième tueur identifié . AFP article on lefigaro.fr , July 28, 2016, accessed July 31, 2016 (French).
  13. ^ Justice: The French authorities were also aware of the second church attacker. AFP article on Welt Online , July 28, 2016, accessed October 3, 2016 .
  14. ↑ Kim Willsher, Julian Borger: Normandy church attackers who killed priest 'claimed to be from Isis'. (No longer available online.) The Guardian , July 26, 2016, archived from the original on July 28, 2016 ; accessed on July 26, 2016 (English). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Présidence de la République , July 26, 2016 (mp4 video; 3:29 minutes; 20.5 MB). @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.theguardian.com
  15. ^ France church attack: Terrorists will stop at nothing - Holland . BBC News , July 26, 2016, accessed July 26, 2016.
  16. ↑ Papa: dolore e orrore per attacco a chiesa in Francia. Vatican Radio , July 26, 2016, accessed on July 26, 2016 (Italian): “Siamo particolarmente colpiti perché questa violenza orribile è avvenuta in una chiesa, un luogo sacro in cui si annuncia l'amore di Dio, con la barbara uccisione di un sacerdote e il coinvolgimento dei fedeli. Siamo vicini alla Chiesa in Francia, alla Arcidiocesi di Rouen, alla comunità colpita, al popolo francese. "
  17. ↑ L. Blevennec: Reunion de la Conférence des représentants of cultes en France . ( Memento of July 27, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Présidence de la République , July 26, 2016, accessed on July 28, 2016 (French).
  18. ↑ a b Prêtre égorgé: les religieux s'affichent unis. AFP article on laDepeche.fr , July 27, 2016, accessed on July 27, 2016 (French).
  19. ^ Un nouveau vicaire général pour la metropole orthodox grecque en France. La Croix , September 29, 2014, accessed July 27, 2016 (French).
  20. ↑ Michaela Wiegel : Terror in France: The Birth of "Lumpenterrorismus" , FAZ, September 13, 2016, accessed on September 14, 2016.

Coordinates: 49 ° 22 '58 "  N , 1 ° 6' 24.6"  E