France’s religious leaders united after church attack

France was still coming to grips with the Bastille Day attack in Nice that killed 84 people when the church was attacked Tuesday. They also called for security at places of worship to be increased.

Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said 4,000 members of the Sentinel military force will patrol Paris, while 6,000 will patrol in the provinces. They were being bolstered by tens of thousands of police and reservists.

The impressive unity seen after the attacks on Charlie Hebdo magazine and a Jewish supermarket in January 2015, highlighted by Hollande’s mass march against terrorism attended by 40 foreign leaders, has dissolved under the pressure of the continued shocks.

The terrorists held me with a revolver at my neck.

The archbishop of Paris, Cardinal Andre Vingt-Trois, called on Catholics to “overcome hatred that comes in their hearts” and not to allow the Islamic State group “to set children of the same family upon each other”.

“We deeply desire that our places of worship are the subject of greater (security) focus, a sustained focus”, says French Muslim leader Dalil Boubakeur, after meeting with President Francois Hollande. He did not elaborate.

It was the extremist group’s first attack against a church in the West, and fulfills longstanding threats against “crusaders” in what the militants paint as a centuries-old battle for power. It’s a horror, ‘ She said of her dead colleague: ‘He was an extraordinary priest.

“I was afraid, yes, afraid especially when they entered”.

It appears that they then singled out Father Hamel.

“They started talking instead of Jacques”.

“He only spoke about Syria, and his dream of killing Bashar (al-Assad’s) soldiers”, they said. “They shouted a bit”.

The 19-year-old was forced to wear an electronic monitoring tag after he traveled overseas to try to fight in Syria.

He tried to struggle, he tried, but he is 85 years old. “It’s horrific”, said Sister Danielle. “He [Father Hamel] was at the foot of the altar and they made him kneel down and not move”.

Another resident who said he also knew the attacker told RTL: “He was a young guy like us. This is attacking and killing a priest”. She would later be taken to hospital where she was last night in critical condition.

Hollande, visiting the scene of Tuesday’s slaying, denounced what he called “a vile terrorist attack” and one more sign that France is at war with the Islamic State group, which has claimed multiple attacks on France over the past year and a half, and two in Germany over the past week. One had three knives and a fake explosives belt; the other carried a kitchen timer wrapped in aluminum foil and had fake explosives in his backpack. It has since emerges that one of the attackers, 19-year-old Adel Kermiche, was awaiting trial on terror charges and had been fitted with an electronic tag, when he fled his home and travelled to Saint-Etienne-de-Rouvray where he took several hostages before slitting the priest’s throat.

He was sent back to France and detained until late March this year when he was released on bail. Opposition politicians have responded to the attacks with strong criticism of the government’s security record, unlike past year, when they made a show of unity after gunmen and bombers killed 130 people at Paris entertainment venues in November and attacked a satirical newspaper in January.

“We were saying that is not good”.

“We are scared”, said Mulas Arbanu.

The slain priest had been at the church for the past decade and “was always ready to help”, said Rouen diocese official Philippe Maheut. “The jihadists’ aim is to provoke violent revenge attacks that will create a religious war in our country”, wrote the daily.

Another person held by the hostage-takers at the church suffered life-threatening injuries, said Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet.