2014 Tours police station stabbing
| 2014 Tours stabbing attack | |
|---|---|
 Location of Indre-et-Loire within France | |
| Location | Joué-lès-Tours |
| Date | December 20, 2014 |
| Target | Police officers |
Attack type | Stabbing |
| Weapons | Knife |
| Deaths | 1 (the perpetrator) |
| Injured | 3 |
| Perpetrator | Bertrand Nzohabonayo |
| Motive | Radical Islamism |
On 20 December 2014, a man in Joué-lès-Tours near the city of Tours in central France entered a police station shouting the Islamic takbir Allahu Akbar ("God is Great"), and proceeded to attack officers with a knife, injuring three before he was shot and killed.
The stabbing attack is regarded by French authorities as an act of terrorism.[1][2]
Perpetrator
The attacker was identified as Bertrand Nzohabonayo, age 20, a French citizen and former rap musician born in Burundi in 1994.[3][4][5][6] The attacker had taken Bilal as his new name upon conversion to Islam, and had been posting Islamist material on his Facebook page, including a photograph of the black flag of the Islamic State.[1][7]
The attacker's radical ideology had been reported to French security services before the attack.[8]
In Burundi, a majority-Christian country, police arrested the attacker's brother, Brice Nzohabonayo, a man with known Islamist sympathies, and stated that they had informed French authorities that both brothers should be regarded as suspect due to their radical Islamist opinions.[9]
Aftermath
Nzohabonayo, a recent convert to Islam, has been called the "first of the lone wolves," part of a "drumbeat" of Islamist attackers who struck France with acts of lone wolf terrorism in the weeks preceding the Charlie Hebdo shooting. These attacks began a month after ISIL released a video on 19 November 2014, in French, urging Muslims to carry out attacks against non-Muslims with vehicles.[1][10][11][12]
This series of attacks included ones in Nantes and Dijon. Though the attacks occurred on three consecutive days, only the Joué-lès-Tours attack has been officially categorized as a terrorist attack.[1] Although the three attacks were deemed unrelated with one another, the French government heightened the nation's security and deployed 300 soldiers to patrol the nation's streets.[13]
See also
- 2014 Endeavour Hills stabbings
- 2014 Nantes attack
- 2014 Dijon attack
- January 2016 Paris police station attack
References
- ^ a b c d Cruickshank, Paul (November 16, 2015). "Drumbeat of terror precedes slaughter that shocks France and the world". CNN. Retrieved November 17, 2015.
- ^ Leveille, David (December 22, 2014). "France endures deadly attacks". Public Radio International. Reuters (credited in; not copy of). Retrieved November 17, 2015.
- ^ "French police shoot dead knifeman who was shouting Islamic slogans". The Daily Telegraph. December 20, 2014. Retrieved November 16, 2015.
- ^ Lichfield, John (December 21, 2014). "Man shot dead by police in jihadist attack in Tours". The Independent. Retrieved November 17, 2015.
- ^ Rodrigues, Jason (January 16, 2015). "Terror attacks in Europe: the five danger zones". The Guardian. Retrieved November 17, 2015.
- ^ "France Dijon: Driver targets city pedestrians". BBC News. December 21, 2014. Retrieved December 22, 2014.
- ^ Mulholland, Rory (December 21, 2014). "French knife attacker Bertrand Nzohabonayo was Islamic convert; Man shot dead by French police had changed name to Bilal and posted ISIL flag on Facebook". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved November 16, 2015.
- ^ "French anti-terror department investigates knife attack in Nice". Euronews. February 4, 2015. Retrieved November 17, 2015.
- ^ "Burundi arrests brother of suspect in French police attack". France 24. December 22, 2014. Retrieved November 16, 2015.
- ^ Lane, Oliver (January 12, 2015). "In Pictures: France's Three Weeks of Terror". Breitbart. Retrieved November 17, 2015.
- ^ "Paris terror attacks: West Yorkshire man, 21, arrested after Facebook post praises massacre". The Daily Telegraph. November 17, 2015. Retrieved November 17, 2015.
- ^ Molinié, William (November 15, 2015). "Merah, Kouachi, Belhoucine, Nzohabonayo… Le terrorisme islamiste, une affaire de frères?". 20 minutes (France). Retrieved November 17, 2015.
- ^ "France to deploy soldiers after spate of attacks". BBC News. December 23, 2014. Retrieved December 26, 2014.
