Suspect Arrested After Killing 1, Injuring 2 in Knife and Hammer Attack in Paris
The individual killed in the attack was a German tourist and nurse
AP Photo/Christophe Ena
One man was killed and another two were injured in a knife and hammer attack near the Eiffel Tower in Paris on Dec. 2, 2023.A suspect has been arrested after one man died and two others were injured in a knife and hammer attack in Paris on Saturday night.
The incidents, which occurred just before 9 p.m. local time near the Eiffel Tower, were allegedly carried out by a 26-year-old French citizen with Iranian parents, whose identity has not been confirmed, BBC reported.
The man killed in the attack was a German tourist and nurse, per the outlet.
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France's Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin told BBC that the suspect fatally stabbed the victim on the street while he was with his wife, Rose-Marie Devillers.
After a taxi driver intervened and saved Devillers' life, the alleged attacker fled to a nearby bridge and crossed the River Seine, Darmanin, 41, told the outlet.
He then attacked two more victims, a French man around 60 years old and a 66-year-old British tourist, hitting the latter in the eye with a hammer, per BBC.
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Police arrested a suspect in connection with a Dec. 2 Paris attack that left one man dead and two people injrued.Both victims were treated by emergency services, and neither of them sustained life-threatening injuries, Darmanin said, per The New York Times.
Police then tasered and arrested the suspect on suspicion of assassination — which French law defines as premeditated murder — and “attempted assassination in relation to a terrorist enterprise,” according to the BBC.
Darmanin, per Reuters, said the suspect allegedly was heard shouting "Allahu Akbar” — an Arabic phrase meaning "God is great." He reportedly told authorities he was upset because “so many Muslims are dying in Afghanistan and in Palestine," per BBC.
The suspect was known to intelligence services before the attack, the outlet reported. In 2020, he was released from prison after serving four years for planning an attack, and was supposed to be receiving treatment for psychiatric problems.
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Anti-terrorism prosecutors have opened an investigation into the incident, French President Emmanuel Macron announced in a post on X (formerly Twitter).
“I send all my condolences to the family and loved ones of the German national who died this evening during the terrorist attack in Paris and think with emotion of the people currently injured and in care,” Macron wrote, translated from French.
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A man died and two others were injured in an attack near the Eiffel Tower in Paris on Dec. 2.Related: Man Arrested After 3 Palestinian College Students Shot in Vermont, Possible Hate Crime Investigated
The French president also thanked emergency services and said that the national anti-terrorism prosecutor's office “will be responsible for shedding light on this matter so that justice can be done in the name of the French people.”
The chancellor of Germany, Olaf Scholz, also shared a post on X about the attack.
“I am shocked by the terrorist attack in Paris in which a German was killed and several people were injured,” Scholz wrote, translated from German. “Our thoughts are with the injured, families and friends of the victims. It becomes clear again why we resolutely oppose hate and terror.”
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