The knife attack in the La Belle et La Bœuf restaurant According to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), the attack on Chicoutimi three weeks ago could be considered a terrorist attack.
• Also read: Armed attack at La Belle et la Boeuf: the restaurant reopens two weeks after the tragedy
• Also read: Chicoutimi: Three charges of attempted murder following the attacks at the La Belle et la Boeuf restaurant
• Also read: Armed attack: injured in a restaurant in Saguenay
The RCMP is relying on Facebook posts from defendant Ahmed May to investigate this possibility.
Ahmed May published a first-person portrait said to have been taken in the moments after the attack on December 20th at the restaurant la belle et la Bœuf. Below the photo are the words: “Liberate Palestine” or “Free Palestine” in English.
TVA News
The original Tunisian text would have been a compliment to Hamas in other publications the day before the tragedy.
In particular, he used the Hamas symbol, the inverted red triangle that denotes military targets, with the words “Soon…soon, soon…la Belle team Bœuf.” It also alludes to a holy war of victory or martyrdom.
The RCMP's Integrated National Security Team is therefore investigating the case.
“The RCMP has motives we don’t know,” Louis Audet-Gosselin of the Center for the Prevention of Radicalization Leading to Violence said cautiously. “You have to make the connection to the ideology, which is not easy.”
Hamas is recognized by Canada as a terrorist group and has been banned from the country since 2002.
“It is a group that does not recognize Israel, but there has never been any effort on their part to take international action,” noted Mr. Audet-Gosselin. It concentrates its action on a specific territory.”
Ahmed May is charged with three counts of attempted murder of restaurant employees. According to his public prosecutor, the alleged acts exclusively relate to a conflict at work.
TVA News
“A conflict that had lasted several weeks and even several months,” argued Nicolas Gagnon. “It has nothing to do with other things!”
The defendant's release hearing, which was scheduled to take place this Friday, is being postponed to a later date for a reason other than the involvement of the RCMP. Provisional release would be much more difficult to achieve if the federal police perceived a terrorist threat.
Groupe Resto D, owner of Belle et la Bœuf, declined to comment but said it had never received any information or complaints that the defendant had spoken about Hamas at his workplace.