Police have shot and seriously injured a woman who made threatening comments and shouted “Allah Akbar” on a RER train in Paris on Tuesday, amid tensions in France following the Arras attack and the war between Israel and Hamas .
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Police were called around 7:30 a.m. after reports from two passengers of a woman in a “full veil” making threats on an RER and then traveling in Val-de-Marne, Paris police prefect Laurent Nuñez said during a press conference press conference.
“‘You all will pass there’, ‘Allah akbar’, ‘Boom’,” she declared, according to these witnesses, the police prefect added.
AFP
The woman was later found at the Bibliothèque François Mitterrand train station in Paris, which was quickly evacuated. The station was still closed early Tuesday afternoon and Transport Minister Clément Beaune visited the construction site.
The police “asked him to sit on the ground,” the prefect explained. But the woman got up and “walked towards the police”. They “sent summonses” to her, asking her not to move and to show her hands to check that she did not have a weapon, but she “refused to comply with this summons,” the police chief said.
AFP
Two police officers then fired eight times, said the prosecution, which initially mentioned the single shot by a police officer.
The woman was seriously injured in the stomach and had to be taken to hospital. His “vital prognosis is questionable,” the prosecution said.
Checks showed that she had no explosives or weapons with her.
This 38-year-old woman had already been arrested in July 2021, notably by soldiers of Operation Sentinel. That day, “also wearing a full veil” and carrying a “screwdriver,” she made “remarks of a religious nature” with a “threatening attitude,” explained Laurent Nuñez.
AFP
After being taken into police custody, she was subsequently “interned” because she suffered from “psychiatric disorders.”
Contrary to what police sources initially stated, she was not the subject of a radicalization report (FSPRT).
The identity of this woman, who gave her name to the hospital but did not have any identification with her, still needs to be confirmed, the police prefect emphasized.
Climate of tensions
Two investigations were launched. One was referred to the Paris criminal police for “apologies, death threats and attempts at intimidation against a public official.”
The other was entrusted to the Inspectorate General of the National Police (IGPN), the police force, and targets police shootings, as is the case when a police officer uses his firearm.
AFP
This case comes in the context of tensions in France due to the Gaza war between Israel and Hamas and following the murder of teacher Dominique Bernard in Arras on October 13 by a young person accused of Islamist radicalism.
Since this attack, France has increased the Vigipirate plan’s anti-attack alert level to maximum and switched to “emergency attack” alert.
Since then, bomb threats have targeted dozens of locations in France and led to multiple evacuations from airports, train stations and tourist attractions such as the Palace of Versailles.
A total of 100 bomb threats have been made against French airports since October 18, Transport Minister Clément Beaune said on Tuesday.
On Monday, Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin in France recorded “819 anti-Semitic acts” and “414 arrests” since October 7, the start of the war between Israel and Hamas.