TOULOUSE, France — A motorbike assailant opened fire with two handguns Monday in front of a Jewish school, killing a rabbi, his two young sons and a girl. One witness described him as a man chasing small children and “looking to kill.”
One of the guns he used also had been fired in two other deadly motorbike attacks in the area that targeted paratroopers of North African and French Caribbean origin, officials said. President Nicolas Sarkozy suggested one person was responsible for all the killings.
A massive manhunt was underway, and the terrorism alert was raised to its highest level ever across a swath of southern France surrounding Toulouse. Hundreds of officers increased security at schools, synagogues and mosques across the country, and Sarkozy said 14 riot police units “will secure the region as long as this criminal” hasn’t been caught.
Monday’s attack revolted France and drew strong condemnation from Israel and the United States. Sarkozy called it the worst school shooting in French history.
France has seen a low drumroll of anti-Semitic incidents but no attack so deadly targeting Jews since the early 1980s. This country is particularly sensitive toward its Jewish community because of its World War II past of abetting Nazi occupiers in deporting Jewish citizens.
Prosecutors were studying possible terrorist links, but the motive for all three attacks was unclear. Still, issues about religious minorities and race have emerged prominently in France’s presidential campaign, in which the conservative Sarkozy has taken his traditional hard line against immigration.
News that the gun was used in attacks last week around Toulouse fueled suspicions that a serial killer was targeting not only Jews but French minorities.
In all three cases, the attacker came on a motorcycle, apparently alone, and then sped away.
Monday’s attack was as quick as it was terrifying. A 30-year-old rabbi, Jonathan Sandler, and two of his sons were killed just before classes started at the Ozar Hatorah school, a junior high and high school in a quiet neighborhood, Prosecutor Michel Valet said. The Israeli Foreign Ministry said the sons’ ages were 4 and 5.
Also killed was the 7-year-old daughter of the principal, school officials said. Valet said a 17-year-old boy was seriously wounded.
“He shot at everything he had in front of him, children and adults,” Valet said. “The children were chased inside the school.”
Nicole Yardeni, a local Jewish official who saw video of the attack from a security camera near the school gate, described the shooter as “determined, athletic and well-toned.” She said he wore a helmet with the visor down.
“You see a man park his motorcycle, start to shoot, enter the school grounds and chase children to catch one and shoot a bullet into her head,” Yardeni said. “It’s unbearable to watch, and you can’t watch anymore after that. He was looking to kill.”
The bodies were brought in hearses to the school Monday night for an evening vigil. All of the dead had joint Israeli-French citizenship and will be buried in Israel, the Israel Foreign Ministry said.
A police official said the same powerful .45-caliber handgun used in Monday’s attack was used in shootings five days ago that killed two paratroopers and seriously injured another in nearby Montauban, and in an attack that killed a paratrooper nine days ago in Toulouse.
In Monday’s attack, which took place about 8 a.m., the killer also used a .35-caliber gun, the police official said. At least 15 shots were fired at the school, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.
A police union official in Paris said the shooter knew weapons well to handle a .45-caliber handgun plus a second gun.
“The shooter is someone used to holding arms,” said Nicolas Comte of the SGP FO police union. “He knows what he’s doing, like an ex-military guy.”
The slain rabbi taught at the school and reportedly arrived from Jerusalem in September with his wife and children.
France has the largest Jewish community in Western Europe, estimated at about 500,000, as well as its largest Muslim population, about 5 million.
The U.S. government said it joined France “in condemning this unprovoked and outrageous act of violence in the strongest possible terms.”
“Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families and friends of the victims, and we stand with a community in grief,” U.S. National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said.
The New York Police Department stepped up security at synagogues and other sites Monday after the attack, dispatching extra patrols to more than 50 locations.
