A gun used in a shooting at a Jewish school in south-west France was the same weapon used in the shooting dead of three French soldiers last week, police sources have said. Four people, including a father and his two sons and another child, were killed at the Toulouse school on Monday. Reuters reported that French police were linking the attack with the shooting of the soldiers in Toulouse and nearby Montauban. The French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, had said there were "similarities" between the two attacks.
Speaking in Toulouse, he said: "We are struck by the similarities between the modus operandi of today's drama and those last week, even if we have to wait to have more elements from the police to confirm this hypothesis.
The soldiers who were shot were of north African and Caribbean origin. Two of them were Muslims. The adult victim in the most recent shooting was thought to be a rabbi who taught at the school, who died with his three-year-old and six-year-old sons. The fourth victim, aged between eight and 10 years old, was the school principal's daughter, according to Rahamim Sabag, a rabbi who works at the school, who spoke to Israeli television.
Witnesses described how the gunman entered the Ozar Hatorah school, a private Jewish secondary, at around 8. He pursued some children, including a girl whose hair he reportedly pulled. He then fled through the quiet residential neighbourhood on a motorbike.
Apparently he fled when he saw what happened. How can they attack something as sacred as a school? One pupil described to the local paper, Sud Ouest, how she had arrived for morning prayer, and heard shots ringing out. She said police had been called and children told to sit down. They were given water, and then they prayed together.
