Timeline of extremist attacks in France in recent years

A look at some of the extremist attacks in the country

On October 29 2020. a knife-wielding man kills three people at the church, slitting the throat of at least one of them, in what officials are treating as the latest jihadist attack to rock the country. Credit: AFP Photo

The attack in Nice on Thursday follows a spate of Islamic extremist violence in France in recent years. Here is a look at some of those attacks:

— Oct. 16, 2020: History teacher Samuel Paty is decapitated in the Paris suburbs. He had previously showed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in a class on freedom of expression. The attacker, Moscow-born Chechen refugee Abdullakh Anzorov, 18, was shot dead by police.

— Sept. 25, 2020: Two people are injured in a stabbing outside the former headquarters of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris. A Pakistani man was arrested and handed terrorism charges.

— March 2018: A French-Moroccan armed man opens fire on police officers and took hostages in a supermarket before being shot dead by police in southern France.

— June 1, 2017: An Algerian man wielding a hammer attacks police officers patrolling in front of Notre Dame Cathedral. He had declared his allegiance to the Islamic State.

— April 20, 2017: A gunman shoots and kills a police officer on Paris' Champs-Elysees in an attack claimed by the Islamic State group.

— March 18, 2017: A man wounds a police officer with a revolver loaded with birdshot, then attacks soldiers at Paris' Orly Airport while brandishing a revolver and yelling that he wanted to kill and then die for Allah.

— Feb. 3, 2017: A machete-wielding Egyptian man shouting “Allahu akbar!” attacks French soldiers guarding the Louvre Museum in Paris, slightly injuring one of them.

— July 26, 2016: An 85-year-old priest, Father Jacques Hamel, is murdered in Rouen by two 19-year-old Islamic extremists who slit his throat as he celebrated Mass.

— July 14, 2016: A man drives a truck into Bastille Day revelers in Nice, killing 86. The Islamic State claimed responsibility

— Nov. 13, 2015: Islamic State-linked extremists attack the Bataclan concert hall, France's national sports stadium and other sites across Paris, killing 130 people.

— Jan. 7-9, 2015: Attacks on the Paris offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and on a kosher grocery leave 17 dead. Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula claims responsibility, in revenge for Charlie Hebdo's depictions of the Prophet Muhammad.

— March 2012: A gunman claiming links to al-Qaida kills three Jewish schoolchildren, a rabbi and three paratroopers in Toulouse, southern France.

— Nov. 2, 2011: The offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris are firebombed after the satirical magazine runs a cover featuring a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad. No one is injured.

Also read: Proud to provoke Islamists, despite violence: Charlie Hebdo

Deccan Herald is on WhatsApp Channels| Join now for Breaking News & Editor's Picks