It has been five years since Joachim stopped studying at the Gambetta institute in Arras, in the north of France. And more than a decade that he had as a French teacher at Dominique Bernard, 57 years old. Although her memories of him are vague, she did not hesitate this Saturday to go in front of her high school to place a bouquet of flowers and pay tribute to this teacher, brutally murdered on Friday by Mohammed M., 20 years old, a former student booked. by Islamic radicalism. Dozens of students, alumni and parents of this public secondary school (without any religious denomination) did the same, victim of a jihadist attack that has traumatized this medium-sized city, with about 40,000 inhabitants and located about 180 kilometers north of Paris.
“He was someone who was always willing to protect others and resolve conflicts peacefully. “I’m not surprised that he stood in front of the terrorist,” Joachim explains to EL PERIÓDICO about “Monsieur Bernard,” as his students called him. His death has not only shocked this town in the former mining basin of the northern strip, greatly affected by deindustrialization, but has also forced the French authorities to increase the anti-terrorist alert level to the maximum.
The Government announced this Saturday that it is increasing the number of soldiers to 7,000 – normally there are around 3,000 who patrol French streets – deployed within the framework of Operation Sentinelle. He Louvre Museum and the Palace of Versailles They had to evacuate their visitors and close this Saturday after receiving warning messages, probably false, of possible attacks. They also evacuated one of the parts of the Gare de Lyon in Paris. On the other hand, the large area in Place Concordia in Paris where fans gather to watch the Rugby World Cup matches on a giant screen remains open.
As if facing a tragic alignment of planets, Emmanuel Macron’s Executive is especially afraid of the current situation as it coincides with the third anniversary of the beheading of Professor Samuel Paty —brutally murdered by a young Russian-Chechen jihadist on October 16, 2020— with the possible repercussions in French territory of the war in Gaza. Since last weekend, the authorities have detected more than a hundred anti-Semitic acts. Most of them consisted of graffiti or verbal insults. None of them extremely serious, but it is feared that they could get worse in the future. the country where the largest Jewish community in Europe lives (about 600,000 members).
An attack linked to the war in Gaza?
“Hamas had called for attacks to take place this Friday. “We knew that they could probably take place in France,” says Pierre Millet, 19, who studies at the Gambetta high school in one of its preparatory classes (a special course after Baccalaureate) to prepare for the entrance exams to the Saint-Jean military school. Cyr. The Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, — known for being talkative and not always rigorous with his statements — also said that “there is, unfortunately, a link” between the attack in Arras and the new escalation in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, although he did not provide any evidence of this, beyond the context and the Islamist dimension. The investigation will determine if there is a real link.
“I don’t think it has to do with the relationship in the conflict between Israel and Palestine,” defends Noah, 16, a student at the Savary Ferry high school in Arras, the same one where Mohammed M’s little brother studied. , who was arrested on Friday while trying to sneak into another secondary school. “This attack is above all linked to the case of Samuel Paty,” says Noah, referring to the History teacher who was beheaded for having shown the caricatures of Muhammad from the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in one of his classes.
As happened three years ago, The person responsible for the death of Professor Bernard is a young Russian-Chechen who had spent most of his life in France, where his family obtained asylum. During the attack, according to several witnesses, he had a special fixation on stabbing a history teacher. In addition to the perpetrator of the attack, neutralized by the security forces thanks to the use of the taser, nine other people are currently detained at the police station and were interrogated in relation to the case. Most of them are part of the assailant’s family, known for their Salafist affinities and that he already had a son imprisoned in 2019 for his activities as Islamic State propagandist (EI).
A devotee of education and poetry
“He wasn’t someone who came to school often. “He already had his ideas and strange vision of religion,” recalls Genny, 14, who claims that some of her friends knew the perpetrator of the attack. Despite the sadness and horror experienced, this Gambetta High School student returned to the center this Saturday bloodied along with her parents and her three brothers. While she was waiting in line to participate in the wreath offering, she was teary-eyed and hugging one of her sisters.
“When the alarm went off, at first we thought it was an exercise. Then, when we saw the videos – which circulated very quickly on social networks – we told ourselves that it was a joke. “We didn’t believe what was happening,” Jenny remembers about the moment of the attack. Three other professionals from the centerone of them in a very serious way, also they were injured in the raid of the radicalized former student, with two knives. “Both Professor Bernard and his other three classmates who stood in the way of the terrorist acted as heroes,” says Marine, 22, a former student who had him as a French teacher, as well as her older sister and little brother, who lived in ‘in situ’ attack.
Related news
Bernard, father of three daughters and descendant of a family of teachers, was devoted to education, as well as passionate about poetry. “Always cheerful,” “attentive to the problems of his students,” “passionate about his profession.”… Praise emerges among those who knew him and mourn the death of the teacher. He is added to the name of Samuel Paty and Colonel Beltramemurdered in 2018, on the list of French officials killed by jihadist after having acted as everyday heroes.
“They say that the best are the first to leave us and, unfortunately, this is what happened to him,” said Thibault, 22, who had him as a teacher in his first years at that high school. He had also been the teacher of the same perpetrator of the attack, whom he had rated with 17.5 out of 20 at the end of the course and had advised him to continue studying literature. An advice that Mohammed M. did not follow and embraced the jihadist delirium.