Murders in France: more details/less clarity
Security is super-tight in Toulouse as the hunt for the killer of Jewish school children and immigrant soldiers intensifies.
France has been convulsed by the shooting yesterday of a Rabbi and three children at Jewish school. Schools across the country today observed a moment's silence.
Extra police and security personnel have poured into the area around Toulouse in southwest France as an intense manhunt gets underway.
Yesterday I noted that things are so crazy in the world that the murderer could be either a neo-Nazi or a jihadi. This report at rue89.com (in French) says the police are working from the same point of view and investigating the crimes on a twin track: looking for a neo-Nazi, like Norwegian Anders Breivik, or a Muslim extremist.
A few new facts have come out today that gives greater credence to a white supremacist, neo-Nazi as the shooter. First, eyewitnesses have reportedly told police that the gunman was wearing a camera strapped to his chest. Breivik wore similar device. Interior Minister Charles Gueant said, "This is indeed a clue that we have been told about. It's a video camera worn in a harness on the chest and indeed he was seen, a witness said so, with this device."
The other important clue refers to the paratroopers of North African and Caribbean origin who were gunned down last week by the same shooter.
Apparently a couple of the soldiers served in a regiment that in 2008 had three members expelled for neo-Nazi activity. A photo of the three giving a Nazi salute was published in today's Sun newspaper in London.
The BBC reports the soldiers in the photo have been cleared of any involvement in the shootings, but in this atmosphere it is a coincidence that cannot be totally put out of investigators' minds.
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