Two jihadists murdered an
85-year-old priest , Father Jacques Hamel,celebrating Mass in a church in Normandy on Tuesday — with
one forcing him to kneel near the altar before slitting his throat as the other
captured the gruesome act on video, French officials said.
A nun, named as Sister Danielle,who escaped said she saw
the attackers give a sermon in Arabic at the altar as they carried out their
terror attack.
The two had fake explosives and
used nuns as human shields, a prosecutors said, adding that the attackers
claimed allegiance to ISIS and cried out, “Allahu akbar,” during the attack.
ISIS quickly claimed
responsibility for the attack, in which the assailants stormed the church in
the town of Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray and took the Rev. Jacques Hamel, two nuns
and two worshippers hostage.
“They forced him to his knees,
and obviously, he wanted to defend himself, and that’s when the drama began,”
said one nun, who identified herself as Sister Danielle, The Guardian reported.
“They were filming themselves preaching
in Arabic in front of the altar. It was a horror.”
Police killed the two
terrorists as they came out of the church. One other person was arrested in
connection with the attack, the 16-year-old younger brother of someone wanted
by police for
trying to go to Syria or Iraq in 2015.
back by Turkish authorities and jailed in France.
12:30 p.m. The church was attacked at 9:40 a.m.
is because we are a democracy.”
One of the attackers was
identified as 19-year-old Adel Kermiche, a Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray resident
who had tried to travel to fight for ISIS in Syria in 2015, BFM-TV reported. He
was sent
He was released in March and
allowed to live with his parents near the church while wearing an electronic
bracelet that monitored his movement — allowing him to be out between 8:30 a.m.
and
The church was one of several
houses of worship that appeared on a hit list discovered on an ISIS suspect in
April 2015, sources told the Express of the UK.
French President François
Hollande, visiting the scene of the “ignoble terrorist attack,” said ISIS had
declared war on France, which was already reeling from recent massacres at the
hands of savage jihadists.
“We are confronted with a
group, Daesh, which has declared war on us,” he said, using an alternative name
for ISIS. “We have to wage war, by every means, [but through] upholding the
law, which
ISIS claimed responsibility
shortly after the attack. “The perpetrators of the Normandy church attack are
soldiers of the Islamic State who carried out the attack in response to calls
to target countries of the Crusader coalition,” the group said via its Amaaq
news agency.
Pope Francis expressed his
“pain and horror,” according to the Vatican.
The attack comes amid a spate
of terror strikes in France, including Tunisian Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel’s
truck rampage in Nice on July 14, when he plowed into Bastille Day revelers,
killing 84 and injured more than 300.
After that attack, the nation
extended a state of emergency until January, giving authorities extra powers to
carry out searches and place suspects under house arrest.
France has been concerned about
church attacks ever since Algerian student Sid Ahmed Ghlam, 24, was found with
a hit list when he was arrested in Paris in April 2015 for allegedly killing a
woman.
Authorities found documents
about ISIS in his apartment and believe he had been in touch with a jihadist in
Syria about an attack on a church.
Credits: http://nypost.com/2016/07/26/france-church-where-priest-was-killed-came-up-on-isis-hit-list/
Aren’t
they still newlyweds? Didn’t she just announce her pregnancy with a baby girl
due later this year and show off her cute bump? But it seems the whirlwind romance
of all-grown-up Rudy and a Real Househusband has come to a sad and unexpected
demise. In this swipe right, on demand society the divorce filing was in our
faces before even the woman it was addressed to. But the
details of what happened between this couple can’t be our main concern. Our
priority has to be the health of this mother-to-be and the baby girl growing
inside her womb and sending them all the love their hearts can hold.
Keisha Knight-Pulliam’s baby is also listening and
feeding off the energy of her surroundings and us, the society she will enter.
If she could send us a message I’m sure it would include, “I can hear you.” She
is not a faceless headline, but a woman in the making, already impacted by the
lives and decisions of her parents. Resist your judgement of how she came to be
and focus on her wellbeing and all the babies making their way to the world. We
can send her love and be the light in our own relationships and families. Dear Baby
Girl, we stand guard for your #blackgirlmagic as you prepare for your debut.
You are loved.
