LA GRANDE-MOTTE, France: Police arrested a man suspected of setting fires and causing an explosion at a synagogue in southern France on Saturday (Aug 24) in what officials suspect was a terror attack, the country’s interior minister said.
“The suspected perpetrator of the criminal fires at the synagogue has been detained,” minister Gerard Darmanin said on X, adding that officers who made the arrest came under fire.
Police earlier said they were hunting for a man who, draped in a Palestinian flag, was believed to have set fires at a synagogue and triggered an explosion that injured an officer in the seaside resort of La Grande Motte.
An official source who asked not to be named told AFP the arrest took place in the nearby town of Nimes. An official in the state prosecution service added that two people associated with the suspect were also detained.
France’s interim Prime Minister Gabriel Attal earlier visited the site of the attack along with Darmanin and said: “We narrowly avoided an absolute tragedy.”
“Once more, French Jews have been targeted and attacked as a result of their beliefs,” Attal said.
“If the synagogue had been filled with worshippers … there probably would have been human victims.”
Security around Jewish sites was tightened following the attack early Saturday at Beth Yaacov synagogue in La Grande Motte, near the city of Montpellier.
Two cars outside the synagogue were set alight, with a gas canister then likely exploding inside one of the vehicles, police said.
Two fires were also started at the entrance of the synagogue, damaging two doors, but were quickly put out, investigators said.
The wounded police officer had been injured by the blast after rushing to the scene after the fires were started, police said.
President Emmanuel Macron called the incident “an act of terror”, adding on X: “The fight against anti-Semitism is a daily fight.”
He said “all means are being deployed” to apprehend the suspect.
La Grande Motte’s mayor, Stephan Rossignol, said that CCTV had picked up images of an individual setting fire to the cars.
In part of the footage, watched and authenticated by AFP, a man is seen with a Palestinian flag draped around his waist, his head covered by a red Palestinian keffiyeh.
The man carried two bottles filled with a yellowish liquid. The footage also seems to show the contours of a handgun.
Sources close to the investigation said the suspect left the scene on foot.
The fires and explosion came amid a heightened state of alert in France and other European countries because of the war in Gaza.
Source: CNA
