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Shooting at Jewish School Leaves Rabbi, 3 Kids Dead in France
By CHRISTOPHE SCHPOLIANSKY and NICK SCHIFRIN | Good Morning America – 2 hours 11 minutes ago
A shooter opened fire on a Jewish school in Toulouse, France, this morning just as students arrived, killing four, including a 30-year-old rabbi and his two children, officials said.
The shooter, who arrived and fled from the Ozar Hatorah school on a scooter or a motorcycle, "shot at everything he could see," according to local prosecutor Michel Valet.
The dead included Rabbi Jonathan Sandler, who taught at the school, his 3- and 6-year-old sons Gabriel and Arieh, and the school headmaster's 8-year-old daughter, according to the Israeli newspaper Ynet. Sandler, a French-Israeli national, had left Israel last September to begin a two year teaching stint at the school, according to the Le Parisien newspaper.
A 17-year-old and two other students were seriously wounded.
Authorities are investigating whether the shooting is linked to two other incidents where a shooter targeted his victims while driving a motorcycle in the same area.
Last Sunday, a paratrooper out of uniform was killed by a gunman on a motorbike outside of a gym in a suburb of Toulouse.
On Thursday, two soldiers were killed and a third wounded by a shooter on a
scooter as they used an ATM in Montauban, about 30 miles away.
The same caliber weapon – a .45 handgun, referred to in France as an 11.43 – was used in the shootings last week and this morning, police officials told local
media.
"It is too early to link the different shootings, but there are similarities between these shootings: same modus operandi, same area," French Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet told ABC News. "The shooter in all these cases was very determined."
Witnesses of today's shooting described a horrific scene at the drop-off point for nursery- and primary-age students. The killer arrived with two weapons, and one jammed, according to AFP.
"I saw two people dead in front of the school, an adult and a child ... It was a vision of horror, the bodies of two small children," a father whose child attends the school told RTL radio. "I did not find my son. Apparently he fled when he saw what happened. How can they attack something as sacred as a school?"
"Just because we are different doesn't mean we should be killed," one student's father, in tears, told the local newspaper Sud Quest from outside the school.
One student described how the shooting began just as she arrived for her morning prayers. "We were really afraid," she told Sud Quest. She said after police arrived, the children sat down, were given water, and prayed together.
The killer arrived at the school carrying two weapons, including the same .45 caliber gun that killed one of the soldiers in Thursday's attack, according to the Toulouse-based La Depeche newspaper.
Police say they have locked Toulouse down as they hunt for the killer, and the government tightened security at all religious sites in France, particularly Jewish schools. Sixty police officers, including anti-terrorist police, are helping with this investigation after they had already begun examining the attacks on the troops.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is running for re-election, immediately flew to Toulouse, which is about 425 miles south of Paris.
"Whatever happens," he said, "faced with this kind of toll, we can say that the French Republic as a whole has been hit by this appalling tragedy."
A shooter opened fire on a Jewish school in Toulouse, France, this morning just as students arrived, killing four, including a 30-year-old rabbi and his two children, officials said.
The shooter, who arrived and fled from the Ozar Hatorah school on a scooter or a motorcycle, "shot at everything he could see," according to local prosecutor Michel Valet.
The dead included Rabbi Jonathan Sandler, who taught at the school, his 3- and 6-year-old sons Gabriel and Arieh, and the school headmaster's 8-year-old daughter, according to the Israeli newspaper Ynet. Sandler, a French-Israeli national, had left Israel last September to begin a two year teaching stint at the school, according to the Le Parisien newspaper.
A 17-year-old and two other students were seriously wounded.
Authorities are investigating whether the shooting is linked to two other incidents where a shooter targeted his victims while driving a motorcycle in the same area.
Last Sunday, a paratrooper out of uniform was killed by a gunman on a motorbike outside of a gym in a suburb of Toulouse.
On Thursday, two soldiers were killed and a third wounded by a shooter on a
scooter as they used an ATM in Montauban, about 30 miles away.
The same caliber weapon – a .45 handgun, referred to in France as an 11.43 – was used in the shootings last week and this morning, police officials told local
media.
"It is too early to link the different shootings, but there are similarities between these shootings: same modus operandi, same area," French Interior Ministry spokesman Pierre-Henry Brandet told ABC News. "The shooter in all these cases was very determined."
Witnesses of today's shooting described a horrific scene at the drop-off point for nursery- and primary-age students. The killer arrived with two weapons, and one jammed, according to AFP.
"I saw two people dead in front of the school, an adult and a child ... It was a vision of horror, the bodies of two small children," a father whose child attends the school told RTL radio. "I did not find my son. Apparently he fled when he saw what happened. How can they attack something as sacred as a school?"
"Just because we are different doesn't mean we should be killed," one student's father, in tears, told the local newspaper Sud Quest from outside the school.
One student described how the shooting began just as she arrived for her morning prayers. "We were really afraid," she told Sud Quest. She said after police arrived, the children sat down, were given water, and prayed together.
The killer arrived at the school carrying two weapons, including the same .45 caliber gun that killed one of the soldiers in Thursday's attack, according to the Toulouse-based La Depeche newspaper.
Police say they have locked Toulouse down as they hunt for the killer, and the government tightened security at all religious sites in France, particularly Jewish schools. Sixty police officers, including anti-terrorist police, are helping with this investigation after they had already begun examining the attacks on the troops.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who is running for re-election, immediately flew to Toulouse, which is about 425 miles south of Paris.
"Whatever happens," he said, "faced with this kind of toll, we can say that the French Republic as a whole has been hit by this appalling tragedy."
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