French police have arrested a man suspected of setting fires and causing an explosion at a synagogue in a southern resort on Saturday in what officials are treating as a terror attack, the country's interior minister said.
"The alleged perpetrator of the arson attack at the synagogue has been arrested," Interior Minister Gerard Darmanin said in a social media post on Saturday evening, adding that officers who made the arrest came under fire and had shown "great professionalism".
French prosecutors said the suspect was arrested in the southern city of Nimes shortly before midnight Saturday.
He was shot and injured by police after he opened fire on officers during the arrest. His life was not in danger.
“He opened fire on the police intervention unit, which returned fire, injuring [the suspect] in the face," the National Antiterrorism Prosecutor’s Office, tasked with investigating the incident, said in a statement Sunday.
Two other people linked to the suspect were also taken into custody, it added.
Police earlier said they were hunting for a man who, draped in a Palestinian flag, was believed to have set fires at the Beth Yaacov synagogue in the southern seaside resort of La Grande Motte, triggering an explosion that injured an officer.
French media reported that the suspect was a 33-year-old Algerian national, residing legally in France.
Tragedy narrowly avoided
Saturday's explosion was caused when two cars outside the synagogue were set alight. One contained a gas canister which then likely exploded 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.
Five people, including the rabbi, were in the synagogue at the time of the blast, which occured between 08:00 and 08:30 on Saturday morning, just half an hour before its Saturday service. None of them were injured.
Visiting the site of the attack, outgoing Prime Minister Gabriel Attal 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."
Images of an individual setting fire to the cars were picked up on CCTV.
In part of the footage, watched and authenticated by AFP, a man is seen with a Palestinian flag draped around his waist. His head, but not face, is 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.
Rise in antisemitism
"Exploding a gas bottle in a car in front of the Grande Motte synagogue at the expected time of arrival of the faithful: it's not just attacking a place of worship, it's an attempt to kill Jews," said Yonathan Arfi, head of the CRIF – an umbrella organisation of French Jewish groups.
Police protection of synagogues and Jewish schools and shops is being stepped up across France following the attack.
France is home to Europe's largest Jewish and Muslim population.
Local Jewish community leader Perla Danan denounced all the politicians and elected officials who've imported the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to France.
"You can't do that with impunity. It's put weapons into people's hands," she told RFI. "The incessant hate speech and constant stigmatisation of Jewish people has become impossible for French Jews."
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Acts of antisemitism have increased sharply in France since the 7 October attack by Hamas on Israel which triggered the war in Gaza.
"We are outraged, revolted and scandalised by this, given that antisemitic acts have increased dramatically, even more so since 7 October," Attal said.
Darmanin said this month that the government had counted 887 antisemitic acts in France in the first half of 2024, nearly three times as many as in the same period in 2023.
President Emmanuel Macron has called the synagogue attack "an act of terror", adding on X: "The fight against antisemitism is a daily fight."
(with newswires)
