Teacher decapitated in France after showing cartoons of the prophet Muhammad.

 

People stand near the scene of the attack. Reuters. 

A teacher has been beheaded by a radical Muslim in France after showing cartoons of the prophet Muhammad in class. Reuters. The attacker was shot dead by police after he killed the teacher and was originally from Moscow. French President Emmanuel Macron condemned the attack, calling it an Islamic terror attack. The attacker screamed "Allahu akbar", a common saying during Islamic terror attacks. The murder of a teacher is being considered an attack on the French state itself by many of France's leaders. The teacher had shown the cartoons as part of a civics class but video from that class was leaked by one of his students and went viral on social media. France has a long history of Islamic terror attacks and most recently had a man attack people with a meat cleaver near the old offices of the Charlie Hebdo magazine, which were also victim of a terror attack in 2015. 

My Comment:

Terrible case out of France today. There are graphic photos of this attack but I am not going to share them here. But it is very clear that the victim was decapitated in a brutal murder. This is one of the more terrible attacks to hit France since the fall of ISIS.

I think the teacher was right to show the cartoons in his class. Like it or not, those cartoons are part of France's history now and you can't teach history if you have to censor it. After all, those cartoons are a symbol of free speech and the French State and you can't possibly understand the Charlie Hebdo attacks if you don't see the cartoons. 

I know that depicting the prophet Muhammad is against most forms of Islam but what French Muslims need to understand is that most people don't follow their religion. Considering how important the Charlie Hebdo attacks are now it's pretty much impossible for those cartoons to not be discussed. And there is no reason why a secular school can't show them to their students, most of them who have zero religious objection to it whatsoever. 

I was somewhat surprised that the attacker was from Russia, specifically Moscow. I know that Russia has a large Muslim minority but I didn't realize that there were many in Moscow. I guess I shouldn't be surprised though as I am sure many of them traveled around internally in Russia. And there have been several major terror attacks in Russia committed by Russian Muslims. 

I don't think this attack had any wider connections to any terror groups. Mostly because al-Qaeda and ISIS simply don't exist as organized forces anymore. Their base of power has been destroyed and with it the ability to conduct terror attacks. The attacker may have viewed their online information but I doubt there was much more than that. 

Indeed, this looks like a classic "lone wolf" attacker. I don't see much in the way of a larger conspiracy here unless his friends and family helped him. Though I would say that the people that made the teacher go viral are responsible for this attack as well. They doxxed this teacher and did it full well understanding that someone like the attacker could hurt or kill him. And that's exactly what happened. 

As for the teacher himself, I consider him a martyr for free speech, a right that has been under fierce attack in the west for some time now. Anyone who stands up for that right is brave and anyone who dies because of it is a martyr. And since he was brave, I will continue to do so as well and publish one of the Muhammad cartoons on this page.