The cold-blooded killing of a rabbi and three young children at a Jewish school in Toulouse in south-west France have cast a sombre shadow over the country. Jonathan Sandler, aged 30, his two sons aged three and six and a seven-year-old girl were all shot dead at close range by a lone gunman outside the Ozar Hatorah Jewish secondary school in Toulouse at 8am on Monday March 19th.
The killer is thought to be the same gunman who shot dead a French soldier in Toulouse on March 11th and two other soldiers at nearby Montauban on March 15th. All three soldiers were of North African origin. Investigators have since identified a prime suspect, a 24-year-old called Mohamed Merah who is said to have described himself as an Al Qaeda sympathiser who wanted to avenge the plight of Palestinian children and who was opposed to French military operations abroad. He was killed on Thursday after a long siege at his flat in Toulouse.
The bloody tragedy has inevitably cast a shadow, too, over the presidential election campaign, in which the first round of voting takes place on April 22nd (1). The two frontrunners President Nicolas Sarkozy and the Socialist Party's François Hollande both visited Toulouse in the immediate aftermath of the shootings to pay tribute to the victims. Here Mediapart looks at how the various candidates have so far reacted to the events in Toulouse. For some it has been a question of continuing to campaign without appearing to; others have kept to their election agenda. But all have adjusted their strategy hour-by-hour in reaction to this fast-moving and tragic story.
Nicolas Sarkozy
The candidate for the right-wing UMP may have suspended his electoral campaign after the shootings but that did not mean he disappeared from public view. Re-assuming his role as President of the Republic rather than presidential candidate, Sarkozy called for a minute's silence in all of France's schools on Monday at 11am. He also visited the Nazareth synagogue in Paris. On Monday he formally announced that his official campaign would be suspended until at least Wednesday – the day of the three soldiers' funerals in Montauban which he attended in his capacity as president. Official campaign visits were stopped, as were scheduled media appearances. Sarkozy's campaign website lafranceforte.fr had a black band added and announced the suspension of the campaign (see below).
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According to a Sarkozy aide who spoke to Le Monde newspaper Sarkozy “doesn't want to be accused of exploiting the tragedy”. But the unnamed aide added: “Even if, re-assuming the mantle of president in these circumstances does him no harm.”
A spokesman for Sarkozy's right-wing UMP party Sébastien Huyghe added: “Nicolas Sarkozy is carrying out the role of a president, he is doing his job. He cannot be criticised for doing something; he has a very sober attitude. To criticise him would be out of place – and would also be playing politics.'
Nonetheless Sarkozy did attract criticism when, during a visit to a collége in Paris' 4th arrondissement the president told pupils “the killer attacked a young girl, you should reflect on that”. The socialist mayor of that arrondissement, Dominique Bertinotti, later said on Twitter that it was a speech “à la George W. Bush” in a reference to the former United States president. “I'd have preferred a republican speech rather than an emotional one,” she added (see below).
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1: The French presidential election takes place over two rounds of voting, this year to be held on April 22nd and May 6th. The two candidates who receive the most votes in the first round go through to a head-to-head in the second. Before the Toulouse shootings opinion polls suggested that François Hollande and Nicolas Sarkozy would get a similar number of votes in the first round but that Hollande would beat Sarkozy comfortably in the second round.
"The campaign's on hold"
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François Hollande
The campaign team of Socialist Party candidate François Hollande, the pollsters' favourite to win the election, also suspended their campaign. “The Republic must pull together,” was the message. Their big fear was their candidate committing a serious error which could be exploited by main adversary Nicolas Sarkozy and which would undermine Hollande's credentials as a future president. This explains the campaign team's and the candidate’s grave posture since Monday and their instruction to activists not to give the impression of exploiting the story.
Hollande himself went on television on Monday to announce that “[the campaign] is suspended ...it is not democracy that is suspended,” he added. “I don't want to believe that anyone would want to exploit a tragedy...” Campaign events were called off, and Hollande's scheduled media appearances put on hold. In Rennes in Brittany preparations were well under way for a political rally when Hollande's electoral campaign director Pierre Moscovici issued a press release saying that it had been postponed until April 4th. François André, a close supporter of Hollande who is standing in Rennes at the parliamentary elections taking place in June, said: “The campaign is on hold – the nation is mourning.”
The campaigning was due to be suspended until at least Thursday, after the funeral of the three soldiers which Hollande was also attending.
François Bayrou
The leader of the centrist Modem party François Bayrou chose not to suspend his campaign, though his schedule was modified. “You don't put an end to [intolerance] by taking a break for three days,” he told a meeting at Valence, after holding a minute's silence for the victims of Toulouse. “It is a subject that should be dealt with during the presidential campaign.”
Bayrou had drawn criticism when at a meeting at Grenoble hours after the shootings he attacked what he called a “growing...degree of stigmatisation” in the country and national debate. This was widely interpreted as an attack on the right and far-right for the way they had tackled the issues of immigration and national identity during the election campaign and before.
Foreign minister Alain Juppé accused Bayrou of adding the “vile” to the “horrid”. However, Jean-Luc Benhamias, vice-president of Modem, said Bayrou had been talking about the “general climate” in France. “If some people feel targeted, then too bad for them,” he said.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon
On the left Jean-Luc Mélenchon and aides at the Front de Gauche (Front of the Left), which includes the Communist Party and his own Party of the Left, were, like Bayrou, sceptical about the suspension of the campaign. “François Hollande was on the television this morning, Nicolas Sarkozy explains that he has resumed the role of president. No one has forgotten that they are in a campaign,” said Eric Coquerel, special adviser to Mélenchon. The candidate himself, who on the Sunday before the Toulouse school shootings had enjoyed a successful public meeting in Paris, gave a brief public statement about the tragedy and joined a silent march through the French capital. But from Tuesday he and his team had resumed their campaign.
Eva Joly
Meanwhile Eva Joly, candidate for the environmental movement Europe Ecologie-Les Verts, decided to suspend her campaign. 'You have to respect national mourning,” said her campaign director Stéphane Sitbon-Gomez. 'You cannot continue the campaign in the same way.” He also warned against drawing political conclusions too quickly from the tragic events of recent days. “Today is above all a time for silence,” he added.
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English version: Michael Streeter