The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, condemned this Friday the “cowardly” murder of a secondary school teacher in a high school in Arras, northern France, in an Islamist attack, and asked to “remain united” in the face of terrorism .
“I condemn in the strongest possible terms the cowardly murder of a teacher and the attack on two of his colleagues at a school in Arras today,” Von der Leyen wrote on her profile on the social network X.
The German politician assured that her thoughts are with the families of the victims and stated that “we must remain united against the terrorists.”
The attack at the Gambetta Lyceum in Arras occurred this morning, when a 20-year-old Russian-Chechen used a knife to kill a teacher and cause very serious injuries to a worker at the center and serious injuries to another teacher.
The murdered teacher intervened when he saw the perpetrator, a former student of the center, and with his action, along with that of the director and other workers, “he saved many lives,” according to French President Emmanuel Macron from the scene.
A 16-year-old brother of the author and two other people have also been arrested, according to police sources cited by various French media. Macron assured that his country will not “give in to terror” after the Islamist attack.
Likewise, the president of the European Commission was convinced this Friday that Israel’s response to the Hamas attacks will show that “it is a democracy”, a few hours before the deadline given to one million Palestinians in Gaza to to leave the north of the enclave. The UN, for its part, asked to cancel this evacuation order.
“I know that Israel’s response will show that it is a democracy,” Von der Leyen said in a media appearance alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who called for “a concrete position from the international community to apply sanctions against countries” that host Hamas representatives.
In another brief statement, together with the president of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, and the president of Israel, Isaac Herzog, Von der Leyen called on Hamas to “immediately release all hostages and completely refrain from taking civilians as shields, which is what Hamas constantly does.
“Hamas is a threat not only to Israel, but Hamas is also a threat to the Palestinian people. Therefore, once again, our call, very loud and clear, is to release the hostages and stop taking the people as human shields,” stressed the German.
The Islamist movement “is a terrorist organization that does not represent the aspirations of the Palestinian people. Therefore, it must – and we can – stop Hamas,” said Metsola, along with Herzog.
“I know that we can work together through the humanitarian consequences of what we face, after this barbaric act that we have seen,” added the president of the European Parliament.
Von der Leyen and Metsola traveled to Israel this Friday to show solidarity with the Israeli victims of last Saturday’s brutal attacks, visit the sites of the attacks and meet with the country’s authorities.
The president of the Commission assured that what she saw and heard in the Kfar Aza agricultural cooperative, where dozens of families were massacred, is “breaking her heart”: “people murdered while they slept”, “innocents burned alive or massacred in their homes “, “children and elderly torn from their families and taken hostage.”
“This is the most atrocious attack against the Jews since the Holocaust,” lamented the German conservative, who reiterated that Israel has the “right” and “duty” to defend itself.
For Von der Leyen, only Hamas and its “barbaric terrorists” are responsible for the massacres, which “have nothing to do with the legitimate aspiration of the Palestinian people.”
On the contrary, he stressed, “the horror that Hamas has unleashed is only causing more suffering for innocent Palestinians. They too are threatened.”
For his part, Metsola alluded to the massacre of young people in Reim, the place where Hamas turned a music festival “into a carnage of murders,” he said on his official X account.
“The horror is indescribable (…). The terrorists opened fire on people who were partying, killed, tortured and kidnapped,” said the Maltese politician, who was previously with Von der Leyen at the Kfar Aza cooperative.
From Brussels, the chief spokesman of the European Commission, Eric Mamer, regarding the “planned” displacement of a large part of the population of the Palestinian enclave due to the evacuation notice made by the Israeli Army for the north of the Strip, said that “the “Civilians must be previously warned and alerted about the arrival of military operations, allowing them to leave, and this is what Israel has done.”
For his part, from Beijing, where he is on an official visit, the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs, Josep Borrell, stated that it is “very unrealistic that a million people can move in 24 hours.”
