Strasbourg market killings a ‘massacre of innocents’

The traditional Christmas market in Strasbourg, one of the busiest in Europe, reopened last week after an Islamist militant killed five visitors and wounded a dozen others in what the city’s archbishop called a “massacre of innocents”.

The bells of all Catholic churches in the eastern French city tolled in memory of the victims on 12 December, the day after the attack by a local-born man. Local dignitaries, residents and leaders of all faiths in the region attended an evening prayer service at the cathedral the next day, where Archbishop Luc Ravel told them: “There is nothing good that is not fused with evil.”

But he added: “The Christmas message was not contradicted but confirmed by the drama on Tuesday night. Good and evil are there but in the end, good will has the last word.”

Chérif Chekatt, 29, was shot dead in a gun battle with police two days after the attack.

A known delinquent with 27 convictions for robbery and violence in France, Germany and Switzerland, he apparently embraced radical Islam during his last prison sentence in 2016.

In his first statement on 12 December, Archbishop Ravel said he had been at his residence “only a few steps away from where this crime occurred, where any of us could have been”. Apart from being shocked by it, he denounced the “clear-headed madness” of the killer whose act was not “rational or religious”.  

At the prayer vigil, Ravel said good could only triumph if people did not follow “old demons” such as anti-Semitism, agitation against migrants and manipulating social anger — an oblique reference to the way some politicians have stoked the recent “yellow vest” demonstrations in France. “We need God’s help,” he said. “These old demons will be driven out by prayer and unity.”

Ravel thanked the police, medical staff and shopkeepers who had protected visitors to the market during the shooting spree. The Pope also sent his condolences to victims’ families and to those “who cared for the injured”.