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Nice terror suspect, 21, sent selfie to family just hours before killings

Brahim Aouissaoui, 21, selfie in shop
Brahim Aouissaoui, 21, was wearing the same clothes when he was shot by armed police after the attack (Picture: REX / AFP)

This is the selfie suspected Nice terror attacker Brahim Aouissaoui sent to his family just hours before worshippers were brutally killed at the Notre Dame Cathedral.

The 21-year-old sent this picture to friends back in Tunisia showing off his new clothes bought with money working illegally in Europe.

The image was taken at a shop in France the day before he walked into the cathedral, allegedly armed with two knives.

And he was wearing the same clothes – a red puffa jacket, white t-shirt, blue jeans and trainers – when he was shot by armed police after the attack.

Family and friends say he sent a series of pictures detailing his journey across the Mediterranean Sea from Tunisia over to Italy, and then to France.

But the purported extremist gave no hint of a plan to carry out a deadly attack on innocent worshippers, they told MailOnline.

His older brother Yassin, 38, said: ‘He bought new clothes and a mobile phone in France with the money he had earned working harvesting olives in Italy.

‘He was very proud of his new clothes and wanted to show us he was doing well. Brahim said he wanted to go to Europe to earn money to buy a car.

Dressed to kill: Terrorist sent a SELFIE to his family in Tunisia hours before launching a deadly attack on worshipers at French cathedral
The selfie Aouissaoui sent to his family just hours before the attack
The parents of the Nice assailant Brahim Aouissaoui, who a day earlier killed three people and wounded several others in the southern French city of Nice, are pictured at the family home in the Tunisian city of Sfax, on October 30, 2020. - The knife attacker killed three people, cutting the throat of at least one woman, inside a church in Nice on the French Riviera. (Photo by FETHI BELAID / AFP) (Photo by FETHI BELAID/AFP via Getty Images)
The parents of Aouissaoui, pictured at the family home in the Tunisian city of Sfax on Friday (Picture: AFP via Getty Images)
Rex Features Ltd. do not claim any Copyright or License of the attached image Mandatory Credit: Photo by REX (10987974a) Brahim Aoussaoui, a 21-year-old Tunisian migrant who killed three church-goers including Vincent Loqu?s, 54, the church warden at the Basilica of Notre-Dame in Nice, France, who had his throat slit as he prepared for mass at the church. Aoussaoui murdered him and two other Catholic church-goers on Thursday using a foot-long sword in an Islamic terror attack. Brahim Aoussaoui is pictured here smiling for a photograph after entering Italy after travelling from North Africa and arriving on the Italian island of Lampedusa on a small boat on September 20. This photo was posted on an
Aoussaoui smiling for a photograph upon entering Italy, after travelling from North Africa and arriving on the Italian island of Lampedusa on a small boat on September 20 (Picture: REX)

‘He made a lot of phone calls the night before the attack. He called us, the family and his friends.

‘He spent hours on the phone reassuring us that everything was fine. He said he had met an Arab man who was helping him to get on his feet in France.’

The family are devastated after the attack and claim they had no knowledge of Aouissaoui’s radicalisation.

His mother Gamra, 61, revealed: ‘Brahim did start praying and taking his religion more seriously a few months ago but he was not in contact with Salafists [Islamic extremists].

‘I thought becoming more interested in his religion would stop him drinking and taking drugs.’

His father Muhammad, 63, cannot believe that his gentle son carried out such an atrocity.

‘I just want the truth,’ he said.

Gamra, the mother of Brahim Aouissaoui, who is suspected of carrying out Thursday's attack in Nice, France, reacts at her home in Thina, a suburb of Sfax, Tunisia, October 30, 2020. REUTERS/Zoubeir Souissi
His family are left devastated by the events of last week (Picture: Reuters)
This image grab from AFP TV shows a picture of Nice assailant Brahim Aouissaoui, who a day earlier killed three people and wounded several others in the southern French city of Nice, held by his mother at the family home in the Tunisian city of Sfax, on October 30, 2020. - The knife attacker killed three people, cutting the throat of at least one woman, inside a church in Nice on the French Riviera. (Photo by AFPTV teams / AFP) (Photo by AFPTV TEAMS/AFP via Getty Images)
The picture the family have of their son (Picture: AFP via Getty Images)
Attacker in Nice church stabbing/beheading reportedly a 21 year old Tunisian migrant named Brahim Aoussaoui, who has been in France for less than a month. Arrive to Europe via Italy and entered France in October.
The first picture of Aouissaoui after the attack, when he was shot and Tasered by police (Picture: Northcliffe Collection)

Aouissaoui was identified by police to have arrived in Europe on a migrant boat last month, after being processed through the Italian Red Cross.

He beheaded a 60-year-old woman, slit the throat of sexton Vincent Loques, 55, and stabbed mother-of-three Simone Barreto Silva, 44, to death at Nice Notre-Dame Basilica on Thursday morning.  

He repeatedly shouted ‘Allahu akbar’, meaning ‘God is greatest’ in Arabic, even after he was shot by police 14 times.

He was Tasered, detained and treated by paramedics before being taken to hospital, where he remains in a critical condition.

Six other people between the ages of 25 and 63 have also been arrested in connection with the attack.

France was hit by five separate attacks over the course of a few days amid religious tensions, with President Emmanuel Macron saying the country is ‘under attack’.

BGUK_2024272 - Nice, FRANCE - Rescue and police are mobilised because a man attacked several people with a knife in the Notre-Dame Basilica in Nice on 29 October 2020. Pictured: Nice attack BACKGRID UK 29 OCTOBER 2020 BYLINE MUST READ: BEST IMAGE / BACKGRID UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com *UK Clients - Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
Picture from the scene in Nice after the attack on Thursday (Picture: Best Image / Backgrid)
NICE, FRANCE - NOVEMBER 01: A police officer with a sniffer dog checks flowers in front of Notre Dame basilica, before a mass to pay tribute to the victims on November 01, 2020 in Nice, France. A 21-year-old Tunisian man is accused of fatally stabbing three people in the church on Thursday, in what French President Emmanuel Macron described as an
A police officer with a sniffer dog checks flowers in front of Notre Dame basilica, before a mass to pay tribute to the victims yesterday in Nice (Picture: Getty Images)
NICE, FRANCE - NOVEMBER 01: Press stand in front of the Basilica during a mass to pay tribute to the victims on November 01, 2020 in Nice, France. A 21-year-old Tunisian man is accused of fatally stabbing three people in the church on Thursday, in what French President Emmanuel Macron described as an
Press stand in front of the Basilica during a mass to pay tribute to the victims yesterday in Nice (Picture: Getty Images)
NICE, FRANCE - NOVEMBER 01: Police stand in the street during a mass at Notre Dame basilica on November 01, 2020 in Nice, France. A 21-year-old Tunisian man is accused of fatally stabbing three people in the church on Thursday, in what French President Emmanuel Macron described as an
Police stand guard in the street during the mass (Picture: Getty Images)

At around 11.15am on Thursday, a knifeman was shot dead by police in the Montfavet district of Avignon, in southeastern France.

The shouter also shouted ‘Allahu Akbar’ as he threatened passers-by and police with a blade, according to reports.

At around a similar time, a man was arrested in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, for attacking a guard with a ‘sharp tool’ outside the French embassy.

And a man was tasered by police and shot with rubber bullets in Paris on Friday after allegedly trying to attack officers with a knife.

Then a priest was left critically injured after he was gunned down on Saturday while locking up his residence in Lyon. Police have launched a manhunt to find the gunman.

The recent spate of attacks come after teacher Samuel Paty was beheaded by an Islamist attacker in a Paris suburb two weeks ago.

It is not yet clear whether all the attacks were linked, which occurred ahead of the Catholic holy day of All Saints Day yesterday.

President Macron said soldiers would be posted at churches to ‘protect’ them, and raised the terror alert level to the maximum ’emergency’.

He told reporters in Nice: ‘If we are attacked, it is because of our values, our values of freedom and our desire not to yield to terror.

‘A deployment of soldiers [is] to be stepped up on French territory, stepping up protection of places of worship including churches.’

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.

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source https://metro.co.uk/2020/11/02/nice-terror-suspect-21-sent-selfie-to-family-just-hours-before-killings-13518906/

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