What does the terrorist organization Hamas have to do with the beheading of French history teacher Samuel Paty four years ago? Quite a lot, as the criminal trial that recently opened in Paris against seven men and one woman might reveal. One of the accused, 65-year-old Abdelhakim S., has fueled hatred against Israel and promoted anti-Semitic ideas for years.
In 2004, he founded a collective in France named after Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmad Yassin. He spread his Islamist propaganda online and on the streets. S. now faces trial for inciting the hate campaign against Paty on social media in the fall of 2020, potentially facing up to 30 years in prison. Only after Paty’s beheading at the end of October 2020 was the Sheikh Yassin Collective banned and dissolved by the Interior Minister.
In the coming weeks, the court in Paris will analyze the seemingly unstoppable spiral of violence that escalated from a lesson on freedom of speech to the murder of the history teacher near the school in the Paris suburbs. A significant plaintiff is the teacher’s sister, Mickaëlle Paty. In her book, she described how the institutions and people who should have protected Paty failed to act, fearing scandal. In her view, the rectorate in Versailles and the laïcité representative were reluctant to offend the accusers. “We’re betting that things will calm down eventually if no one talks about it,” she summarized. She describes poignantly how her brother felt increasingly threatened and isolated.
He had been accused by a student, who was absent during the lesson, of discriminating against and provoking Muslims by showing, as educational material, the Muhammad cartoons published by the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo. The student’s father, also among the accused, then launched serious accusations on social media against the allegedly Islamophobic teacher, triggering the hate campaign that S. picked up and fueled.
It is the story of a deadly spiral that lasted two weeks. On October 6, 2020, Samuel Paty taught a fourth-grade class at Collège du Bois d’Aulne a subject on the curriculum that he had covered many times: “To Be or Not to Be Charlie?” The phrase comes from the slogan “#JeSuisCharlie” (I am Charlie), which circulated beyond France’s borders after the Islamist attack on the Charlie Hebdo office in January 2015. But can one not be Charlie? Paty’s students were asked to discuss a dilemma: Do the Charlie Hebdo caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad go too far by hurting Muslims’ feelings, or does freedom of expression take precedence?
Before showing one of the cartoons, Paty gave Muslim students who wished to do so a chance to avert their gaze for a few seconds or briefly leave the classroom, which some did. But soon the incident took on a new dynamic. A 13-year-old student told her parents that Paty had excluded her and all Muslim classmates from the room. This, as later proven, was a double lie: the girl had not even been present in class.
The girl’s father, Brahim Chnina, was outraged. He posted his daughter’s version on Facebook, calling the teacher a “voyou” (thug) and sharing the school’s name, address, and the teacher’s name. The information remained online for only an hour and a half before he deleted it, but by then it was too late. Samuel Paty had become a target. Calls began pouring into the school from around the world, including threats.
Two days later, the Islamist Abdelhakim Sefrioui contacted the girl’s father and encouraged his outrage. Sefrioui recorded a ten-minute YouTube video, interviewing father and daughter, who repeated their allegations. The video was titled: “In a State High School, Islam and the Prophet Are Insulted.” Tens of thousands viewed it.
The campaign against Samuel Paty intensified, spreading on other social media platforms, and the false narrative became unstoppable. An 18-year-old Chechen from Évreux, who had radicalized online only that summer, learned about the story. On social media, he wrote: “You’ll see, soon people will talk about me.” He contacted Brahim Chnina, and they spoke on the phone several times. The young man sought information about Paty, though he did not know the teacher.
On October 16, he traveled to Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, armed with a knife. He offered a group of students 300 or 350 euros to point out Samuel Paty. Three students agreed. He then followed Paty on his way home. It was nearly 5 p.m., the last day before fall break. He killed Samuel Paty in broad daylight and posted a prepared statement: “I have executed one of your hellhounds who insulted Muhammad. It is Monsieur Paty.” Ten minutes later, the attacker was shot dead by police.
The presiding judge emphasized the historical significance at the start of the trial, which is being recorded for posterity. “It wasn’t just one man, one teacher, who was targeted by Islamists; it was our entire education system,” said history teacher Iannis Roder on the radio. He is one of the authors of the book The Lost Territories of the Republic, which in 2004 first documented the retreat of schools in the face of the creeping Islamization of entire districts.
At the end of 2023, the trial against Samuel Paty’s students, who had accepted money to point him out to the attacker, concluded, resulting in suspended sentences of six to fourteen months. The student whose lie sparked the manhunt testified as one of 98 witnesses. Four other defendants are suspected of inciting the attacker to avenge the insult against Muhammad via Snapchat groups. The 36-year-old Priscilla M. and the 22-year-olds Yusuf C., Ismael G., and Louqmane I. were only virtual contacts of the attacker.
Can online hate already constitute aiding terrorism? And can that be proven in court? The case shook the country then, and it still does today. The teacher’s name is burned into the collective memory of the French.
