Attacker in France kills two police officials and posts video pledging loyalty to Islamic State

Reporting from Paris —  An attacker fatally stabbed a French police commander and an administrator -- partners with a 3-year-old son -- and posted online video pledging loyalty to Islamic State before being killed when police moved to end a three-hour standoff.

Larossi Abballa had claimed allegiance to extremist group leader Abu Bakr Baghdadi, telling police he was responding to Baghdadi’s call to “kill nonbelievers” at home and with their families, authorities said.

In that pursuit, Abballa stabbed and killed Les Mureaux Police Commander Jean-Baptiste Salvaing, 42, outside his home in Magnanville, about 30 miles west of Paris, Monday night, prosecutor Francois Molins said.

Molins said Abballa then went into the home, taking 36-year-old Jessica Schneider, a police administrator in nearby district Mantes-la-Jolie, as well as the couple’s son, hostage.

While inside, he posted a video on Facebook and also claimed responsibility for the attack on Twitter.

In the video, Abballa called on extremist supporters to attack police, journalists, public figures, prison guards and rappers and urged terrorist sympathizers to attack “members of parliament or your town mayors,” the news agency Agence France-Presse reported.

“It’s super easy, you just have to wait for them by their offices.… We will wait for you in front of your homes,” said Abballa, 25.

Authorities said that after several hours, when negotiations with the attacker had failed, police stormed the property and killed him. They found Schneider dead from a knife wound to the neck.

The child was “safe and unharmed but shocked” and was immediately taken to a hospital, Molins said.

Before police moved in, Abballa had threatened to cause more damage, authorities said.

“He finished by insisting the rapid-intervention police move away from the door of the house, and then broke off all contact with them,” Molins said. “At midnight, the rapid-intervention police launched an assault on the house before neutralizing the mortally wounded terrorist.”

In 2013, Abballa, of Mantes-la-Jolie, was given a three-year jail term, with six months suspended, for “association with criminals with a view to preparing a terrorist attack” after being found guilty of involvement in a network to recruit extremist fighters. As he had already spent most of the prison sentence in custody awaiting trial, he was released shortly after his conviction in September 2013.

President Francois Hollande called Abballa’s attack a terrorist act and urged heightened security. France is hosting the monthlong European Championship soccer tournament. The nation also is recovering from an Islamic State attack in November that killed 130 people.

Mayor Michel Lebouc visited the scene of the attack Tuesday. He said the orphaned boy was being looked after by social services and that children at the school he attended would be offered counseling.

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Willsher is a special correspondent.

UPDATES:

4:15 p.m.: This article has been updated with Times reporting.

6:01 a.m. This article has been updated with additional information from French officials

3:49 a.m.: This article has been updated throughout with additional details and background.

This article was originally published at 12:48 a.m.