Footage has emerged of the terrifying moment a man attacked a Parisian police officer with a hammer after yelling “this is for Syria”.
The footage shows a lot of tourists strolling around Notre Dame before the attacker bursts through the crowd and launches himself at police patrolling the area.
He knocks one of the officers to the ground and attempts to hit him in the head, but is shot within seconds by the injured officer’s colleagues.
Thousands of people were evacuated from the space, and the famous landmark was put into lock down with 900 people trapped inside for their safety.
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The attacker has been identified as Algerian journalist Farid Ikken who was studying his doctorate in Paris.
The 40-year-old married a local woman in Sweden in 2005 and published a number of university papers on migration, asylum seekers and the treatment of alleged jihadi militants while studying there.
His former colleague Kamal Ouhnia described him as unhappy but “completely secular”.
Nephew Sofiane Ikken, said his uncle made derisive comments about Isis as recently as last summer, but seemed “a little bit alone” in a recent phone call.
Ikken’s family and friends are said to be completely floored by the news of his role in the attack.
“It’s not the person we knew.”
His thesis director, Arnaud Mercier, told BFMTV that he was also confused by his involvement in the attack.
“He was someone who believed a lot in democratic ideals, the expression of free thinking, in journalism,” Mr Mercier.
“Nothing, absolutely nothing, foretold that one day he’d be a jihadi who’d want to kill a policeman in the name of I don’t know what cause.”
Isis did not take credit for Ikken’s attack.
