March 2017 Île-de-France attacks

The March 2017 Île-de-France attacks were a pair of terrorist attacks by the same individual in Garges-lès-Gonesse, an outer suburb of Paris, and Orly Airport near Paris on 18 March 2017. The attacker, a 39-year-old man identified as Ziyed Ben Belgacem, was shot dead after attempting to seize a weapon from a soldier patrolling the airport under Opération Sentinelle.

The first attack took place at 06:55 local time in Garges-lès-Gonesse when the attacker was stopped by police during a routine traffic stop. He used a pellet gun to shoot and lightly injure a female police officer before driving away. He abandoned his vehicle in Vitry-sur-Seine shortly afterwards, where he threatened the patrons of a bar and, saying "in the name of Allah," stole another car at gunpoint from a mother driving her daughter.

At about 08:30, he went to the departures level of the south terminal of Orly Airport and assaulted a member of a three-person patrol of air force soldiers. He knocked one soldier to the ground and seized her assault rifle, a FAMAS, shouting, "I am here to die for Allah." He was killed by the other two soldiers when the first soldier dropped to her knees and they opened fire. The attacker was found to have been carrying a gasoline can, a lighter, a Koran, a pack of cigarettes, and 750 euros. The seizure of the assault rifle was filmed by a camera.

Belgacem is said to have been a radicalised French-born Muslim of North African origin who was a resident of Garges-lès-Gonesse. He was known to the authorities and on a police watchlist, though not on the Fiche "S" list of national security threats. Some reports say that he was born on 14 February 1978 in Paris. He had a lengthy criminal record that included convictions for armed robbery and had been in prison between March and November 2016. Due to his connection with radicalised Islamists, his home was searched in November 2015 following the Paris attacks a few days earlier. His father and brother were arrested following the attacks in Garges and Orly, as is normal procedure in France.

The attack at the airport led to its temporary closure and the evacuation of about 3,000 people. All flights to and from Orly were suspended and some were diverted to the larger Charles de Gaulle Airport east of Paris. The airport's west terminal was fully reopened by early afternoon, but air movements at the south terminal remained partly suspended with only incoming flights being permitted.