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In July 2016, the Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray attack cost the life of Father Jacques Hamel, who was 85 years old. Four alleged accomplices of the terrorists will be tried from Monday, February 14 before the special court in Paris. Father Hamel’s sister, Roseline, has been waiting for this moment for six years.
For nearly 6 years, Roseline Hamel, 81, has been awaiting trial for the attack in Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray (Seine-Maritime), in memory of her murdered brother, Father Jacques Hamel. She admired him for his commitment. “We were far from imagining that he was going to suffer this atrocious barbarism”, she says. On the day of the attack, July 26, 2016, she was at his home. They were going on a family vacation. On hearing news of a hostage-taking at the church, she had rushed. “I firmly believed that it was going to be fine, that these police forces which seemed to me immense were going to free him”says Roseline Hamel.
The monk was however already dead, assassinated with knives in the middle of mass. He was 85 years old. “He left as a martyr, with a very strong spirit in the face of his executioners”, she continues. For months, Roseline maintained the memory of her brother with the general public. She then wished to meet the mother of one of the terrorists. “She opened the door for us, opened her arms for us and said sorry. And I said to her, ‘I didn’t come to seek forgiveness, I came to help each other through the pain. “.