“For them, we were guilty”: Muslim victims of the attack of July 14, 2016 in Nice spoke on Monday of the double trauma of mourning and the hatred expressed against them by some, during the appeal trial of two relatives of the Islamist author of the attack.
There were around thirty Muslims among the 86 people killed in the ram truck attack on the Promenade des Anglais, but their loved ones had to endure “looks of hatred”, reported several sisters of Aldjia Bouzaouit, Franco- 42-year-old Algerian woman killed in the attack.
“There have been beautiful people, but there have been many people who have expressed their hatred and disgust. I can’t get over it,” testified Sabra Mokaissi.
The family even received numerous malicious messages on the phone listed on the wanted notice that they had sent out, because they were unable to find Aldjia after the tragedy: “good for you”, “keep killing each other”…
“There are people who hugged us but those words stay, they haunt you,” testified Ms. Mokaissi. “We were victims, but for them we were guilty, because we are Muslim.”
“It was terribly painful. I had to justify myself all the time. That’s not what Islam is,” said this woman who wears the veil and who recited in court, in Arabic, the verse from the Koran that she had chosen to announce Aldjia’s death to her mother.
Married to a gendarme, she also wanted to address the terrorists: “You are not of my religion! […] We built bridges to learn to live peacefully with each other. No matter how many you destroy, we will rebuild them.”
Aldjia’s two daughters, aged 10 and 18 at the time of their mother’s death, had planned to give a testimony to another of their aunts, but they did not manage to write it down. “It’s still too early,” testified the aunt.
For the first time in this case, two children, however, testified directly on Monday, by videoconference from Nice. At first instance, adults spoke on behalf of the children.
” Horror movie “
Beyond the fifteen minors killed in the attack, the association “A Way for Children” estimates that 3,000 children were present on the evening of the tragedy and that 700 of them were followed by the psychological unit specially created after the attack.
On Monday, Landy and Telyan, now 13 and 12 years old, each read their testimony in a clear voice.
“Suddenly, boom, nothing. We fell, hit by various crowd movements and by this truck. We passed out and the horror movie started,” said Landy, then five and a half years old.
Hit in the head and one leg, she spent a month in hospital, but remains especially marked by the panic that struck the family just after the attack: overturned among the corpses, the stroller of her eight-month-old little brother was empty.
It took several hours and a call relayed on social networks to find the baby, sheltered by a couple who had heard screaming.
“I remember it as if it were yesterday,” insisted Landy, evoking the anxieties, the school delays, the behavioral problems which affected her like many child victims.
In total, around ten children plan to testify in the coming days.
Since April 22 and until mid-June, Mohamed Ghraieb, 48 years old and Chokri Chafroud, 44 years old, both sentenced at first instance to 18 years of criminal imprisonment (out of 20 years incurred), have been tried on appeal for association of terrorist criminals.
They have always proclaimed their innocence, claiming to have no knowledge of the criminal plans of the author of the attack, killed by the police.