During an interrogation lasting several hours, the accused sought to dilute his responsibility with grand speeches. He strived to demonstrate that he was only on the “margins” of the events which led to the professor being made a target.
“If my video didn’t exist, would it have changed anything? No.” Abdelhakim Sefrioui proclaimed it loud and clear on Tuesday December 3: he did not contribute to designating Samuel Paty as a target. With thinning white hair and a collared beard, dressed in a pale blue shirt, the Muslim preacher has nevertheless been on trial for almost a month before the special assize court of Paris because he, among other things, instigated through a video “a feeling of hatred” towards the teacher, beheaded when leaving Bois-d'Aulne college, on October 16, 2020, by Abdoullakh Anzorov.
The ten-minute montage, posted on YouTube five days before the attack, is titled “Islam and the Prophet insulted in a public college.” At 65 years old, Abdelhakim Sefrioui is the oldest of the accused, but also the one who is the most energetic. He maintains that this video did not “nothing changed”especially since the investigation did not prove that the assassin viewed it before committing the act. He maintains being “on the margins” and that he does not have “nothing to do with the channel” of cause and effect which contributed to making Samuel Paty a target.
Originally from Morocco, who arrived in France in 1982, Abdelhakim Sefrioui immediately poses as a slayer of injustice. This former teacher claims to have intervened in educational establishments in order to support students to “the problem of long dresses” from the 2010s, “in the name of law”. A “self-proclaimed legitimacy”the president of the special assize court pointed out to him. Abdelhakim Sefrioui also created the pro-Palestinian collective Cheikh Yassine in 2004. The association, which takes the name of the founder of Hamas, was dissolved after the assassination of Samuel Paty.
The sixty-year-old, who does not lack confidence, retorts that his collective was only supporting the “résistance” Palestinian and dares a historical comparison: “Jean Moulin was not a terrorist for the French, he was a terrorist for the Germans.” He rests both hands on the edge of the box, when he is not waving his arms during his explanations, in which he sometimes gets lost. He claims to be “practicing” but refuses the qualification of“radical Islamist”.
However, the video published on October 11, 2020 begins with the mention “messenger of Allah” projected onto a religious song. Then images of the Conflans-Saint-Honorine college appear filmed by Abdelhakim Sefrioui, whose voice in commentary designates it as an educational establishment “where the abject still took place”. A way to denounce “Islamophobia”the preacher defends himself today.
In this video, the schoolgirl behind the rumor about Samuel Paty, filmed from behind, then unfolds her “lie” : according to her, after showing caricatures of naked Mohammed, the teacher asked Muslim students to leave class if they were shocked. However, she was actually absent from the class. The video of his father, Brahim Chnina, also referred to the special assize court, is then inserted. “He makes his video, I make my video. No link between the two”he asserts, however, denying himself having participated in a terrorist criminal association as the courts accuse him of.
In the second part of his video, which totaled 13,000 views on October 16, 2020 at the end of the afternoon, Abdelhakim Sefrioui launches into a monologue in front of the camera and describes Samuel Paty as “thug”. “It's unfortunate to use this term in absolute terms, but a father who is playing with his 3 or 5 year old child can say: 'Come on, little thug'”he minimizes to the audience. At the material time, he claimed to have wanted to denounce “exclusively discrimination” supposed on the part of Samuel Paty. Although he is “offended” through caricatures, “it’s not at all” what he accuses him of, he assures in court.
However, as he does not fail to point out smugly, Abdelhakim Sefrioui never delivers “the teacher's name” in his video, “released four days after Anzorov's macabre project was completed”. The accused explains his remarks based on the legal file that he knows like the back of his hand: “The victim in this is Mr. Paty, but according to everything that comes out, the killer has been looking for a target since September.” Abdelhakim Sefrioui, however, has no words of apology, neither for the teacher nor for his family, unlike most of his co-defendants.
“This Friday, October 16, I would have liked to have been there to prevent this crime, even at the cost of my life, to prevent this heinous crime: I would have done it without hesitation”he says only by way of regret, especially concerned about his own fate. “To be involved in this is a stain,” of which the accused says he doubts he can “wash yourself completely”. Faced with the prosecution's questions asked at the end of the afternoon, while his interrogation stretched on, Abdelhakim Sefrioui, who faces 30 years of criminal imprisonment, insisted: “I am a stranger to this crime.”
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