Murder of Samuel Paty, beheading near school

On 16 October 2020, Samuel Paty, a 47-year-old history and geography teacher at the College du Bois d'Aulne in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, northwest of Paris, was stabbed and beheaded in the street near his school. The attacker was Abdoullakh Anzorov, an 18-year-old of Chechen origin who had come to France as a child refugee. Police shot and killed him minutes later in nearby Eragny as he confronted them. Earlier that month, during a class on freedom of expression, Paty had shown students Charlie Hebdo caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, having invited any students who might be offended to look away or leave beforehand.

An online hate campaign preceded the killing. A pupil's father posted videos on social media naming Paty, falsely describing the lesson, and identifying the school, while an associate amplified the accusations. Investigators established that Anzorov had been in contact with people tied to that campaign and had paid pupils to identify Paty. In December 2024, a Paris special assize court convicted eight people in connection with the murder, handing down sentences that ranged up to 16 years for two men found guilty of complicity in the killing. An appeal trial for several of the convicted opened in Paris in 2026.

This was an act of jihadist (Islamist) terrorism, as classified by French authorities and prosecuted under France's anti-terrorism laws. A lone attacker murdered a teacher in retaliation for showing caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad in a lesson on free expression, after an online campaign had targeted the victim. There is no indication of foreign-state direction, hybrid warfare, or Russian state involvement. The case reflects ideologically motivated religious extremism and the role of social-media incitement in mobilizing violence, not state-sponsored sabotage or interference.