(JTA) — For a second straight day, a motorist rammed his vehicle into a crowd in France shouting “Allahu Akbar,” Arabic for “God is greatest.”
Ten people and the driver were injured Monday in Nantes when the man drove his white van into a crowd at a Christmas market. French officials said it appeared that the incident was not a terrorist attack.
The driver stabbed himself with a knife as his vehicle plowed forward, a police officer and witnesses said, according to Reuters.
The attack in western France occurred a day after a similar incident in Dijon, when a French motorist slammed his car into a crowd shouting “This is in the name of the children of Palestine.” The same man also shouted “Allahu Akbar” as he drove into the crowd in various locations in the eastern France city, according to AFP.
Dijon prosecutor Marie-Christine Tarrare told reporters Monday that the driver had a “long-lasting and severe psychological disorder” and that the incident was “not a terrorist attack,” AFP reported.
The attack was similar to several committed by Palestinians in the West Bank and Jerusalem in November.
A day earlier, a Muslim attacker shouted “Allahu Akbar” as he stabbed three officers at a police station in central France.
