Grenade thrown into suburban Paris kosher market

An explosion at a kosher grocery shop near Paris, reportedly caused by a grenade, damaged the store and injured a shopper, French police said.

Police have not linked the Sept. 19 attack to the release of caricatures hours earlier by a Paris weekly depicting the Muslim Prophet Muhammad, including one featuring a haredi Orthodox Jew and a religious Muslim.

The store in the Paris suburb of Sarcelles reportedly was full of shoppers after the Rosh Hashanah holiday beginning their preparations for the pre–Yom Kippur meal.

Sarcelles, known as “Little Jerusalem,” is home to a large Jewish community that emigrated from North Africa in the 1960s.

On Sept. 14, the security service of Jewish communities in France alerted French Jews to “individuals pretending to be Jewish to gain access to community facilities,” and declared a state of elevated alert during the High Holy Days. — jta