KILLED AT PRAYER
Popular butcher, professor among victims
They were fathers, businessmen, a university professor and others who were killed while at evening prayers.
Azzeddine Soufiane, 57, a father of three, a grocer and a butcher, welcomed newcomers to Quebec, helped them integrate and was a brother to everyone, said a friend.
“Mr. Soufiane was someone who was well known in Quebec because he opened one of the first community businesses here,” said Karim Elabed, an imam at a mosque in nearby Levis.
“Myself, when I arrived here eight years ago, (his shop) was the first place I learned about and pretty much all of Quebec’s Muslims did their groceries there.”
Elabed and another friend, Ali Ouldache, told The Canadian Press they’d been told that Soufiane tried to engage the shooter and that’s how he died.
Ouldache, who arrived in 2007, said Soufiane was the first person he spoke to when he arrived from France, a little bit lost in his new surroundings.
“It (his store) was really my refuge and we became friends after that,” Ouldache said. “He was a father to everyone, a brother to everyone — very tolerant, very respectful.”
Ouldache said Soufiane was really someone who really loved Quebec — a true Québécois, who’d called the province home for 30 years.
“He was really likable and generous,” Ouldache said. “It’s a tragedy the way he died.”
“We’ve just lost someone who was very, very nice, a good person … such a loss, someone who was so welcoming, who helped everybody,” said Ali Miladi, who said he and his father-in-law knew Soufiane well.
Miladi drove to Soufiane’s meat shop in the Ste-Foy neighbourhood Monday morning, cut his car’s engine and let the tears run down his face.
“He was a friend.”
Still in shock, Miladi said he will spend the day consoling and helping Soufiane’s widow.
In 2009, Soufiane defended Quebec as an open society in an interview he gave to Le Soleil. “I’ve been here for 20 years,” he said at the time, “and I’ve never had any problems. We live in society, we live in peace, and we hope that it will continue like this.”
Ali said he followed in Soufiane’s footsteps and opened his own halal meat shop in Ste-Foy.
Khaled Belkacemi, 60, a professor at Université Laval’s agricultural sciences and food department, was one of the victims, the university said, noting he was “devoted and beloved by his colleagues and students.”
Belkacemi’s wife is also a professor at Laval.
“I wish to salute (Belkacemi’s) human qualities and professionalism,” said Jean-Claude Dufour, dean of the department.
“He was a very educated man, passionate and committed to the faculty. His remarkable work will survive his sudden departure, which saddens us all deeply.”
“Our university community is in mourning today,” rector Denis Briere said in a statement. “We mourn the death of an esteemed member of the faculty and the university, a devoted and beloved man of his colleagues and students.”
Mohamed Labidi, vicepresident at the mosque where the attack took place, said Belkacemi was a good friend.
“He wouldn’t have hurt anyone,” Labidi said. “He was so kind and gentle.”
Retired Universite Laval professor Hani Antoun described Belkacemi as a valued colleague and respected scientist.
He said Belkacemi was married to another professor in the department and had three children.
“He was a kind person, someone who was appreciated by everyone,” Antoun said. “He was a renowned scientist who was very well known. It’s an enormous loss.”
Abdelkrim Hassane, 41, another father of three, was identified by a friend Ali Hamadi. Hamadi said he left the mosque a few minutes before the shooting and that Hassane was killed.
Hamadi said Hassane worked in information technology for the government and that he was a father with three daughters and a wife.
The Quebec coroner’s office later identified the other three victims as Mamadou Tanou Barry, 42, Ibrahima Barry, 39, and Aboubaker Thabti, 44.
Two of the victims were Guinean nationals, the government of that country reported Monday.
“In this painful circumstance, the government of Guinea expresses its deepest sympathy and condolences to the Canadian government, the families of the disappeared, and the entire nation,” said a statement on the government’s website.
“Guinean representatives in Canada are actively engaged in meeting the families of our compatriots and expressing the support of the nation as a whole.”
Anoiar Monadi told the Montreal Gazette he went to the hospital where the injured were being treated out of concern for his friends, who he called brothers.
In a rare move, the hospital let Monadi and a group of people go up to the second floor, in the trauma department, to visit with at least one of the patients in stable condition. Monadi said the news was encouraging: “I saw one of my friends, he was shot in the shoulder. He’s in stable condition.