2 charged with killing of Jewish woman

FRENCH prosecutors have charged two people, one of them a neighbor, with the murder of an 85-year-old Jewish woman, who was stabbed and whose body was then set alight in a crime being treated as anti-Semitic.

Mireille Knoll, who escaped the mass roundup and deportation of Jews from Paris during World War II, was found dead in her bed in her small apartment in eastern Paris on Friday by firefighters called to extinguish a blaze.

An autopsy showed she had been stabbed several times before a fire was started in the apartment.

The two men charged with her murder have also been charged with aggravated robbery and damaging property. They were taken into custody.

The death of the frail octogenarian described by a neighbor as very quiet has shocked the Jewish community, coming a year after an Orthodox Jewish woman in her sixties was thrown out the window of her Paris flat by a neighbor shouting “Allahu Akhbar” (God is greatest).

Jewish groups called for a silent march in her memory this afternoon in Paris, which several politicians planned to attend.

‘Cheerful’ woman

One of the suspects is a neighbor in his twenties who visited her regularly, according to her family.

According to a police source, the suspect had a previous conviction for sexual assault.

The second suspect, aged 21, has a history of violent robbery.

He was in the apartment building on the day of Knoll’s death and his name was given to police by the first suspect, according to a police source.

Pictures of Knoll circulated on Facebook showed a woman with lively brown eyes and bobbed hair.

Philippe, another neighbor who often met Knoll out on her daily walk, described her to France Info radio as “very quiet” but “cheerful.”

On Monday, investigators said they believed her killing was anti-Semitic.

A source said that statements by one of the suspects and the fact that both knew Knoll was Jewish led them to conclude that the murder was motivated by her religion.