Three Jewish children and a rabbi shot dead at a Jewish school in France were buried in Jerusalem today in a funeral where one Israeli official said the attack was inspired by "wild animals made crazy by their hatred".
Their bodies were wrapped in burial shrouds in accordance with orthodox tradition after being flown overnight from France.
The funeral took place in a hill-top cemetery at the entrance to Jerusalem as police in the French city of Toulouse lay siege to a house where the suspected shooter, who claimed to be a member of al-Qaeda, was holed up.
"The Jewish people face wild and insatiable animals, wild animals made crazy by their hatred," the speaker of parliament, Reuben Rivlin, said in a eulogy at the burial site.
The victims were 30-year-old Rabbi Jonathan Sandler, his children Gabriel (4) and Arieh (5) and the daughter of the school's principal, seven-year-old Miriam Monsonego.
They were killed by the gunman who attacked the Jewish school on Monday.
"The entire house of Israel weeps over these murders," Mr Rivlin said.
French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe, who flew to Israel to attend the funeral, said at an earlier meeting with Israeli president Shimon Peres that he had come to express "the solidarity of the French people with the Israeli nation" in its time of sorrow.
"The blood of both our peoples was spilled in this murder," he said.
Reuters