Man shot by air rifle outside Paris-area synagogue

Police arrested two teenagers who are suspected of perpetrating a hate crime, but a local Jewish leader said the incident was not an anti-Semitic assault.

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(JTA) — French police arrested two teenagers in a suburb of Paris on suspicion that they wounded a person while firing an air rifle at a synagogue on Shabbat.

The two teenagers, who were being investigated as suspects in an anti-Semitic hate crime for the incident, lightly wounded a passerby near the synagogue of Sarcelles on Friday by shooting a lead projectile into his calf, the AFP news agency reported Tuesday.

The two alleged shooters are ages 15 and 16, the Le Parisien newspaper reported.

They had staked out the synagogue from a balcony overlooking the building on Friday night, as worshipers began to gather there.

Moïse Kahloun, the president of the Jewish community of Sarcelles, said he does not believe the attack was anti-Semitic. “This is not an anti-Semitic attack, just kids who shot at random.”

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