Terrorist sent thousands of dollars to family in Tunisia days before the Nice attack
Tunisian Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, accused of killing 84 people in Nice this week sent £84,000 (Approximately $110,829) days before the attack.
Bouhlel seems to have been radicalized very quickly according to the French Interior Minister, Bernard Cazeneuve. Lahouaiej-Bouhlel drove a lorry into revellers celebrating Bastille Day on the Promenade des Anglais (Road) on Thursday before he was shot dead by police.
Relatives have reportedly claimed Bouhlel, in the days before the attack, persuaded friends to smuggle the bundles of cash back to his family in their hometown of Msaken, Tunisia according to the Telegraph.
“Mohamed sent the family 240,000 Tunisian Dinars (£84,000) in the last few days,” Bouhlel’s brother told the MailOnline website. “He used to send us small sums of money regularly like most Tunisians working abroad. But then he sent us all that money, it was fortune.
Bouhlel was not known to the intelligence services, pointing to a new scenario with individuals who are becoming very sensitive to the messages of ISIS rapidly according to the Interior Minister.
Three arrests were made on Saturday and two on Friday, including the man’s estranged wife, according to reports by Le Monde.
So-called Islamic State claimed one of its followers carried out the attack. According to the BBC of those dead, 10 were children. A total of 303 people were taken to hospital following the attacks, the French health department confirmed on Saturday. Of those, 121 remain in hospital, 30 of whom are children, and 26 people are still in intensive care – including five children.
A state of emergency has been in place across France since the Paris attacks carried out by militants on the 13 November attacks that left 130 people dead.
