Wounded Manager of Kosher Grocery Plans To Move to Israel

By JTA January 12, 2015

The manager of the Paris kosher supermarket that came under attack plans to move to Israel, his brother told a German newspaper.

Patrice Oalid, 39, who was shot in the arm and is recovering in the hospital, told his older brother, Joel, that after barely surviving the Jan. 9 attack, and seeing his customers and employees killed, he cannot stay in Paris any longer, Joel Oalid told the Bild newspaper on Sunday in what the German daily said was an exclusive interview.

He expects many more French Jews to follow suit, Joel Oalid said his brother told him.

The gunman, Amedy Coulibaly, who in a video that surfaced Sunday pledged allegiance to the Islamic State jihadist group, wore a video camera on his chest during his attack on the Hyper Cacher market and told his hostages that since they were Jewish, they were all going to die.

Patrice Oalid told his brother that Coulibaly had ordered the hostages to look into his camera and greet ISIS, another name for Islamic State.

Joel Oalid said his brother spoke with him immediately after being freed and said “the terrorist said he wanted to die. He said, ‘I will die today, but you before.’ My brother told me, he told all the people, ‘You are Jewish, and today you are going to die.’”

He also reported his brother had tried to alert the police after Coulibaly entered the store and killed one employee. Coulibaly had held up a Kalashnikov in each hand, according to Patrice Oalid.

“My brother ran outside and told the police to come in, and the police said, ‘No, no no, we don’t go in, we don’t have the order to come inside.’”

A day earlier, Coulibaly reportedly killed a police officer.

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