A timeline of extremist attacks in France in recent years

Mar 23, 2018 | 8:00 AM

PARIS — Southern France has faced another terror attack, as an armed man opened fire on police officers Friday and took hostages in a supermarket before being shot dead by police. The attacks in a region around Toulouse follow a string of other extremist violence in France in recent years.

Here is a look at some of the recent attacks in France:

— Aug. 9, 2017: A driver of a BMW slams the car into a group of soldiers in a Paris suburb, injuring six of them.

— June 1, 2017: An Algerian doctoral student wielding a hammer attacks police officers patrolling in front of Notre Dame Cathedral. He had declared his allegiance to the Islamic State.

— April 20, 2017: A gunman shoots and kills a police officer on Paris’ Champs-Elysees in an attack claimed by the Islamic State group.

— March 18, 2017: A man wounds a police officer with a revolver loaded with birdshot, then attacks soldiers at Paris’ Orly Airport while brandishing a revolver and yelling that he wanted to kill and then die for Allah.

— Feb. 3, 2017: A machete-wielding Egyptian assailant shouting “Allahu akbar!” attacks French soldiers guarding the Louvre Museum in Paris, slightly injuring one of them.

— July 26, 2016: An 85-year-old French priest, Father Jacques Hamel, is slain in Rouen when two 19-year-old Islamic extremists slit his throat as he celebrates Mass.

— July 14, 2016: A truck driver targets Bastille Day revelers in Nice, killing 86.

— Nov. 13, 2015: Islamic State-linked extremists attack the Bataclan concert hall, France’s national sports stadium and other sites across Paris, killing 130 people.

— Jan. 7-9, 2015: Attacks on the Paris offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo and on a kosher grocery leave 17 victims dead. Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula claims responsibility, saying the attack was in revenge for Charlie Hebdo’s depictions of the Prophet Muhammad.

— March 2012: A gunman claiming links to al-Qaida kills three Jewish schoolchildren, a rabbi and three paratroopers in Toulouse, southern France.

— Nov. 2, 2011: The offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris are firebombed after the satirical magazine runs a cover featuring a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad. No one is injured.

The Associated Press