Police in Brussels are calling on the public to try to help identify the gunman who opened fire at the Jewish Museum in the Belgian capital on Saturday. The surveillance video shows the man walking into the museum, shooting through a door, and walking away. The shooter used an AK-47 assault rifle, reports CNN. The attacker immediately killed three people and a fourth person who had been seriously injured died on Sunday. The dead included an Israeli couple who were in Brussels for tourism and two museum staff—a French woman and a Belgian man, reports AFP.
Meanwhile, Israel’s ambassador in Brussels said that the police presence at Jewish sites that was announced by Belgian authorities after the shooting is a “sad necessity,” reports Bloomberg. “The place chosen, the people chosen, the modus operandi chosen; all that indicates that it wasn’t by chance that it happened at that place.” Although many Belgians were shocked by the attack, Jewish leaders said they have long been expecting some sort of violence against the community, reports the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “The actual attack comes as no surprise to us after years of living in an atmosphere of rampant anti-Semitism that often leads to violence, ” said Mischael Modrikamen, the Jewish leader of Belgium’s small, centrist Parti Populaire.
