Days after a gunman opened fire on a Québec City mosque, acquaintances of the man accused of murdering six Muslim men as they knelt at prayer were still searching for clues to suggest how the 27-year-old university student had become radicalised.



Alexandre Bissonnette has been charged with six counts of first-degree murder and another five counts of attempted murder over the attack described by the prime minister, Justin Trudeau, as an act of terror.

On Wednesday, the Québec City Islamic cultural center reopened its doors, offering a glimpse of the frantic struggle that took place here; bloodstains dotted the green and beige carpet of the prayer hall, and bullet holes were visible in the walls.

Meanwhile, those who knew Bissonnette were asking themselves if they had missed any warning signs.

“All day I reflected again and again, asking myself: did I forget something?” said Éric Debroise, who met Bissonette at an informal political discussion group Debroise runs in the city. “Was there something I could have picked up on? But I haven’t found anything yet.”

A friend had brought Bissonnette along for a discussion on debt and the Canadian economy. That night, Bissonnette, a student in the social sciences faculty at Laval University, attempted to speak about Marine Le Pen, but was cut off by Debroise, who said that praise of the French far-right leader was not welcome.

Bissonnette was silent for the rest of the evening, and never attended another event – but Debroise kept in touch with him on social media.

In the wake of the shooting, Debroise contacted the police, describing Bissonnette as “far-right and an ultra-nationalist white supremacist”. He also flagged to police past comments he had heard Bissonnette make about the Jewish community.

Toma Popescu, a high school classmate of Bissonnette, described him as a timid introvert. “He doesn’t have a big personality. You wouldn’t notice him.”



Alexandre Bissonnette. Photograph: Handout/Reuters

He was often bullied by other students over the way he dressed and his habit of collecting rocks, said Popescu. “We didn’t know what he was thinking, ever.”

Months ago Popescu began hearing from other classmates that Bissonnette’s views had begun to harden. “I heard that he was very radical and that he loved Donald Trump,” he said.

For one local group dedicated to welcoming refugees, Bienvenu aux réfugiés, Bissonnette’s name was a familiar one. The group described him as an online troll who took aim at refugees and expressed support for Le Pen.

In a Facebook post, the group said Bissonnette was “unfortunately known by several campaigners in Québec City for his viewpoints that were pro-Le Pen and anti-feminist, as expressed in social media and at the Université Laval”.

Bissonnette did not hide his hostility toward Muslims during a long interrogation by police, Montreal’s La Presse newspaper said, citing a source close to the investigation.



Sunday’s attack was swiftly condemned by politicians of all stripes, but Montreal police said reports of hate crimes in the city had risen since Sunday’s attack, with more than a dozen calls coming in. On Wednesday, a 47-year-old man was arrested after allegedly making online threats against Québec’s Muslim community.

Thousands of others across Canada have denounced the attack, holding vigils and sending messages of support to the mosque through social media. A GoFundMe page, set up to help the families of the victims with funeral costs, had raised more than C$240,000 to date while a Toronto businessman has offered to cover the full cost of repairs and renovations to the mosque.

Six people – all fathers with deep roots in this tight-knit community – were killed in the attack. Another 19 people were wounded. Two remain in critical condition.



In Québec city, dozens of bouquets were piled up outside the shuttered entrance of Boucherie Assalam, the grocery owned by Azzeddine Soufiane. On Sunday evening the 57-year-old had closed up shop to make the short drive to the mosque, a journey the devout father of three made at least once a day.



He was well-known in the city’s 6,700-strong Muslim community. “He was almost like the president of the community,” Nouzha Enkila, head of a Moroccan community group called La Voix des Marocains du Canada told the Globe and Mail. “He helped and guided all the people who arrived here – students, families.”

A public funeral will be held on Thursday in a Montreal hockey arena for three of the men, including Khaled Belkacemi, 60, a professor in the food science department at Laval University, and Aboubaker Thabti, 44, a Tunisian-born father of two. The ceremony will also honour Abdelkrim Hassane, 41, an information technology worker for the government and father of two young children who waited in vain for him to come home on Sunday night.

On Wednesday, relatives of Mamadou Tanou Barry, 42, told the Associated Press in Guinea of a project he had launched to bring drinking water to the remote village where he grew up. His close friend Ibrahima Barry, 39, also from Guinea and who lived in the same building, was also killed in the shooting. The two leave behind six children between then.