The father of the man accused of attempting to carry out a terror attack on the Louvre museum in Paris has denied he belonged to any Islamist groups.

Abdallah el-Hamahmy, 29, was shot four times by soldiers after attacking one of them with a machete when he was denied entrance to the shopping centre next to the famed gallery on Friday morning.

The Egyptian national, who arrived in Paris last week on a tourist visa issued in Dubai, is currently in hospital but his condition is no longer being described as life-threatening.

Soldier shoots 'attacker' outside Louvre museum in Paris

One soldier suffered minor injuries to his scalp.

Francois Hollande, the French President, said there was “no doubt” al-Hamahmy intended to carry out a terror attack.

Parisian police said he had been carrying a bag with a second machete and spray cans filled with paint but no explosives.

His father said el-Hamahmy, who had no criminal record or known links to extremist organisations, was a “very normal young man”.

Reda el-Hamahmy said he was shocked to learn of his son’s involvement in the attack and found out the news from Facebook.

He told Reuters: "Is he alive? Is he dead? Was it really him?.

"For them to say in the end that he is a terrorist is nonsense... this is a cover up so they don't have to apologise or justify the acts of this soldier who used brute force with a poor young man of 29.

The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism Show all 10 1 /10 The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 10: Greece Greek Presidential Guards, or Evzones, take their place for a review by US President Barack Obama and his Greek counterpart Prokopis Pavlopoulos in Athens, Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2016. President Barack Obama arrived in Greece Monday morning on the first stop of his final foreign tour as president, the first visit to Greece by a sitting U.S. president since Bill Clinton in 1999 trip. (AP Photo/Lefteris Pitarakis) AP The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 9: Denmark Shutterstock The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 8: Austalia The incident allegedly took place in a primary school in Sydney Getty Images The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 7: Sweden Ola Ericson/imagebank.sweden.se The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 6: Mexico People talk to relatives at a section of the wall separating Mexico and the United States, as photographed from Playas Tijuana, in Tijuana, Mexico, November 6, 2016. REUTERS/Stringer FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVES. Reuters The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 5: Germany Afghan asylum seeker Shakira Sarwari, 27, and her two children, Mohammed, 17 months, and Setayesh, 7, are taken off a Munich-bound train in Salzburg, Austria, by German police Anthony Faiola/The Washington Post The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 4: Israel Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, attends the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Sunday, Nov. 13, 2016. (Ronen Zvulun, Pool via AP) AP The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 3: US US police have shot 698 people in 2016 so far. Four times more black than white people have been shot Getty The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 2: France French policemen and security officers stand guard at the entrance of the Bataclan concert hall in Paris on November 12, 2016, a few hours before the reopening concert by British musician Sting to mark the first anniversary of the November 13 Paris attacks. Rock star Sting reopens the Bataclan on November 12, the revered Paris concert hall where jihadists massacred 90 people, with a hugely symbolic show to mark the first anniversary of France's bloodiest terror attacks. Scores of survivors of the Bataclan assault -- the worst of the gun and suicide attacks across the city that night which left 130 dead -- will attend the concert, the dominant event in a weekend of otherwise low-key commemorations. / AFP PHOTO / PHILIPPE LOPEZPHILIPPE LOPEZ/AFP/Getty Images Getty The 10 developed countries suffering the most deaths from terrorism 1: Turkey AP

"I find it incomprehensible that a young man on his way to commit a terrorist act only has a knife with him. If you tell me he had a gun, a rifle, then yes, I'd believe you, but I don't know... all we want is the truth,"

According to his father, el-Hamahmy, who is married with a seven month-old child, had been visiting Paris on a business trip from his home in the United Arab Emirates and had told his family that he planned to take in the sights before his return to Dubai.

He had sent his father a photo of himself standing in front of the Eiffel Tower shortly before the attempted attack on the Louvre.

Following the attack his brother Ahmed, who works at the health ministry in Dubai, was interrogated for several hours by UAE security officials.

Meanwhile in Egypt, several domestic security agency officers visited the family home in the Nile Delta on Friday night to question family members.

According to police el-Hamahmy had paid €1,700 (£1,462) for a one-week stay at a Paris apartment in the upmarket eighth arrondissement near the Champs-Elysees. While in the capital he bought the two military machetes at a gun store.

On the Twitter account of an "Abdallah el-Hamahmy," a tweet was posted about a trip from Dubai to Paris on 26 January. In the profile photo, al-Hamahmy is seen smiling and leaning against a wall in a blue-and-white jacket.

In another tweet in Arabic written shortly before the Louvre attack, the account posted: "No negotiation, no compromise, no letting up, certainly no climb down, relentless war."