Eight people including a girl were lightly wounded late on Sunday in a shooting in front of a mosque in the south-east French city of Avignon, the prosecutor’s office said, ruling out terrorism.
According to initial accounts taken on the spot, at least two men got out of a car around 10.30pm near the mosque and opened fire, including with a shotgun,.
None of the wounded had life-threatening injuries, it said.
“From what we know this evening, the mosque was not targeted. The fact that it happened in the street of the religious establishment was unconnected with it,” the prosecutor said.
Witness accounts mentioned four men in the car, all hooded. The criminal investigation department has taken charge of the case.
La Provence regional newspaper, which first reported the incident, cited a judicial source as saying police are “not at all treating it as terrorist related” and suspected instead a dispute between youths.
Four people were wounded outside the mosque while a family of four in their apartment 50 metres away were hit by shrapnel, La Provence said.
The shooting comes a few days after a man on Thursday attempted to drive his car into worshippers outside the Creteil mosque in south-east Paris.
The driver, a 43-year-old Armenian who suffered from schizophrenia, hit barriers and pillars outside the mosque with his car without causing any injuries, before crashing into a traffic island.
According to a source close to the investigation, the suspect had made “confused remarks in relation” to a string of jihadist attacks that have struck France, killing 239 people since 2015.
#BREAKING Police say this was a fight between young people or gangs, not necessarily targeting the mosque/Muslims. https://t.co/4ew8mrj5ia
— Natasha Fatah નતાશા (@NatashaFatah) July 2, 2017
Following a van attack against worshippers leaving Finsbury Park mosque in London on 19 June which left one dead and 11 injured, France’s Muslim community has also felt threatened.
Some Muslim officials have described the Paris incident as an attack and called on the authorities to “strengthen protection of places of worship”.
France is on high security alert following a series of militant attacks in recent years.
Reuters and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report