Diesel police dog death sparks #JeSuisChien Twitter trend
Diesel was shot dead as police entered a flat suspected of harbouring Paris attacks 'mastermind' Abdelhamid Abaaoud
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.The death of a police dog during an operation to “neutralise” terror suspects near Paris has sparked a viral Twitter trend.
Thousands of people have been paying tribute to Diesel, the seven-year-old Belgian Malinois who was shot by an extremist as armed police raided a building in Saint-Denis this morning.
A female suicide bomber blew herself up and another extremist was killed during the operation targeting suspected Paris attacks “mastermind” Abdelhamid Abaaoud.
While the seven people arrested were being taken into custody, France’s National Police tweeted that Diesel “was killed by terrorists in the current operation in Saint-Denis”.
A spokesperson said that attack and sniffer dogs were “indispensable” in special operations.
The announcement has since been shared more than 11,000 times, compared to just 1,600 for the previous tweet announcing that five police officers were injured.
It sparked a wave of tributes using the hashtag #JeSuisChien, meaning “I am dog”.
Not everyone was taking the trend seriously…
Hashtags starting with the French phrase “je suis” have been used to express solidarity with numerous causes since January’s Paris attacks, when the rallying cry because “Je suis Charlie”, representing targeted newspaper Charlie Hebdo, and “Je suis Ahmed”, in memory of the Muslim police officer shot dead.
France remains in a national state of emergency following massacres across Paris on Friday that killed 129 people.
Francois Hollande today called for French people to show Isis they had not succeeded in taking their liberty be resuming normal life, while he continues co-ordination with the US and Russia to bomb the group’s fighters in Syria.
Subscribe to Independent Premium to bookmark this article
Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Premium subscription today.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments