PARIS, Oct 30: Three more people were murdered in Nice in France on Thursday by terrorists. One of two women among them was decapitated. She was 60. These gruesome killings, that took place inside a church, it is reported, are part of the spreading violent protests in France and several other countries that have echoes of an incident involving the Islamic Prophet's cartoon.

A teacher, Samuel Paty, was beheaded close to his school near Paris, on October 16, days after showing the students cartoons of Prophet Muhammad in the class. His killer, 18-year-old Abdullakh Anzorov, was shot dead by police. Islamist extremists consider any form of representation of Prophet as sacrilegious.

French President Emmanuel Macron's speech condemning terrorism at Samuel Paty's memorial had incensed the extremists who have started anti-French violent protests in several Islamic countries. Macron said France "will not give up our cartoons". Paty's Légion d'Honneur, France's highest honour posthumously awarded to Paty, was on the coffin. The situation got vitiated after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's cartoon appeared in the French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, which was in the news earlier also for carrying Prophet's cartoon.

France has started taking action, which may lead to a vertical division of the country. The Government closed a mosque in Pantin, north-eastern Paris, for "involvement in the Islamist movement", and for sharing a social media video targeting teacher Samuel Paty.

A crackdown on radical Islam has begun, targeting asocaiations involved in spreading terrorism and terrorst funding.

Macron said the knife attacks near a church, Notre-Dame basilica, in Nice that killed the three were "Islamist terrorist attacks". Macron said, "I say it with great clarity once again today: we won't surrender anything." National security has been tightened.

Police said the suspect was a 21-year-old Tunisian national who had arrived in France earlier this month. He has been shot at and wounded.

Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi said the assailant had shouted 'Allahu Akbar' (God is greatest). He described the terrorist incidents as "Islamo- fascism."

Four years ago, on Bastille Day, a Tunisian had driven a truck into crowds killing 86 people.

Meanwhile, in spreading violence, a guard was attacked outside the French consulate in Jeddah in Saudi Arabia. A suspect was arrested and the guard taken to hospital, BBC reported. Protests were raging in Pakistan, Bangladesh and several other countries over the cartoon and Macron's move against Islamic terror.