Nice

You can’t put a guard in every church and patrol every beach. But after a wave of attacks in Western Europe, authorities are struggling to protect their people as best they can. The French Riviera city of Cannes has banned large backpacks on beaches lest they hide explosives, and Britain is providing extra funding for security at tens of thousands of places of worship.

A 31-year-old father of three obsessed with fitness and sex, Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel led multiple lives. His darkest side appears to have been his best-kept secret: a calculated, committed jihadi ready to kill scores of people in a French Riviera rampage.

French authorities detained two more people Sunday and released the estranged wife of the slain Nice truck attacker from custody as they tried to determine whether he had been an Islamic extremist or just a very angry man.

Just hours after a man drove a large truck through a crowd in the French seaside town of Nice, killing at least 84, French President Hollande made a televised address to the nation.

This time, France was supposed to have been better prepared.

The rogue driver who turned a night of fireworks and fun into the worst carnage the French resort city of Nice has seen in decades appeared aloof and menacing to his neighbors and family, while authorities said Saturday that he had recently turned to religious extremism.

—France called up thousands of reserve security forces Friday as authorities tried to determine why a Tunisian deliveryman known only to be a petty criminal took the wheel of a 19-ton truck and plunged through a terrified seaside crowd on Bastille Day, leaving 84 people dead and more than 200 wounded.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve says that the truck driver who killed 84 people when he careened into a crowd at a fireworks show was “radicalized very quickly.”

A Dallas woman found herself in the midst of two deadly attacks in one week—once in her home city, where 5 police officers were shot and killed, and another in Nice, France, where a man plowed a truck into crowds of people during Bastille Day celebrations on July 14.

The attack in Nice demonstrated once again that open societies have so many vulnerable targets that the opportunities for carnage are numerous.

A family lost their eight-month old baby amidst chaos during the Nice, France, attack at Bastille Day celebrations on July 14.

The president of the Nice region says at least 60 people have died in what officials say was a deliberate attack when a truck drove into Bastille Day revelers in the resort city.