FILE - A general view of the scene of attack on the Jo Goldenberg restaurant in Paris, France, Aug. 9, 1982. (AP Photo/Aulnay, File)

PARIS (AP) — France's president on Friday welcomed the arrest this week in the occupied West Bank of a key Palestinian suspect in a 1982 terror attack in Paris, calling it the result of “excellent cooperation” with the Palestinian Authority.

The suspect, Hicham Harb, 70, was one of France’s most wanted men and a fugitive for decades. He is accused of overseeing the militants who stormed the Jo Goldenberg restaurant on Rue des Rosiers on Aug. 9, 1982, in a machine-gun and grenade attack that killed six people and wounded 22 — an assault that stunned the nation and scarred its Jewish community.

Attributed to the Abu Nidal Organization, a Palestinian militant group designated as terrorist by the United States and Europe, it remains the deadliest antisemitic attack in France since World War II. It shocked the nation and underscored the global reach of Palestinian militant groups at the time.

France’s national anti-terrorism prosecutor’s office told The Associated Press it was informed through Interpol that Palestinian authorities arrested Mahmoud Khader Abed Adra, known as Hicham Harb, under a 2015 international warrant linked to the Rue des Rosiers attack.

The office described the arrest as a major step forward in the long-running case and said it was grateful for the cooperation of the Palestinian authorities.

Harb is suspected not only of having supervised the assault but also of being one of the gunmen who opened fire on the diners and passers-by.

He was formally indicted by French judges on July 31 on charges of murder and attempted murder in connection with the attack. Harb and five other men in the case were referred to trial. Another suspect has been in French custody since his 2020 extradition from Norway.

The 1982 assault began at midday when a grenade was tossed into the crowded dining room of Jo Goldenberg’s restaurant, which was serving about 50 customers. Gunmen then burst in with Polish-made machine guns, firing at diners and spraying bullets at passers-by as they fled into the narrow Rue des Rosiers.

President Emmanuel Macron said in a post on X that the arrest was the result of “excellent cooperation with the Palestinian Authority” and said he hopes for a “swift extradition.”

Macron called the arrest “another step forward for justice and truth” and added: “My thoughts are with all the families who have endured the pain of waiting for so long.”

The arrest of Harb — long considered the ringleader — marks a breakthrough in a case that has haunted France’s Jewish community, the largest in Europe. Families of the victims and Jewish leaders have repeatedly pressed authorities to pursue justice in the Rue des Rosiers case for more than four decades.

Investigators say the other suspects — believed to be abroad if still alive, in places such as Jordan and the Palestinian territories — have long eluded justice because of political sensitivities and lack of cooperation from foreign governments.

Macron is expected to announce France’s recognition of a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly in New York next week — a step that would make France one of the most influential Western powers to endorse Palestinian statehood in recent years.

On Friday, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot tied Macron’s diplomatic efforts to Harb's arrest, adding the recognition of a Palestinian state “will allow us to seek the extradition” of the suspect.

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