French police arrest knife-wielding assailant on terrorism charges

PARIS (Reuters) - French police arrested on Friday a man on terrorism charges accused of trying to murder a taxi driver with a knife while expressing support for Palestinian militant group Hamas, a source at the terrorism prosecutor's office said.

France is on its highest state of security as it gears up to host millions of visitors, athletes and world leaders during the Paris Olympic Summer Games, kicking off on July 26.

The man, already known by authorities as someone who had been radicalized, stopped a taxi on Tuesday night while brandishing a gun in the city of Le Mans, and asked to be taken to an isolated area near Ferte-Bernard.

He then forced the driver out of the car, bound him and attacked his neck with the blade, the source said.

The driver managed to escape to a local resident's home, where he was eventually treated by emergency services. The assailant was arrested early on Friday morning in Yvelines, west of Paris, the source said.

He is being investigated on terrorism, attempted murder and kidnapping charges, the source said.

On Thursday, a police officer was critically injured in a stabbing attack in Paris' Champs Elysees shopping district, in the latest in a string of unrelated security incidents in the French capital this week.

A soldier was stabbed and wounded by a man armed with a knife at a railway station on Monday. Authorities are also investigating whether a man who rammed a car into the terrace of a cafe on Wednesday evening did so deliberately.

(Reporting by Dominique Vidalon; Writing by Gabriel Stargardter; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)