The bodies of four Franco-Israeli citizens, three of them young children, who were murdered in a French school shooting were to be flown to Israel on Tuesday, a Jewish community body said.
30-year-old teacher Jonathan Sandler, his two sons Gabriel, 4, and Arieh, 5, and a eight-year-old pupil at the Ozar Hatorah school, Myriam Monsonego, were to be brought to Paris from Toulouse before being put on a plane.
The Central Consistory, which represents Jewish communities in France, said the bodies would be carried on an El Al flight from Paris Charles de Gaulle airport at 10.00 p.m. (2100 GMT) bound for Tel Aviv.
The Israeli embassy in Paris told AFP the plan was for all of the victims to be buried on Wednesday in Israel, as requested by the families.
France launched an unprecedented manhunt following Monday's shooting, in which a man rode up to the Ozar Hatorah Jewish school in the southern city of Toulouse on a scooter, parked up and then opened fire on a crowd of pupils.
It also impoosed an unprecedented terror alert in the southwest.
Witnesses said that Rabbi Sandler was killed outside the school as he tried to shield his two toddlers from the hail of bullets. The shooter then ran into the school grounds, grabbed Myriam and shot her through the head.
A 17-year-old was also severely wounded.
Anti-terrorist police believe the gunman was also responsible for two similar shootings in the same region last week in which four off-duty French paratroopers were shot, three of them fatally.
The three dead soldiers were of North African origin while the wounded one was black.
With the country in shock, President Nicolas Sarkozy suspended his re-election campaign until at least Wednesday, as police probed the third fatal shooting in the Toulouse area in eight days by a gunman using the same pistol and a stolen scooter
Distraught and often angry parents converged on the scene shortly after the shooting as frightened children were brought out in small groups.
“I came to the school this morning for prayers," said six-year-old Alexia.
"Five minutes later we heard shots, and we were very afraid. We were gathered in a room and prayed together while we waited for our parents."
The gunman initially used a nine-millimetre weapon but it jammed prompting him to switch to a .45-calibre gun as he stormed the school, police said.
French authorities stepped up security at Jewish and Muslim schools following the bloody assault on the Ozar Hatorah school, and Sarkozy said the terror alert in the Midi-Pyrenees region had been raised to "scarlet", its highest level, following Monday's shootings.
"In attacking children and a Jewish teacher, the anti-Semitic motive of the attack appears to be obvious," Sarkozy said in a nationally televised address after he returned to Paris from the scene of the shooting.
Witnesses said Sandler died trying to shield his sons, and that the gunman had chased Miriam, the daughter of the school head, into the school before shooting her in the head.
Yaacov Monsonego was praying in the synagogue attached to the school when another young pupil brought him the body of his slain daughter, witnesses said.
A fifth victim, a 17-year-old boy, was wounded, but local community leaders said he was expected to survive.
The killer wore a full face helmet and appeared calm and collected, carefully parking his scooter before opening fire, witnesses said.
Last week, three French paratroopers -- all of North African descent -- were killed in two similar incidents in the same southwestern region in which the attacker rode a scooter and wielded the same .45 calibre handgun.
"What is sure is that he has now acted three times, and we are concerned by the attitude of impunity that he has demonstrated," Interior Minister Claude Gueant said, admitting that police have "no clear leads".
"This tragedy has left the entire national community distraught," Sarkozy declared at the scene, his voice cracking as he sent condolences to the Jewish community and the Rabbi's wife who lost her husband and two children.
He said a moment of silence would be observed Tuesday in all French schools, adding that security would be stepped up around religious establishments in the region and police reinforcements deployed to hunt down he gunman.
Electioneering was effectively suspended but both the right-wing incumbent and his Socialist rival Francois Hollande rushed to Toulouse to pay their respects.
"We cannot back down in the face of terror," Sarkozy said. "Barbarism, savagery, cruelty cannot win. Hate cannot win. The Republic is too strong for that, much too strong."
"In attacking children and a Jewish teacher, the anti-Semitic motive of the attack appears to be obvious," Sarkozy said in a nationally televised address after he returned to Paris from the scene of the shooting.
France's press said the tragedy had brought a measure of unity to France during a period of political division ahead of next month's presidential election.
"In the space of a few hours the unity of the nation supplants the partisan rants and the bad-natured arguments among the presidential hopefuls," the regional Midi Libre daily said.
The scarlet alert allows authorities widespread powers to disrupt daily life and implement sweeping security measures, including potentially closing rail terminals and airports or even halting water supplies.
Mixed police and military patrols can be ordered. It is the last step in a ladder of terror alerts before a formal state of emergency.
Led by the Union of Jewish students in France (UEJF), thousands of Parisians Tuesday evening held a silent march through the east of the capital, passing by historic Jewish districts.
The Toulouse Ozar Hatorah association runs a small religious school for 200 people in a quiet suburb of Toulouse, a city with a 25,000-strong Jewish minority.