A rabbi and his son have been stabbed outside a synagogue in Paris after leaving morning prayers, sources in France have reported.

Shimon Samuels at the Simon Weisenthal Centre in Paris said: “At 7am this morning, an Iranian screaming ‘Allahu Akbar’ attacked a rabbi and his son with a cutter outside his synagogue in the 9th district of Paris.”

France’s chief rabbi has stunned the Jewish community after admitting to plagiarism in his latest book, Forty Jewish Meditations, and to deception about his academic credentials.

Maurice Lévy, one of the most powerful men in global advertising, has named his rabbi grandfather as his greatest inspiration.

Mr Lévy is chief executive officer of the French Publicis Groupe, one of the three largest advertising companies in the world, with a £5bn revenue last year.

In the easterly part of Toulouse, where the detached houses range from washed white to poached salmon and burnt peach, sits the Ohr Torah school. Set within a formidable compound, gated behind walls flanked by security cameras, it has been this way for a long time, for the safety and security of the children.