TOULOUSE, France French police stepped up the search on Tuesday for a gunman who filmed his carnage as he shot dead three children and a rabbi at a Jewish school, fearing the killer could strike again. 
 
 Officials believe the scooter-riding gunman is a trained marksman with "extremist" views who may also be responsible for last week's shootings of three soldiers of North African origin. 
 
 France's President Nicolas Sarkozy has said racism appeared to be the motivation for Monday's school attack, which came just five weeks before the first round of the presidential election. 
 
 Racist and anti-Semitic attacks are not uncommon in France. 
 
 Immigrants and Islam have been major themes of the campaign as Sarkozy tries to win over the voters of far-right leader Marine Le Pen. Analysts say the shootings could transform the election debate and possibly tone down populist rhetoric. 
 
 "We will track down this monster," Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said of the killer on France 2 television. "We will find him, bring him to justice and punish him." 
 
 France is home to the largest Jewish and Muslim communities in Europe and has a history of attacks on both groups, but Monday's shooting was the most deadly anti-Semitic attack on French soil in nearly 30 years. 
 
 The police tightened security at religious sites, raised the terror alert in the southern town to the highest possible level and talked to gun clubs in an effort to track down the killer. 
 
 "It would be surprising if he stops now," one police officer involved in the investigation told Reuters. 
 
 Surveillance tapes at the school showed the gunman recorded his shooting spree with a small video camera around his neck. 
 
 He is also the prime suspect in the killing of three paratroopers in two separate shootings last week in Toulouse and the nearby town of Montauban. 
 
 "This shows a profile of the murderer as someone who is very cold, very determined, with precise gestures, and therefore very cruel," Interior Minister Claude Gueant said. 
 
 In each attack, the gunman arrived on a stolen Yamaha scooter and used a Colt 45 handgun. His face was hidden by a motorcycle helmet during the attacks. 
 
 The three dead soldiers included two members of the 17th parachute regiment. Police have interviewed three former soldiers expelled from the regiment for neo-Nazi activity in 2008, but a police source told Reuters on Tuesday they had been ruled out of the investigation. 
 
 "GETTING READY FOR PRAYERS" 
 
 At the entrance of the Ozar Hatorah Jewish school in Toulouse, a five-floor brick building in a leafy residential neighborhood, residents and parents left floral tributes and candles in memory of the victims. 
 
 A child who survived the attack spoke of his sheer terror as the shots rang out through the school. 
 
 "We were getting ready for prayers when the principal stormed in and screamed that there was a shooting. I panicked and fled to the old canteen and heard the shots, but saw nothing," an 11-year old boy told France Info radio. 
 
 "I thought he was going to come in any minute and finish us all. Then I waited and waited and then my daddy came to get me." 
 
 Schools all over France observed a minute of silence. 
 
 "This has happened in Toulouse, in a religious school with children from Jewish families, but it could have happened here. The same killer could have come here, these children are exactly like you," Sarkozy said, attending the silent vigil in a Paris secondary school. 
 
 The bodies of the four victims, who hold dual French-Israeli nationality, will be repatriated to Israel on Tuesday night, Joel Mergui, the head of a Jewish religious organization, said. 
 
 The Israeli embassy identified the victims as Jonathan Sandler, 30, his children Gabriel and Arieh, aged four and five, and Myriam Monsonego, seven. 
 
 RACIAL TENSION 
 
 France's Jewish umbrella group Crif welcomed the decision by political parties to suspend their election campaigning until Wednesday out of respect for the victims. Analysts said the killings would change the election debate. 
 
 "The tone of the campaign cannot go back to what it was," said Dominique Reynie, head of Fondapol politics institute. 
 
 "The campaign was dominated by an aggressive tone and a strong degree of populist rhetoric. This rhetoric will cease because there will be voter demand for healing." 
 
 France's far-right leader Marine Le Pen is running third in the race for the presidency and this has helped to draw issues of race and immigration into the election campaign. 
 
 The centre-right Sarkozy has tried to attract her voters with a pledge to halve immigration and criticism of halal slaughter as he lags Socialist Francois Hollande in voting intentions polls. 
 
 Some analysts said there would be a discussion about whether Sarkozy has stirred feelings that led to the attack. 
 
 "There will be more debate, notably on whether the tension created in society by Nicolas Sarkozy and the UMP (ruling party) has not somehow provoked or facilitated this type of violence," said L'Express magazine editor-in-chief Christophe Barbier. 
 
 Juppe said the campaign could not have triggered the shooting. 
 
 "Anti-Semitism exists in France, we have fought it for years," he said. 
 
 "Nobody should try to benefit in any way from this drama, which is in no way linked to the electoral campaign." 
 
 (Additional reporting by Geert De Clercq, Emmanuel Jarry and Marine Pennetier; writing by Geert De Clercq; Editing by Anna Willard) ||||| New York (CNN) -- Thousands of miles from a bloody shooting in southern France, Jewish and municipal leaders voiced concerns and vowed to bolster protections for schools, neighborhoods and synagogues while noting they have no indication any fresh, faraway attacks are imminent. 
 
 Three children and one teacher were fatally shot Monday at the Ozar Hatorah school in Toulouse, an incident French President Nicolas Sarkozy called a "national tragedy." 
 
 Yet its effects aren't being felt only in France. Jewish leaders, law enforcement officials and others around the world have responded with promises that security will be sound and requests that all be on the lookout for suspect activity. 
 
 Sarkozy puts region on high alert 
 
 There has been no evidence, however, that there's any active threat beyond southern France -- where the Toulouse incident was the third fatal attack in 10 days to target minorities. 
 
 "Just because there's something that happens there, doesn't mean there are more threats here. But we take everything very seriously," said New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg. 
 
 In the United States, an official with the Department of Homeland Security said U.S. authorities are monitoring the situation in France along with European authorities, as well as looking at the prospect of attacks targeting Jews domestically. 
 
 "Currently, we are aware of no specific threat to locations within the United States whatsoever," said the U.S. official, who asked not to be named. "As always, we encourage the general public to be vigilant and report any suspicious activity to local law enforcement." 
 
 Yeshiva University in New York issued a statement saying that "security concerns have increased as a result of the tragic shooting incident in Toulouse, France" -- urging people to "be alert to any suspicious activity or persons." 
 
 Farther north in Manhattan at Park East Synagogue, director Benny Rogosnitzky said parents with children at the day school and others going in and out of the synagogue have been asked not to congregate outside. 
 
 "It's certainly a concern," Rogosnitzky said, noting that the facility is on high alert as often happens after such attacks. 
 
 New York police have increased security coverage at synagogues and "Jewish locations" in the city, Commissioner Ray Kelly said. 
 
 Earlier, Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne had added that NYPD's Counterterrorism Bureau will assign critical response vehicles to patrol around about 20 Jewish institutions and neighborhoods. 
 
 Kelly, the department's leader, said there was no specific intelligence regarding threats to places where Jewish people might gather. But he said that increasing security at such locales is "prudent," nonetheless. 
 
 "We have a significant Jewish population in this city, and ... we know that we're at the top of the terrorist target list. So we're concerned about the so-called 'copy cat syndrome,' where someone might see the events unfolding in Toulouse and take it upon themselves to act out," said Kelly. 
 
 Similar security measures are being taken in Washington, where Metropolitan Police Department spokeswoman Gwendolyn Crump said authorities "have directed that additional attention be provided to schools and religious institutions." 
 
 There are increased patrols at Jewish schools, synagogues and neighborhoods in San Francisco as well, said police spokesman Albie Esparza. 
 
 People around Jewish institutions in New York, at least, said attacks like Monday's in France raise awareness, sympathies and concerns, but it doesn't mean they're expecting it to unfold in their backyard. 
 
 "You feel for these people; you would never want that to happen to anybody. But I still feel very safe and very protected," said Abby Morris, a preschool teacher at a school affiliated with New York's Central Synagogue. 
 
 Still, some Jewish leaders said that added precautions are needed in light of the Toulouse and similar incidents. 
 
 "In light of the incessant anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rhetoric worldwide, we urge that all Jewish institutions review their security procedures in conjunction with local law enforcement," said Dr. Shimon Samuels, director of international relations for the Los Angeles-based Simon Wiesenthal Center. 
 
 Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, said that the Toulouse attack serves as a "reminder," but it does not represent any big shift in the danger or people's attitudes. 
 
 He cited a poll of 1,754 Americans, released by his advocacy group in November, in which 15% of respondents held "deeply anti-Semitic views." If the ratio holds true nationally, that would equate to about 35 million Americans. This is up 3 percentage points from a poll two years earlier. The survey had a margin of error of plus/minus 2.8%. 
 
 "Unfortunately, the Jewish community lives in vigilance against terrorism and anti-Semitic attacks 24/7/365 days a year," said Foxman. 
 
 He noted that, before Monday, security precautions were common in synagogues and other Jewish institutions because it is a reality that such hatred exists. If anything, he says, the Jewish community needs to be even "more vigilant" in protecting themselves against attacks. 
 
 "And it should be vigilant in between acts of terrorism and violence, not just when it happens," he added. "That's part of being Jewish, unfortunately, in our (world)." 
 
 CNN's Greg Botelho and Carol Cratty contributed to this report.
– As if there could be a crueler twist to the Jewish school shooting in Toulouse that yesterday rocked France: France's interior minister today revealed that the gunman likely filmed the killings. The school's surveillance video revealed that a video camera was attached to the killer's neck, reports Reuters. "This adds another element to the profile of the killer. It is someone who is cruel enough to record it," says Claude Gueant, "someone who is very cold, very determined, with precise gestures, and therefore very cruel." A 200-strong group of police officers is hunting the killer, who is also suspected in the deaths of three paratroopers who were gunned down in Toulouse and Montauban last week. Police believe the perpetrator many have been trained as a marksman, and used a Yamaha scooter to flee the scenes. And while there's no indication that Jews are in danger outside of Southern France, the Department of Homeland Security told CNN that US officials are keeping an eye on the situation and on the possibility that Jews could be targeted stateside. The NYPD has beefed up security at synagogues and potential targets in the city.