Police in southwestern France say one adult and three children are dead after a gunman opened fire at a private Jewish school in the city of Toulouse.

Authorities say the attack at the Ozar Hatorah school also seriously wounded at least one other person. The dead include a teacher who worked at the school and his three and six-year-old sons. School officials say another child between the ages of eight and 10 was also murdered.

A police spokesman said the shooter escaped on a motorbike.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy rushed to Toulouse, accompanied by Education Minister Luc Chatel and Richard Prasquier, the president of CRIF, a group representing French-Jewish organizations.

Mr. Sarkozy called the attack “a national tragedy” and vowed to find the gunman, saying the “savagery, the cruelty cannot win.”

In Washington, the White House said it was deeply saddened by the attack and stands with the community in Toulouse. National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor said Washington joins the French government in condemning what it called an “unprovoked and outrageous act of violence.”

The attack comes days after three soldiers were killed and two wounded in two separate shootings in the same region, also by a man who escaped on a motorbike.

A French police official said the .45-caliber handgun used Monday was the same weapon used in the two earlier attacks.

It is not immediately clear if Monday's attack is related to the previous shootings.