Frenchman charged after posting photos online of controversial gesture at Jewish school

French authorities have filed preliminary charges against a man over photos posted online appearing to glorify a deadly attack on a Jewish school.

Toulouse Prosecutor Michel Valet told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the administrator of the website showing the photos was charged late Tuesday with inciting racial hatred.

Valet said the website included two photos of a man performing an arm gesture known as the "quenelle." One photo shows a man wearing a Yasser Arafat T-shirt doing the quenelle in front of the Toulouse school where gunman Mohamed Merah killed three children and a rabbi in 2012. In another, the man is in front of Merah's apartment building.

The gesture was popularized by provocateur-comic Dieudonne M'Bala M'Bala, and is being increasingly used to express ant-Jewish views.