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Version 7 Version 8
2 Dead in Paris Raid Seeking Top Suspect; 7 Arrested 2 Dead in Paris Raid Seeking Top Suspect; 7 Arrested
(about 1 hour later)
ST.-DENIS, France — The French police stormed an apartment in the medieval heart of the northern Paris suburb of St.-Denis early Wednesday morning, in an attempt to find the Belgian man suspected of orchestrating the Paris terrorist attacks. Two people died in the raid, including a young woman who detonated an explosive vest, and seven people were arrested. It was not clear if the suspect was there. ST.-DENIS, France — The French police stormed an apartment in the medieval heart of the northern Paris suburb of St.-Denis before dawn on Wednesday in an attempt to find the Belgian man suspected of orchestrating the Paris terrorist attacks.
Two people died in the raid, including a young woman who detonated an explosive vest, and seven people were arrested. It was not clear if the suspect was there.
“It is currently impossible to give you the identities of the people who were arrested, which are being verified,” the Paris prosecutor, François Molins, told reporters after the raid. “Everything will be done to determine who is who.”“It is currently impossible to give you the identities of the people who were arrested, which are being verified,” the Paris prosecutor, François Molins, told reporters after the raid. “Everything will be done to determine who is who.”
The raid began around 4:15 a.m., when special police forces, backed by truckloads of soldiers, cordoned off an area near the Place Jean Jaurès, a main square in St.-Denis not far from the Stade de France, where three of the seven attackers who died on Friday night blew themselves up. The raid began around 4:15 a.m. Paris time, when special police forces, backed by truckloads of soldiers, cordoned off an area near the Place Jean Jaurès, a main square in St.-Denis not far from the Stade de France, where three attackers blew themselves up on Friday.
Inside the apartment, on the third floor of a building on the Rue du Corbillon, at least five suspects were holed up. One of them, the woman, opened fire and then killed herself; a man — “another terrorist,” Mr. Molins said — died from a combination of gunfire and the detonation of a grenade.Inside the apartment, on the third floor of a building on the Rue du Corbillon, at least five suspects were holed up. One of them, the woman, opened fire and then killed herself; a man — “another terrorist,” Mr. Molins said — died from a combination of gunfire and the detonation of a grenade.
A total of seven people were arrested: three in the apartment, two who were found “hiding in the rubble,” and two more outside the apartment. Mr. Molins said that three people in the apartment, two who were found “hiding in the rubble” and two more outside the apartment were arrested.
The target of the operation was Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the Belgian militant who is thought to have organized the attacks. The target of the operation was Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the Belgian militant who is thought to have organized the attacks. Intelligence officials in both France and the United States had said that they believed Mr. Abaaoud was in Syria with other members of the Islamic State, but that it now appears that he may have been in Europe all along.
Mr. Molins said the raid was the result of the intense investigation that began after the attacks on Friday night.
“A lot of work was done as part of this investigation, which made it possible to obtain, through phone records, surveillances and testimony, elements that could have suggested that the man named Abaaoud was potentially in an apartment used for plotting in St.-Denis,” he said.
A man arrested during the police operation on Wednesday later told Agence France-Presse that he had lent the apartment to the men as a favor to a friend. “I said that there was no mattress, they told me, ‘It’s not a problem,’ they just wanted water and to pray,” the man was quoted as saying, before he was handcuffed and led away by the police.
The police operation unfolded over nearly seven hours, with an initial series of explosions followed by sporadic bursts of gunfire. A government spokesman declared the operation over on Twitter at 11:47 a.m. Five police officers were lightly wounded, and a 7-year-old police dog, a Malinois named Diesel, was killed.The police operation unfolded over nearly seven hours, with an initial series of explosions followed by sporadic bursts of gunfire. A government spokesman declared the operation over on Twitter at 11:47 a.m. Five police officers were lightly wounded, and a 7-year-old police dog, a Malinois named Diesel, was killed.
Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said the 110 police officers involved had been “extremely brave” during the operation, “enduring gunfire for many hours, in conditions that they never encountered up until now.” He also praised the inhabitants of St.-Denis for their calm.Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said the 110 police officers involved had been “extremely brave” during the operation, “enduring gunfire for many hours, in conditions that they never encountered up until now.” He also praised the inhabitants of St.-Denis for their calm.
St.-Denis, a city of 118,000 people, is known for its melting-pot population and large Muslim community, as well as a Gothic basilica where many French monarchs are buried. Toward the end of the raid, the police broke through the door of a smaller church, St.-Denys de l’Estrée, for reasons that were not immediately clear. St.-Denis, a city of 118,000 people, is known for its melting-pot population and large Muslim community, as well as a Gothic basilica where many French monarchs are buried.
Djamila Khaldi, a 54-year-old cashier who lives near the basilica, was preparing to take her daughter to the airport when the gunfire erupted.Djamila Khaldi, a 54-year-old cashier who lives near the basilica, was preparing to take her daughter to the airport when the gunfire erupted.
Ms. Khaldi said she was not surprised the police had tracked the suspects to the neighborhood. She said a friend of hers believed she had seen one of the wanted men, Salah Abdeslam, on Monday. “She was terrified and she looked at another woman knowing that she recognized him too,” Ms. Khaldi said. “They did not dare to go to the police.” Ms. Khaldi said was not surprised the police had tracked the suspects to the neighborhood. She said a friend of hers believed she had seen one of the wanted men, Salah Abdeslam, on Monday. “She was terrified and she looked at another woman knowing that she recognized him too,” Ms. Khaldi said. “They did not dare to go to the police.”
Didier Paillard, the mayor of St.-Denis, said the Rue du Corbillon, where the raid occurred, had “many buildings and habitats in a disgraceful state,” with some apartments lacking even electricity and running water. “We were not prepared for this discovery,” he said of the raid. “This is a city that has 130 different nationalities, including people who come from war zones. We are a population that needs serenity.”Didier Paillard, the mayor of St.-Denis, said the Rue du Corbillon, where the raid occurred, had “many buildings and habitats in a disgraceful state,” with some apartments lacking even electricity and running water. “We were not prepared for this discovery,” he said of the raid. “This is a city that has 130 different nationalities, including people who come from war zones. We are a population that needs serenity.”
Mr. Abdeslam was thought to have escaped to Brussels after the attacks, which killed 129 people. He has been the subject of an intense international manhunt, along with a second suspect. It was not immediately clear on Wednesday morning if that suspect was Mr. Abaaoud, or if the police were instead seeking three men: Mr. Abdeslam, Mr. Abaaoud and yet another man. Prime Minister Manuel Valls, Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian and Justice Minister Christiane Taubira joined President François Hollande and Mr. Cazeneuve, the interior minister, at the Élysée Palace to monitor the operation.
French and American intelligence officials had said on Tuesday they believed that Mr. Abaaoud was in Syria with fellow Islamic State militants. Afterward, Mr. Hollande told a conference of French mayors that the raid in St.-Denis “confirms that we are at war.” He said he would travel to Washington next week to meet President Obama, and then to Moscow two days later to meet President Vladmir V. Putin of Russia, to discuss the formation of “a large coalition” to act “decisively” against the Islamic State, which is also known as ISIS, ISIL or Daesh.
French media outlets reported that the location of the suspected hide-out in St.-Denis was gleaned from one of the attackers’ cellphones, which was found in a trash bin near the Bataclan concert hall, where 89 people died on Friday. “Daesh has financial and oil resources, and has created young radical Islamists through complicity in Europe and within our own country,” Mr. Hollande told the gathering.
A man arrested during the police operation on Wednesday later told Agence France-Presse that he had lent the apartment to the men as a favor to a friend. “I said that there was no mattress, they told me, ‘It’s not a problem,’ they just wanted water and to pray,” the man said before being handcuffed and led away by the police. “Their attacks bloodied Paris and St.-Denis,” he added, “but it is the entire country that has been attacked.”
Mr. Cazeneuve, Prime Minister Manuel Valls, Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian and Justice Minister Christiane Taubira joined President François Hollande at the Élysée Palace to monitor the operation. Mr. Hollande declared a state of emergency on Friday and has sought sweeping new authorities, including constitutional amendments, which he says would make it easier to fight terrorism. On Wednesday, he said the government would help the mayors to equip and arm local police officers. He also said that the government was introducing legislation that would make it possible to “immediately” dissolve organizations that glorify terrorism.
Some of the attackers in the Friday night attacks rented a house in the northeast Paris suburb of Bobigny last week, telling the landlady they were businessmen from Belgium, and a hotel suite in the southeast Paris suburb of Alfortville, officials said. “I say it firmly, France will remain the country of liberty, of movements, of culture,” he said. “An active, valiant, dynamic country.”
France conducted another series of airstrikes late Tuesday and into Wednesday in Raqqa, Syria, the stronghold of the Islamic State. More than 25 explosions struck Raqqa late Wednesday, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group in Britain that has a network of contacts in Syria. “What would France be without its museums, without its terraces, without its concerts, without its sports competitions?” he added.
Many of the strikes hit deserted areas that had already been struck before; but there were also casualties reported, in addition to property damage, the observatory said. But even as parts of France have started to return to normal life, the raids in St.-Denis were a reminder of the nationwide dragnet that continues. Heavily armed police guarded La Défense, the business district west of Paris, on Wednesday, and officials announced that they had finished positively identifying the bodies of the 129 people who died in the attacks.
France, through its defense minister, Mr. Le Drian, took the extraordinary step on Tuesday of invoking a European Union treaty that obliges members to help any member that is “the victim of armed aggression on its territory.” Clues that have emerged since the attacks suggest that they required careful planning around weapons, transportation, communications and logistics.
Mr. Hollande took steps to shore up global support for what he has called a war to annihilate the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL. He met with Secretary of State John Kerry, who expressed sympathy but reiterated the Obama administration’s view that the group would not be destroyed until Syria’s embattled president, Bashar al-Assad, relinquishes power. Some of the attackers in the Friday night attacks rented a house in the northeast Paris suburb of Bobigny last week, telling the landlady they were businessmen from Belgium, and a hotel suite in the southeast Paris suburb of Alfortville, officials said. A French official who was briefed on the investigation but not authorized to discuss it said that a cellphone found in a trash can near the Bataclan concert hall, where 89 people died on Friday, led the police to the Alfortville hotel. The phone contained a text message — “on est parti on commence’’ — that loosely translates as “here we go, we’re starting” or “we have left, we’re starting.”
Mr. Hollande will visit Washington and Moscow next week to meet with Mr. Obama and the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin. In Britain, Prime Minister David Cameron told Parliament that the Paris attacks had strengthened the case for intervening against the Islamic State in Syria, a move that Parliament rejected in 2013.
On Tuesday, France’s third and final day of national mourning, crowds gathered to light candles and lay flowers at the Place de la République and at makeshift memorials at the sites of the attacks. In the southwestern city of Toulouse, thousands gathered in the central square, waving French flags and singing “La Marseillaise,” the national anthem.
“The terrorists want to erase everything: culture, youth, life, and also history and memory,” Mr. Hollande said in a speech at a Unesco conference in Paris.
“You do not fight against terrorism by hiding, by putting your life on hold, by suspending economic, social and cultural life, by banning concerts, theater, sports competitions,” he said. “We will not yield to terrorism by suspending our way of life.”
Many Parisians and visitors followed his advice, flocking to restaurants, cafes and museums. But the country continued to reel from the attacks, the worst violence on French soil in decades. Officials said the bodies of 117 of the 129 people killed had been positively identified; 221 of the 352 people injured remained in hospitals, or which 57 were in intensive care.
The country remained under a state of emergency, as developments in the investigation emerged in a steady trickle.
On Tuesday morning, the authorities seized a black Renault Clio with Belgian license plates in the 18th Arrondissement on the northern edge of Paris, next to the suburb of St.-Denis, where three suicide bombers detonated their explosives during a soccer game at the Stade de France. The authorities are looking into the possibility that the vehicle might have been intended for yet another attack.On Tuesday morning, the authorities seized a black Renault Clio with Belgian license plates in the 18th Arrondissement on the northern edge of Paris, next to the suburb of St.-Denis, where three suicide bombers detonated their explosives during a soccer game at the Stade de France. The authorities are looking into the possibility that the vehicle might have been intended for yet another attack.
On Tuesday night, the authorities released a photo of one of the stadium bombers — who used a Syrian passport to enter Greece last month, evidently posing as a migrant — and asked for the public’s help in identifying him. The passport was probably stolen, and the identity on the passport page — Ahmad al-Mohammad, 25, of Idlib, Syria — may be that of a dead Syrian soldier, the French official said.On Tuesday night, the authorities released a photo of one of the stadium bombers — who used a Syrian passport to enter Greece last month, evidently posing as a migrant — and asked for the public’s help in identifying him. The passport was probably stolen, and the identity on the passport page — Ahmad al-Mohammad, 25, of Idlib, Syria — may be that of a dead Syrian soldier, the French official said.
The authorities said the car had been seen — it was not clear when, or who drove it — on the A1 highway, which connects the suburbs of Paris with the northeastern city of Lille, about a dozen miles from the Belgian border. Belgium, where Mr. Abaaoud is believed to have organized the attacks, remained on a state of high alert on Wednesday, as the authorities continued to search for Salah Abdeslam, who is thought to have been part of the plot. (His brother Ibrahim was one of the seven attackers who died on Friday.)
In Belgium, the authorities put the country at its highest alert level. They charged two men — Hamza Attou, 21, a Brussels native, and Mohamed Amri, 27, who was born in Morocco — with participating in a terrorist activity, saying they had driven Mr. Abdeslam, the fugitive, from Paris to Brussels. The number of federal police officers patrolling Brussels will be doubled starting Thursday, to 40 from 20 during the day, and to 30 from 15 at night, Interior Minister Jan Jambon announced.
The two men frequented a bar owned by Mr. Abdeslam and his brother Ibrahim, who blew himself up at a restaurant on Friday in one of the attacks. The brothers lived in the Brussels district of Molenbeek, also the base for Mr. Abaaoud, the Belgian believed to have planned the attacks. A third brother, Mohamed, who was not involved in the assaults, publicly appealed on Tuesday for Salah to turn himself in. Molenbeek, a working-class Brussels neighborhood, was the base for Mr. Abaaoud, the suspected plotter, and for the Abdeslam brothers. (A third brother, Mohamed, who lives there, was not involved in the attacks and has pleaded for Salah to turn himself in.)
“We are a family, we are thinking about him, we are wondering where he is, if he is scared, if he is feeding himself,” Mohamed Abdeslam told the French news channel BFM TV in Brussels. “The best would be for him to surrender so that the justice system may shed light on this situation.” Salah Abdeslam was thought to have escaped to Brussels after the attacks. He has been the subject of an intense international manhunt, along with a second suspect. It was not immediately clear on Wednesday morning if that suspect was Mr. Abaaoud, or if the police were instead seeking three men: Salah Abdeslam, Mr. Abaaoud and another man.
Salah Abdeslam was stopped at a traffic check in the French town of Cambrai on Saturday morning, as he headed toward the Belgian border, but was then waved through after showing identification. The Belgian authorities have charged two men — Hamza Attou, 21, a Brussels native, and Mohamed Amri, 27, who was born in Morocco — with participating in a terrorist activity, saying they had driven Salah Abdeslam from Paris to Brussels.
The Austrian police disclosed on Tuesday that Mr. Abdeslam was also stopped during a routine police check in northern Austria on Sept. 9 — four days after Germany and Austria opened their borders to refugees streaming in via Hungary. He crossed into Austria from Germany in a car with two men who have not been identified, and told the police that he would be spending a few days on vacation in Austria, an Interior Ministry spokesman said.
Mr. Kerry, in a hastily arranged trip to Paris to show solidarity, said the United States and France had no choice but to wage war against the Islamic State, the apocalyptic militant group that purports to have restored a caliphate, or a global Muslim community under a single leader.
“This is just raw terror to set up a caliphate,” Mr. Kerry said before meeting separately with Mr. Hollande and Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius. “This is not a situation where we have a choice. We’re not choosing to randomly go to war. We’re trying to avoid it, trying to find a better path.”
At least four Americans were wounded in the attacks on Paris, and one, Nohemi Gonzalez, died.
Mr. Cazeneuve told France Info radio on Tuesday that the police had conducted 128 raids in France overnight against terrorism suspects. He also said 115,000 police officers and troops had been deployed across the country “to ensure the protection of the French.”