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ISIS Video Appears to Show Paris Assailants Earlier in Syria and Iraq ISIS Video Appears to Show Paris Assailants Earlier in Syria and Iraq
(about 2 hours later)
PARIS — The Islamic State released a video on Sunday apparently showing footage of the men who carried out the November attacks in Paris while they were in Syria and Iraq, where they are pictured carrying out executions, including beheadings.PARIS — The Islamic State released a video on Sunday apparently showing footage of the men who carried out the November attacks in Paris while they were in Syria and Iraq, where they are pictured carrying out executions, including beheadings.
If the identities of the men in the video are confirmed, it would be the first evidence that the group that killed 130 people in coordinated attacks in Paris on Nov. 13 had been sent entirely from the Islamic State’s base in Syria. If the identities of all of the men in the video are confirmed, it would be the first evidence that the group that killed 130 people in coordinated attacks in Paris on Nov. 13 had been sent from the Islamic State’s base in Syria.
The video appears to make clear that the Paris attacks were not just inspired by the Islamic State, but that the group itself was attacking on European soil. It also aims to show that the assailants — some of whom had European passports — had been carrying out atrocities in the group’s name long before their return to Europe. The video makes it clear that the Paris attacks were not just inspired by the Islamic State, but rather carried out by core members of the terrorist group, who had been trained and vetted in Syria before being tapped to carry out attacks on European soil. It also aims to show that the assailants — some of whom had European passports — had been carrying out atrocities in the group’s name long before their return to Europe.
The Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, began teasing the release last week in the latest issue of Dabiq, its monthly magazine, where a still image of the video appeared. Several of the assailants pictured in Syria or Iraq are seen wearing what appear to be lapel microphones suggesting that they were recording themselves. The footage shows one of the attackers beheading a victim and another shooting a captive. It is unclear why it took the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, more than two months to release the video, which also includes numerous images of the Paris attacks. Under the headline “Target Area: Paris,” it shows frantic televised scenes of soccer players and fans reacting to explosions at the Stade du France, and chaos on the streets near the Bataclan and other venues where the mass shootings took place.
The Islamic State began teasing the release of the video last week in Dabiq, its monthly magazine, where a still image of the video appeared. Several of the assailants pictured in Syria or Iraq are seen wearing what appear to be lapel microphones suggesting that they were recording themselves.
The existence of prerecorded videos is important in the debate about whether earlier attackers had been deputized by an Islamic extremist group before acting. In the January 2015 attacks in Paris on the Charlie Hebdo satirical magazine (claimed by adherents of Al Qaeda) and on a kosher supermarket (claimed by a man acting in the name of ISIS) some analysts argued that if those groups had sent the attackers the men would have made videos in the groups’ respective territories.
Though at least one of the Kouachi brothers, who carried out the Charlie Hebdo attacks last year, was known to have traveled to Yemen to train with Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, no video has surfaced of either brother in Yemen or in the presence of other Qaeda members.
In the ISIS video released Sunday, seven of the Paris attackers are shown addressing the camera, one by one, on a windswept dune. The youngest of the group, Bilal Hadfi, 20 — who wept when he said goodbye to his mother in Belgium before leaving for Syria last year — is shown with a prisoner kneeling at his feet.
He pushes the man to the ground and beheads him.
Samy Amimour, from the Drancy suburb of Paris whose 67-year-old father traveled to Syria in a failed attempt to retrieve him, smiles as he holds a captive’s head.
And Omar Ismail Mostefai, who detonated a suicide vest inside the Bataclan concert hall, is shown holding another victim by the nape of his neck. “Know that we have received an order from the emir of the Believers to kill you wherever you are,” he says, using the honorific for the leader of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
One of the few attackers who is not shown executing a captive is Abdelhamid Abaaoud, who appears in a room with the ISIS flag.
“We will not stop fighting you in every part of the world regardless of whether you are on a tourism trip or a work trip,” he says in French. “So expect more. Expect a mujahid to show up to kill you.”
The video also states that ISIS has plans to attack Britain. It shows images of politicians, including Prime Minister David Cameron, as they authorize military action against the group.