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Charlie Hebdo Office Hit in Terror Attack; 12 Dead Charlie Hebdo Office Hit in Terror Attack; 12 Dead
(about 1 hour later)
PARIS — Masked gunmen burst into the Paris offices of a French satirical newspaper on Wednesday and killed 12 people, including top journalists and two police officers, before fleeing in a car. The gunmen were still at large at dusk, as an extensive police dragnet spread across a traumatized city. PARIS — At least two masked gunmen on Wednesday burst into the Paris offices of a satirical newspaper that had drawn threats for lampooning Islam, killing 12 people in a methodical hail of gunfire, fleeing by car as they battled on the street with the police and setting off a wide manhunt for the killers who remained free.
Among the dead were four prominent cartoonists who have repeatedly lampooned Islamic terrorists and the Prophet Muhammad, leading to speculation that the attack on the newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, was the work of Islamic militants acting alone or in concert with extremist groups. The terrorist attack on the newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, was among the worst in postwar France and set the nation on edge and threatened to deepen distrust of France’s large Muslim population at a time when Islamic radicalism has become a central concern of security officials across Europe.
A police guard assigned to protect the newspaper was among the first victims. A second police officer, who responded to reports of the shooting, was killed on the sidewalk outside the office by the fleeing suspects, the Paris police said. The shooting of the second police officer was captured in a widely-seen video. President François Hollande of France called the attack, carried out with automatic weapons and characterized by an unusual degree of military-style precision, a display of extraordinary “barbarism” that was “without a doubt” an act of terrorism. He declared Thursday a national day of mourning.
President François Hollande immediately declared that the attack was an act of terrorism and an assault on freedom of the press. He ratcheted up France’s nationwide terror alert to its highest level, and met with his cabinet in an emergency session. He said France was already on high alert after several planned terrorist attacks were thwarted in recent weeks. He also raised the nationwide terror alert to its highest status, saying several terrorist attacks had been thwarted in recent weeks as security officials here and elsewhere in Europe have grown increasingly wary of the return of young citizens from Syria and Iraq where they went to wage jihad.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but several websites and Twitter accounts associated with extremist groups applauded the violence, calling it revenge for the newspaper’s satirical treatment of Islam and its prophet. The French authorities put some schools on lockdown for the day, and added security at houses of worship, news media offices and transportation centers, and conducted random searches on the Paris Metro.
Additional security was put in place at houses of worship, news media offices and transportation centers in Paris, and many schools were locked down as the search for the gunmen continued. The Paris prosecutor, François Molins, said witnesses said the attackers had screamed “Allahu akbar!” or “God is great” during the attack, which the police characterized as a “slaughter.”
The radio station France Info quoted a witness as saying that he saw the attack from a nearby building in the heart of the French capital, not far from the Place des Vosges. Corinne Rey, a cartoonist known as Coco, who was at the newspaper office during the attack, told Le Monde that the attackers spoke fluent French and had said they were part of Al Qaeda.
“About half an hour ago, two black-hooded men entered the building with Kalashnikovs,” the witness, Benoît Bringer, told the station. “A few minutes later, we heard lots of shots.” He added that the men were then seen fleeing the building. An amateur video of the assailants’ subsequent gunfight with the police, showed the men shouting, “We have avenged the Prophet Muhammad. We have killed Charlie Hebdo!” The video, the source of which could not be verified, also showed the gunmen killing a police officer as he lay wounded on a nearby street.
Xavier Castaing, a police spokesman, said that three armed, masked men forced their way into the offices, firing indiscriminately at people in the lobby and wounding many. He said that they were carrying AK-47 rifles, and that the attack lasted several minutes before the assailants fled by car. The victims at Charlie Hebdo included some of the country’s most revered and iconoclastic cartoonists. The weekly’s editorial director, Stéphane Charbonnier, had already been received light police protection after earlier threats, the police and the prosecutor said. An officer assigned to guard the newspaper’s offices and its top editor was among the victims.
News reports said the gunmen shot at the police outside the building as they escaped. Several journalists sought safety on the roof of the building during the attack. As news of the attack spread, an outpouring of grief mixed with expressions of dismay and demonstrations of solidarity for free speech. By the evening, not far from the site of the attack in the east of Paris, a crowd of nearly 1,000 gathered at Place de La République — young and old, and various classes — some chanting, “Charlie! Charlie!” or holding signs reading, “I am Charlie” — the message posted on the newspaper’s website. Spontaneous vigils of hundreds and thousands formed in other cities around the country.
In 2011, the Charlie Hebdo office was badly damaged by a firebomb after it published a spoof issue “guest edited” by the Prophet Muhammad to salute the victory of an Islamist party in Tunisian elections. It had announced plans to publish a special issue renamed “Charia Hebdo,” a play on the word in French for Shariah law. Mr. Molin, the prosecutor, said that two men armed with AK-47 rifles and wearing black hoods, had forced their way into the weekly’s offices about 11:30 a.m., firing at people in the lobby, before making their way to the newsroom on the second floor, interrupting a news meeting and firing at the assembled journalists.
A lawyer for the newspaper said that a number of prominent editors and cartoonists had been killed on Wednesday, including Stéphane Charbonnier, known as Charb, and Jean Cabut, who signs his work Cabu. He said that the cartoonists Georges Wolinski and Bernard Verlhac were also among the victims. The attackers then fled outside, where they clashed three times with the police, shooting one officer as he lay on the ground on a nearby street. They then fled in a black Citroen, and headed north on the right bank of Paris. During their escape, prosecutors said, they crashed into another car and injured its female driver, before robbing and abducting a bystander.
The police said that they had discovered an abandoned car in the 19th Arrondissement, a relatively poor, heavily populated area of Paris. They said they believed it was used by the gunmen. The police said the precision with which the assailants handled their weapons suggested that they had received military training. During the attack, which the police said lasted a matter of minutes, several journalists hid under their desks or went to hide on the roof, witnesses said.
One journalist at the Charlie Hebdo office, who asked that her name not be used, texted a friend after the shooting: “I’m alive. There is death all around me. Yes, I am there. The jihadists spared me.” Meziani Zina, 32, who works at the reception of an employment center across from the building, said she heard several loud shots ringing from the weekly’s headquarters.
One journalist who was at the weekly during the attack and asked that her name not be used, texted a friend after the shooting: “I’m alive. There is death all around me. Yes, I am there. The jihadists spared me.”
Treasured by many, hated by some, and indiscriminate in its offensiveness, Charlie Hebdo has long reveled in provoking.
In 2011, the office of the weekly was badly damaged by a firebomb after it published a spoof issue “guest edited” by the Prophet Muhammad to salute the victory of an Islamist party in Tunisian elections. It had announced plans to publish a special issue renamed “Charia Hebdo,” a play on the word in French for Shariah law.
Police said the dead included four celebrated cartoonists at the weekly, including its Mr. Charbonnier, known as Charb, Jean Cabut, Georges Wolinski and Bernard Verlhac.
Mr. Charbonnier stoked controversy and earned the ire of the Muslim community in 2006, when he republished satirical cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad that had been published in a Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten. His last cartoon for Charlie Hebdo featured an armed man who appeared to be a Muslim fighter with a headline that read: “Still no attacks in France. Wait! We have until the end of January to give our best wishes.”
The police said that an abandoned black Citroen with silvered wing-mirrors, used by the gunmen, was later discovered in the 19th arrondissement of Paris.
A senior United States counterterrorism official said on Wednesday that the American authorities were following the developments in Paris closely, but that they had not yet identified any individuals or groups who might be responsible for the attack.A senior United States counterterrorism official said on Wednesday that the American authorities were following the developments in Paris closely, but that they had not yet identified any individuals or groups who might be responsible for the attack.
The American official noted that, according to social media reports, the attackers did refer to the Prophet Muhammad, saying he was “avenged.” Michael J. Morell, the former deputy director of the C.I.A. and now a consultant to CBS News, said it was unclear whether the attackers acted on their own or were directed by organized groups.
President Obama issued a statement condemning the attack.
“Time and again, the French people have stood up for the universal values that generations of our people have defended,” he said. “France, and the great city of Paris where this outrageous attack took place, offer the world a timeless example that will endure well beyond the hateful vision of these killers. We are in touch with French officials, and I have directed my administration to provide any assistance needed to help bring these terrorists to justice.”
In a letter addressed to Mr. Hollande, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany offered condolences, saying, “In this difficult hour, we stand close at the side of our French friends.”
“This horrible act is not only an attack on the lives of French citizens and the domestic security of France,” Ms. Merkel said. “It also stands as an attack on the freedom of expression and the press, a core element of our free, democratic culture that can in no way be justified.”
The cover of the newspaper on Wednesday featured a caricature of Michel Houellebecq, a controversial novelist whose sixth novel, “Submission,” imagines a France one day run by Muslims, in which women forsake Western dress and polygamy is introduced. On the cover, Mr. Houellebecq is depicted as a wizard and smoking a cigarette. “In 2022, I will do Ramadan,” he is shown saying.
The book’s publication, ahead of presidential elections in 2017, comes as the increasingly influential far-right National Front has helped spur a loud and often acrimonious debate about immigration. The attack comes as nearly 1,000 French citizens have gone or planned to join jihadist groups in Iraq and Syria last year, further fueling concerns about radical Islam encroaching into France.
Last month, Prime Minister Manuel Valls ordered hundreds of additional military personnel onto the streets to reinforce a routine deployment of security forces after a string of attacks across France raised alarm about Islamic militancy.
In Dijon and Nantes, a total of 23 people were wounded when men drove vehicles into crowds, with one of the drivers shouting a Muslim rallying cry. The authorities depicted both drivers as mentally unstable.
The attacks stoked concerns that militants were ramping up attacks against French citizens in retaliation for the French government’s support for the United States-led air campaign against Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq. The attacks came after violence attributed to lone-wolf attackers in London in 2013, in Canada in October, and in Sydney, Australia, last month.
Charlie Hebdo is part of a venerable tradition in France, deploying satire and insolence to take on politicians and the police, bankers and religions of all kinds, including this week a mock debate about whether Jesus existed or not.
The weekly was born in controversy in 1970 with the ban of a publication called Hara-Kiri after it mocked the death of former President Charles de Gaulle. That prompted its journalists to set up a new weekly, Charlie Hebdo, a reference to its reprint of Charlie Brown cartoons from the United States.
The publication, which has a weekly circulation of about 30,000, suffered through periods in the 1980s when it ceased publication. Like other frail journals in the French newspaper industry, it recently issued appeals to its readers for financial aid with a declaration on its site, “Charlie Is in Danger.”
Michael J. Morell, the former deputy director of the Central Intelligence Agency and now a consultant to CBS News, said it was unclear whether the gunmen acted on their own or were directed by organized groups.
“This is the worst terrorist attack in Europe since the attacks in London in July of 2005,” Mr. Morell said. “The motive here is absolutely clear: trying to shut down a media organization that lampooned the Prophet Muhammad. So, no doubt in my mind that this is terrorism.”“This is the worst terrorist attack in Europe since the attacks in London in July of 2005,” Mr. Morell said. “The motive here is absolutely clear: trying to shut down a media organization that lampooned the Prophet Muhammad. So, no doubt in my mind that this is terrorism.”
He added, “What we have to figure out here is the perpetrators and whether they were self-radicalized or whether they were individuals who fought in Syria and Iraq and came back, or whether they were actually directed by ISIS or Al Qaeda.”He added, “What we have to figure out here is the perpetrators and whether they were self-radicalized or whether they were individuals who fought in Syria and Iraq and came back, or whether they were actually directed by ISIS or Al Qaeda.”
Dalil Boubakeur, the rector of the Grand Mosque in Paris, one of France’s largest, expressed horror at the assault on Charlie Hebdo. “We are shocked and surprised that something like this could happen in the center of Paris. But where are we?” he was quoted as saying by Europe1, a radio broadcaster.
“We strongly condemn these kinds of acts and we expect the authorities to take the most appropriate measures.” He added: “This is a deafening declaration of war. Times have changed, and we are now entering a new era of confrontation.”
The attack comes as thousands of Europeans have gone to join jihadist groups in Iraq and Syria, further fueling concerns about Islamic radicalism and terrorism being imported. Those concerns have been particularly acute in France where fears have grown that militants are seeking to target French citizens in retaliation for the government’s support for the United States-led air campaign against jihadists with the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq.
Last month, Prime Minister Manuel Valls ordered hundreds of additional military personnel onto the streets to beef up security after a series of attacks across France raised alarm about Islamic terror.
In Dijon and Nantes, a total of 23 people were injured when men drove vehicles into crowds, with one of the drivers shouting an Islamic rallying cry. The authorities depicted both drivers as mentally unstable. The attacks came after violence attributed to lone-wolf attackers in London in 2013, in Canada in October and last month in Sydney, Australia.
In September, fighters in Algeria aligned with the Islamic State beheaded Hervé Gourdel, a 55-year-old mountaineering guide from Nice, and released a video documenting the brutal killing. Mr. Gourdel was kidnapped after the Islamic State called on its supporters to target Europeans to avenge the airstrikes in Iraq and Syria.
President Obama issued a statement condemning the attack. “Time and again, the French people have stood up for the universal values that generations of our people have defended,” he said. “France, and the great city of Paris where this outrageous attack took place, offer the world a timeless example that will endure well beyond the hateful vision of these killers. We are in touch with French officials, and I have directed my administration to provide any assistance needed to help bring these terrorists to justice.”
The former French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, called the assault a “direct and savage attack against one of our most revered republican ideals: the freedom of expression.”
In a condolence letter addressed to President Holland, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany expressed condolences on behalf of the German people.
“This horrible act is not only an attack on the lives of French citizens and the domestic security of France,” Ms. Merkel said. “It also stands as an attack on the freedom of expression and the press, a core element of our free, democratic culture that can in no way be justified.”