2015-11 Paris attacks

 Mass murder in Paris(Deep event)

Locations of the attacks
Date	13 November 2015 - 14 November 2015
Perpetrators	Masterminded by Abdelhamid AbaaoudProperty "Has perpetrator" (as page type) with input value "Masterminded by Abdelhamid Abaaoud[1][2]" contains invalid characters or is incomplete and therefore can cause unexpected results during a query or annotation process.[[Masterminded by Abdelhamid Abaaoud|Masterminded by Abdelhamid Abaaoud]]
Type	• Mass shooting • bombing • hostage-taking • suicide attack
Weapon	AK-47 assault rifles Hand grenades Suicide vests utilising TATP and improvised shrapnel
Deaths	139, of which 129 immediate victims: Bataclan: 89 Le Carillon and Le Petit Cambodge: 11 La Casa Nostra: 5 Stade de France: 6 La Belle Équipe: 18 3 subsequent deaths 7 perpetrators",ofwhich*129immediatevictims:**Bataclan:89**LeCarillonandLePetitCambodge:11**LaCasaNostra:5**StadedeFrance:6**LaBelleÉquipe:18*3subsequentdeaths*7perpetrators[3]" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 139.
Injured (non-fatal)	352,",[4]" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 352.
Motive	Islamic extremism Ideological objection to Paris as a capital of "abomination and perversion" Retaliation for Opération Chammal (French airstrikes in Syria and Iraq Foreign policy of François Hollande in relation to Muslims worldwide.

Mass murder in Paris was perpetrated on Friday 13 November 2015, when a series of coordinated terrorist attacks — consisting of mass shootings, suicide bombings, and hostage-taking — occurred in the French capital and in Saint-Denis, one of its northern suburbs.

Beginning at 21:16 hours (CET), there were six mass shootings in central Paris and three separate suicide bombings outside the Stade de France football stadium, where France were playing Germany.

The deadliest attack was at the Bataclan theatre, where attackers took hostages and engaged in a stand-off with police which ended at 00:58 on Saturday 14 November 2015.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks.

Security experts have claimed that Friday's mass murder in Paris may have been triggered by the killing of Jihadi John by a US drone strike on Thursday 12 November 2015.

On 16 November 2015, the third day of national mourning in France, the suspected mastermind behind the murderous attacks was named as Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a 27 year old Belgian of Moroccan origin.

Victims

129 victims were killed, 89 of them at the Bataclan theatre. A further 415 were admitted to hospital with injuries sustained in the attacks, including 80 people described as being seriously injured. In addition to the victims, seven attackers died, and the authorities continued to search for any accomplices remaining at large. The attacks were the deadliest in France since the Second World War, and the deadliest in the European Union since the Madrid train bombings in 2004.

France is at war

In an immediate response, French President François Hollande announced a state of emergency, the first since the 2005 French riots, and placed temporary controls on the country's borders. People and organisations expressed solidarity including through social media. President Hollande declared the attacks an "act of war".

On 15 November 2015, writer and broadcaster Iain Macwhirter wrote an article entitled "The only weapon IS fear is tolerance":

“France is at war” said Francois Hollande on the morning after the worst attack on French soil since the second world war. But at war with what? Islamic State isn’t a country. They don’t invade with armies, but with fear.

You can’t go to war with an organisation that doesn’t stand and fight and nor can you punish people who’ve already sacrificed their lives. Hollande said the perpetrators of the Paris attacks will be pursued “without mercy”. But you can’t sentence a suicide bomber to death.

IS are terrorists whose primary objective is not to occupy but to polarise; to encourage repressive measures from the state against muslims, and to force non-Muslim communities to regard followers of Islam as ‘enemies within’.

They know that the influx into Europe of large numbers of migrants from North Africa and the Middle East is reawakening latent xenophobia in French society. IS are doing a recruiting job for the far right Front Nationale of Marine Le Pen who is expected to win next month’s regional elections in Northern France. They want Europe to rebuild its borders and end free movement.

The Paris attacks seem to have been consciously targeted at concerts and cafes attended by urban liberals who celebrate multiculturalism and for whom religious or racial intolerance is abhorrent. It was retaliation agains the Paris that came out in force to express solidarity with the victims of Charlie Hebdo in January.

“They curse our prophet” said the IS statement. The rhetoric may be mediaeval but the tactics are twenty first century. These are digital zealots, connoisseurs of popular culture, who may even posses a grim sense irony. Their main attack in Paris was at a rock concert fronted by the American garage band Eagles of Death Metal.

But it was real death metal flying into their bodies of dozens of young Parisians from Kalashnikovs wielded by young muslim fanatics. The message was clear: the young people in the west play at death; IS do the real thing.

IS says that it is targeting Paris in part because of the bombing in Syria, but principally because it is “the capital of adultery and vice” . The cover of the Eagles of Death Metal’s latest album “Zipper Down” depicts a woman in a leather bomber jacked revealing her breasts. The imagery will not be lost on the legions of young impressionable muslims on the internet.

This is culture wars with Kalashnikovs. The only way to defeat IS, as with all terror, is to withstand it. The people of Paris understand this instinctively. On BBC radio yesterday a young parisian announced that “everybody is going to go out and eat cheese and drink wine like we always do on Saturdays”. That’s the spirit.

Hurling militant rhetoric and more drones at IS only makes it stronger. The best way to combat this kind of threat, is to keep calm and carry on. That’s how Britain withstood the IRA’s mainland bombing campaign which killed as many people and nearly blew up the Prime Minister in 1984.

The one thing the terrorists want is for governments to launch another war on terror, just as America did after 9/11. So let’s hear no more of it. The weapon Islamic extremists fear most is tolerance.

Retaliation

On 15 November, France launched its largest single airstrike of Opération Chammal, its contribution to the anti-ISIS bombing campaign, by striking numerous targets in Al-Raqqah, Syria in retaliation for the attacks. France had been bombing in the Middle East for over a year but had targeted Syria in October 2015. ISIS's motive was retaliation for French involvement in the Syrian and Iraqi conflicts. In the weeks leading up to the attacks, ISIS had claimed responsibility for several attacks, such as twin suicide bombings in Beirut two days earlier and the bombing of Metrojet Flight 9268 on 31 October 2015. France had been on Vigipirate (high alert) since the January 2015 attacks in Paris that killed 17 people, including civilians and police officers.

Background

France's military has been involved in airstrikes in Iraq and Syria since 19 September 2014, known by the codename Operation Chammal. In October 2015, France struck targets in Syria for the first time. ISIS specifically mentioned the airstrikes when they claimed responsibility for the attacks in Paris.

France had been on high alert for terrorism since the Charlie Hebdo shooting and the January 2015 Île-de-France attacks. France had also increased security in anticipation of the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference, scheduled to be held in Paris from 30 November to 11 December 2015, and had restored border checks a week before the attacks. The Charlie Hebdo shooting in January 2015 occurred in the 11th arrondissement of Paris, where the Bataclan theatre is situated. France witnessed other, smaller, attacks throughout 2015, including the stabbing of three soldiers in Nice guarding a Jewish community centre in February; an attempt to blow up a factory in Saint-Quentin-Fallavier in June, resulting in the death of an employee; and a shooting and stabbing spree on a Thalys train in August 2015.

Two Jewish brothers, Pascal and Joël Laloux, owned the Bataclan theatre for more than 40 years until they sold it in September 2015. The venue had been threatened several times because of their public support of Israel. In 2011, a group calling itself "Army of Islam" threatened the theatre because of this support.

Recent mass murders

Islamic State and its branches claimed responsibility for numerous deadly attacks which took place in the weeks leading up to the mass murder in Paris. On 12 November 2015, twin suicide bombings took place in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 43 people. On 31 October 2015, Metrojet Flight 9268, carrying mostly Russian passengers crashed in the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt, killing 224 people, for which IS's Sinai Province claimed responsibility. On the day of the Paris attacks, IS's lead executioner, Jihadi John, was reported to have been killed by a US drone strike and IS lost control of Sinjar in Iraq to Kurdish forces.

Religious raid?

The Paris attacks happened on the first day of the Muslim lunar month of Safar, which in 2015 fell on 13 November. Since the Islamic lunar calendar year is 11 to 12 days shorter than the solar year, Safar migrates throughout the seasons. Safar has a religious significance within Islam, as it is named after Prophet Muhammad's “ghazwa” (religious raid) against the "infidel" at Safwan in 623. Islamic State has referred to the Paris attacks as a "ghazwa" (religious raid). When performed within the context of Islamic warfare, a ghazwa's function is to weaken and demoralise an enemy in preparation for their eventual conquest and subjugation.

See also

• Jerusalem Conference on International Terrorism

References

This page imported content from Wikipedia on 16 November 2015.
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