Islamic Terrorist Attack in Paris (Updated and Bumped)

Fifth Update (1/9/2015): Police have killed all three terrorists.

Two hostage sieges came to a bloody and dramatic climax  today after police stormed two buildings in France, killing the Charlie Hebdo gunmen and their accomplice. 

At the first stand-off, Al Qaeda brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi were shot dead by special forces as they tried to fight their way out of a print works. 

Their hostage, named as Michel Catalano, is believed to have been rescued alive.  

Moments later, explosions were heard at a second siege in Paris where a fellow jihadi was threatening to kill captives if police stormed the Kouachis. 

At least one hostage is believed to have survived that stand-off, at a kosher supermarket, in what appears to have been a co-ordinated strike by police. 

However, there are reports four captives had been killed.  

The gunmen, Amedy Coulibay, who was suspected of murdering a police officer yesterday, was reportedly shot dead by police.

Fourth Update (1/9/2015): I have to admit that I thought that having fled into a forest, we might see a manhunt stretch into several weeks. Not so. From the Daily Mail:

 The Kouachis were cornered in Dammartin-en-Goele, around 25 miles from the capital, this morning after leading police on a dramatic car chase. 

After exchanging gunfire with officers, they fled on foot into printing works where they are holding a hostage, believed to be a 26-year-old male. 

Snipers have their weapons trained on the building and helicopters are hovering overhead as negotiations were underway with the Islamic fanatics.  

Runways have been closed at Charles de Gaulle airport, around five miles away over fears the gunmen have rocket launchers that can down planes. 

However, the article also reports:

Gunfire and explosions have been heard at a print works where armed police have surrounded the Charlie Hebdo killers after they seized a hostage. 

It came after Al Qaeda gunmen Said Kouachi, 34, and his brother, Cherif, 33, had reportedly told police negotiators: 'We are ready to die as martyrs'.  

Reports of multiple gun shots and blasts suggest the siege may have come to a bloody climax in a firefight with French special forces.

Meanwhile, in Paris, the black muslim that shot a female police officer yesterday has taken hostages at a kosher grocery. Again, from the Daily Mail:

A Islamic militant holding six people hostage is threatening to kill his captives if police attempt to storm the Charlie Hebdo terrorists currently engaged in a standoff with police on the outskirts of Paris. 

Today's second hostage crisis emerged hours after the Charlie Hebdo killers Cherif and Said Kouachi took one person captive at a business premises near a Paris airport. 

Police say suspected hostage taker Amedy Coulibaly, 32, is using the hostages as a bargaining chip to try and scupper the police response further north. 

He is working with a woman called Hayat Boumeddiene, 26, considered ‘armed and dangerous’, and is said to have yelled at police: 'You know who I am' when they responded to the shooting. 

Police have now ordered all shops in Paris' famed Jewish district to be immediately closed.

Police kitting up with what looks like a Mini-14

What look like more Mini-14s.

Third Update (1/8/2015): Two of the suspects have fled into a forest, while heavily armed police engage in a manhunt. The Daily Mail reports:

Source

Two armed suspects wanted over the Charlie Hebdo massacre are being pursued through woodland after a massive anti-terror dragnet closed in on a forest in northern France, it has been reported. 

The men, believed to be brothers Cherif and Said Kouachi, have been tracked down to a remote area around 80km north-east of Paris after reportedly robbing a nearby petrol station earlier this morning. 

Officers are said to have found a Molotov cocktail bomb and jihadist flag in their car which they abandoned before fleeing on foot, still armed, into a vast forest measuring 32,000 acres, an area larger than Paris.  

Swarms of armed police in armoured personnel carriers have sealed off the nearby village of Abbaye de Longpont, which has just 300 residents, as they conduct house-to-house enquiries with terrified locals. 

* * * 

French anti-terrorism police and helicopters converged on the area after two men matching the description of the brothers raided a garage around 6km away in Villers-Cotterêt. 

The station attendant claimed the suspects drove off in a white Renault Clio with covered number plates in the direction of Paris with 'exposed Kalashnikovs and rocket launchers' inside the vehicle.   

Amid French media reports the men had abandoned their car, Bruno Fortier, the mayor of neighbouring Crepy-en-Valois, said helicopters were circling his town and police and anti-terrorism forces were deploying en masse. 

'It's an incessant waltz of police cars and trucks,' he told Reuters, adding that he could not confirm reports the men were holed up in a house in the area.  

The report goes on to give a significant amount of background on the shooters. The same story reported on another attack, resulting in the death of another French police officer:

In separate disturbing developments, terrified workers in Paris’s business district were warned not to leave their office after a gunman was seen outside – just hours after a female police officer was shot dead by a ‘North African wielding an assault rifle’.  

Workers in Paris's business district La Defense received an email this morning, warning them to stay in their offices as an armed gunman had been spotted in the area, French newspaper Le Figaro reported. 

The email was sent the same morning a police officer, named by Paris Match as Clarissa Jean-Philippe, 27, died after being attacked just before dawn in Montrouge, a suburb in the south of the French capital. 

The street cleaner - who stepped in and confronted the gunman - is also said to be in a serious condition, after he was shot in the face.  

Several attacks against French mosques have also been reported since the massacre - including one which was hit with three blank grenades in Le mans, west of Paris.  

There were also reports this morning of an explosion at a kebab shop near a mosque in Lyon. 

Later in the article, it identifies the weapon used in the second shooting as an MP-5. More details about what are believed to be revenge attacks can be found here.

Automatic weapons and RPGs? Sounds like French Muslims have access to better weapons than the bulk of the police force.

I will be interested to see whether revenge attacks continue because it would be a sign that the French people have given up on the cultural Marxism espoused by the European elites; and, since the French government won't protect them, engaging in their own 4th generation conflict.

Second Update (1/7/2015): The suspects in the murders have been identified. From Mashable:

French police officials have identified three men as suspects in the deadly terror attack at the Paris offices of the Charlie Hebdo newspaper. 

One of the men, 35-year-old Cheriff Kouachi, was convicted on terrorism charges in 2008. 

Two of the suspects, brothers Cheriff and Said Kouachi, 32, are French nationals who were born to Algerian parents in Paris. The nationality of a third man, Hamid Mourad, 18, is unknown; police believe he is a high school student. 

Their names circulated on Facebook and Twitter for an hour before French authorities confirmed that the Kouachi brothers had been identified. 

One of the officials who spoke to the Associated Press said they were linked to a Yemeni terrorist network.

Update (1/7/2015):  A car exploded outside a synagogue in the Paris suburb of Sarcelles. It is being reported as a mechanical malfunction, and unrelated to the terrorist attack. But, as Robert Spencer points out, how do they know?

Islamic terrorists carried out a cowardly attack in Paris. The Daily Mail reports:

Twelve people were killed today when gunmen carried out a massacre at the offices of a notoriously anti-Islamist newspaper in Paris - including a police officer who was executed as he begged for mercy on the pavement. 

Masked attackers brandishing Kalashnikovs burst into the Charlie Hebdo headquarters, opening fire on staff after seeking out journalists by name. 

Clad all in black with hoods and speaking flawless French, the militants forced one of the cartoonists - who was at the office with her young daughter - to open the door. 

Witnesses said the suspected Al Qaeda gunmen were heard to shout 'the Prophet has been avenged' and 'Allahu akbar!' – Arabic for 'God is great' – as they stalked the building.  

They headed straight for the paper's editor and cartoonist, Stephane Charbonnier, killing him and his police bodyguard, who had recruited to protect him following earlier threats. 

They also killed three other renowned cartoonists – men who had regularly satirised Islam and the Prophet Mohammed – and the newspaper's deputy chief editor. 

Horrific footage emerged showing an injured police officer slumped on the pavement as two gunmen approached him outside the office minutes later. 

In an apparent desperate plea for his life, the officer is seen slowly raising his hand towards one of the attackers, who responds by callously shooting him in the head at point-blank range.  

Despite a shoot-out with armed officers, the 'calm and highly disciplined' men were able to escape in a hijacked car and remain on the loose.

Contrary to the above account, the newspaper was not "anti-Islamist," but was the satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. It wasn't that it was anti-Islamist, but that it did not exempt Islam from being satirized. There are numerous other accounts and articles concerning the attack: The Washington Post, The New York Post, Ricochet, CBS, and CNN, for a few.

The CBS report further indicates:

Chilling video initially posted to a Facebook account shows two gunmen open fire on police in a small black car, and then shows them executing one officer as he lays on the sidewalk by shooting him at close range. The masked gunmen are then seen in the video getting into the black car and driving off. The Arabic phrase “Allahu Akbar” can be heard shouted in video of the attack. 

They later abandoned the small black car and hijacked another vehicle, in which they are believed to have left central Paris. It was not clear where the third suspect went, as he was not seen making a getaway in the black car after the police officer was shot. 

Calling the incident a “terrorist attack,” Hollande said “we must show we are a united country,” and vowed to respond with “firmness.” 

Without further explanation, Hollande said “several” attacks had been averted over recent weeks, and added that France was a target for extremists “because we’re a country committed to liberty.” 

Cobbe reported that, according to at least one witness, one of the gunman was heard asking for people by name. 

The suspects managed to escape the scene and were being pursued by police into Paris suburbs. 

A reporter for Britain’s Telegraph newspaper in Paris told Sky News that the first two officers to arrive, who were apparently unarmed, fled after seeing gunmen armed with automatic weapons and possibly a grenade launcher. 

The Guardian reports a witness in the office building said one of the gunman asked where Charlie Hebdo was located. 

“Then someone opened the door to our office and asked where Charlie Hebdo was. He had a rifle. We backed away. Afterwards he left, we heard gunfire. We went to the windows, there were two men running with guns, speaking in bad French … They were shouting outside, and shooting again. Afterwards I saw someone leaving the building with his hands covered in blood,” the unnamed witness said, according to The Guardian.

 From the NY Post article:

Among those killed, or better say executed, were 10 members of the weekly’s editorial staff, including the flower of French political cartoonists: Stephane Charbonnier, alias “Charb,” Jean Cabut, alias “Cabu,” Bernard Tignou and the magazine’s top star, Georges Wolinski. 

All had been threatened with death on numerous occasions, especially for drawing and publishing cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed (including one with a bomb hidden in his turban) and for a special issue, renamed “Sharia Hebdo” for the occasion, with “Mohammed” as guest editor. 

In 2011, Charlie Hebdo was also been the only major publication in the West to republish the Danish cartoons of Mohammed that provoked violence in numerous countries. 

In 2013, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius distanced the French government from the weekly’s in-your-face criticism of Islamism and Islam and warned Charlie Hebdo not to push provocation too far. 

Wednesday’s attack must have been carefully planned and based on some inside information. For it came precisely as Charlie’s weekly editorial meeting was under way with a maximum turnout of writes, cartoonists and editors. 

The attack also came only hours after the weekly’s new issue went on sale with a cover inspired by a new novel by Michel Houelbeque, which envisions the election of a Muslim as France’s president in 2022. 

The government had provided police protection for four of the weekly’s key editors. The assassination of three of them on Wednesday suggests the protection may have been more more formal than real. 

The style of the attack and the getaway, the weapons employed and the safe haven — probably set up in Seine-Saint Denis, a suburb of Paris with a large Muslim population — indicate some input from professional armed bandits who appear to have reached a coordination agreement with jihadists.

Islam should be mocked. Except for a few lone voices, the supposed "moderates" that we always hear about do nothing to condemn the attacks. So, to join in the mocking, a couple more cartoons mocking Islam:

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