Als Hauptverdächtige gelten die beiden Brüder Cherif Kouachi, 32, und Said Kouachi, 34. In Polizeikreisen hieß es, einer der beiden sei identifiziert worden,
weil er seinen Ausweis im Fluchtwagen habe liegen lassen.
With 12 dead and two gunmen still on the loose in France, many questions remain about the brutal armed assault on the satirical French magazine Charlie Hebdo on Wednesday. Above all: who did
it?
Based on video footage and eye witness accounts, security experts are already drawing conclusions. Several note that Wednesday’s attack in Paris’ 11th arrondissement appears qualitatively different from any terror attack on western soil of this decade.
The gunmen were not only dressed and equipped professionally, but moved and behaved professionally, too. They appeared calm and disciplined. Their handling of weapons was restrained and they were precise in their use of ammunition. And they operated as a team, covering each other’s positions.
The implication, then, is that the attack was plotted with the assistance of a foreign terrorist organisation rather than the exploit of a “wolf pack” — a group of radicalised individuals inspired to commit an act of violence, but not necessarily trained or directed to do so by a broader terrorist
group. Given French involvement in the international coalition against Isis, the Iraq and Syria-based group, would be an obvious
culprit.
But so far Isis, whose primary focus is local, rather than global, has mainly attempted to inspire lone wolf attacks in reprisal for western intervention against it, rather than go to the greater effort of more directly exporting its terror abroad. There has been little evidence of Isis actively training its members to be sent back to the west.
Another scenario may be that the attackers are affiliated to al-Qaeda, or one of al-Qaeda’s virulent branches such as al-Qaeda in the Arabian peninsula from Yemen, or Jabhat al-Nusra, from
Syria. Al-Qaeda is desperate to reassert itself after Isis gained the upper hand among jihadi groups. Two eyewitnesses to the attacks in Paris have now said the fighters claimed an al-Qaeda
affiliation.
One, a Parisian who claims to have been stopped by the fighters as they fled, said they told him they were from Yemen. That would point to AQAP, the arm of al-Qaeda charged by the group’s leadership with exporting terror to the west.
While these statements are as yet unverified, they appear to chime with other circumstantial
evidence.
“My initial thought was that it’s al-Qaeda going for relevance through a spectacular attack,” says Patrick Skinner, a former CIA official and counter terrorism expert now working at the Soufan Group who has studied al-Qaeda for years. In comparison, he says, “Isis or Isis sympathiser attacks are more in line with the group’s [own] mindset and ethos: chaotic violence aimed to shock. [AQ and Isis] have different psychologies, which reveal themselves in their attack
planning.”
Western spy chiefs too have long been fearing an AQAP-linked terror plot, even amid the international focus on Isis.
According to one UK security official, the group has been especially active in recent months. In particular, it has been at work to strengthen ties with al-Qaeda’s official affiliate in Syria, Jabhat al-Nusra, they said. The advantage of doing so is clear: AQAP has the professionalism and the expertise to carry out an attack, while Jabhat al-Nusra has the European citizens in its ranks who, with training and time, could execute it in their home
countries.
Other experts point out that AQAP’s favoured attacks feature explosives, not gunmen. The group is also currently preoccupied fighting its own insurgency in
Yemen.
“We can’t really draw any definite conclusions from it yet,” says Raffaello Pantucci, director of international studies at the think-tank RUSI. “But we can say that these sorts of attacks demonstrate a particularly strong dedication to your cause, you have to be pretty radicalised to do this. It's a truly callous
act.”
Mr Pantucci also feared more could be yet to come. “People have been trying to do this kind of attack for a while,” he said. “After the Mumbai attacks this became the attack model to copy. Now they have succeeded,
my worry is that, until they are caught, there might be another target.”
ABCD
Wer hat das Attentat auf Charlie Hebdo beauftragt?
Von Thierry Meyssan
Während viele Franzosen auf das gegen Charlie Hebdo begangene Attentat in der Weise reagieren, daß sie den Islamismus verurteilen und auf der Straße demonstrieren, unterstreicht Thierry Meyssan, daß die dschihadistische Interpretation unmöglich ist. Obgleich auch er jeden Grund hätte, dies als eine Operation von Al-Kaida oder vom Daesh zu verurteilen, erwägt er eine andere Hypothese, weitaus gefährlicher.
Die Strategie des "Kampfes der Kulturen" ist in Tel-Aviv und Washington entwickelt worden
Die Ideologie und die Strategie der Muslimbrüder, von Al-Kaida und des Daesh, zielt nicht darauf ab, den Bürgerkrieg im "Okzident" zu erzeugen, sondern im Gegenteil ihn im "Orient" zu erzeugen und beide Welten hermetisch voneinander zu trennen. Niemals haben Saïd Qotb, noch je einer seiner Nachfolger, dazu aufgerufen, Konflikte zwischen Muslimen und Nicht-Muslimen bei letzteren zu provozieren.
Im Gegenteil, die Strategie des "Kulturkampfes" ist durch Bernard Lewis entwickelt worden für die nationalen Sicherheitsrat der USA, dann durch Samuel Huntington nicht als eine Eroberungsstrategie popularisiert worden, sondern als ein voraussehbare Zustand [1]. Sie zielte darauf ab, die Bevölkerungen der Mitgliedsstaaten der NATO von einer unabänderlichen Konfrontation zu überzeugen, die präventiv die Form des "Krieges gegen den Terrorismus" annahm.
Nicht in Kairo, in Riad oder in Kabul wird der "Kampf der Kulturen" gepredigt, sondern in Washington und in Tel-Aviv.
Die Auftraggeber des Attentats gegen Charlie Hebdo haben nicht versucht, Dschihadisten oder Taliban zu befriedigen, sondern die Neo-Konservativen oder die liberalen Falken.
