“You have to understand that we have a family, we have a mom, and he remains her child”, he said. The police chief for the Lower Saxony region, of which Hannover is the capital, told German public broadcaster NDR “there were serious plans for explosions”. He said Salah prayed and attended a mosque occasionally, but also dressed in jeans and pullovers. “The tip came from federal authorities”. Police in Molenbeek arrested another brother, Mohamed, but freed him Monday without charge. “That’s the best solution – to contact the authorities”.
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The Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the attacks, which killed 129 people. He left for Syria after his release.
Terrified residents awoke to gunfire and explosions as a SWAT team swooped in and “neutralized” what Paris Prosecutor Francois Molins called a “new team of terrorists” that appeared ready for a new attack.
They said one man was also killed and seven people arrested in the standoff, which began before dawn and continued for more than seven hours, with gunfire and large bangs sporadically ringing out near the apartment building In the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis.
At least two people were killed – a woman thought to have blown herself up with a suicide vest and another body that was found riddled with bullets, the prosecutor said.
French police raided homes of suspected Islamist militants across the country overnight in the aftermath of the Paris shootings, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said on Monday as he warned of potential further attacks. “I don’t know where they came from I don’tknow anything”, the man told Reuters Television. Secretary of State John Kerry told CNN he could not confirm the report.
Molins said the assault was ordered after phone taps and surveillance operations led police to believe that Abaaoud might have been in St. Denis, near to the soccer stadium which was site of one of the attacks that hit Paris last week. Officials have identified three of the suicide bombers as Frenchmen Samy Amimour, Ismael Omar Mostefai and Bilal Hadfi. The health minister said 195 people remained hospitalized, 41 in intensive care and three in critical condition. The routine check did not result in any further investigation. Two suspects were arrested in Belgium – Brussels native Hamza Attou, 21, and Mohamed Amri, 27, who was born in Morocco – and officials were hunting down Salah Abdeslam, 26, a French national born in Brussels suspected of being a gunman in the Paris attacks. The suicide bombers sent to attack the soccer match between France and Germany at the Stade de France did not inflict many casualties. One may have carried a Turkish passport, according to a French senator briefed by the Interior Ministry, while the other carried an emergency passport or similar document identifying him as a 25-year-old Syrian using the name Ahmad al Muhammad, which authorities believe is a fake name. “Screw them. We have the champagne!” The magazine’s office was the target of a terror attack in July.
President Vladimir Putin ordered a Russian military cruiser to work with France on fighting the militants in Syria and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry hinted at a possible Syrian cease-fire so the world could focus on crushing IS.
– Hollande will visit Washington next week, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said.
The French constitution, he said, would need to be modified to better enable authorities to respond to the threat posed by terrorism.
– Kerry also said a new coalition that includes Iran and Russian Federation “gives us an opportunity to, perhaps, get a ceasefire in place within the next three, four, five weeks”, ending a civil war that’s been ongoing since 2011. Russian Federation is offering $50 million for information leading to the arrest of those responsible. He said he hoped the measure would be approved by lawmakers by the end of the week. “Over there it’s a real factory”, he reportedly said: “They are really trying to strike France and Europe”.
– Security will be tight when France plays England at Wembley Stadium in Britain on Tuesday.
The official cited chatter from IS figures that Abaaoud had recommended a concert as an ideal target for inflicting maximum casualties, as well as electronic communications between Abaaoud and one of the Paris attackers who blew himself up.
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Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said a cease-fire between Syria’s government and the opposition could be just weeks away.
