Thread: Paris attacks: Who were the attackers?

Paris attacks: Who were the attackers?

• 3 hours ago
• From the sectionEurope

Image copyright PA, Greek Govt, AFP Image caption Four suspects: L-R Salah Abdeslam, 'Ahmad al-Mohammad', Bilal Hadfi and Samy Amimour

French officials investigating the deadly Paris attacks have named six people they believe to have carried out the assaults, claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group.

Two other attackers who died in Friday's violence have not yet been named.

Below is a brief profile of each named suspect grouped according to which attack they are accused of involvement in.

The attacks are suspected to have been masterminded by Abdelhamid Abaaoud, who is believed to live in Syria.

Bar and restaurant attacks



Image copyright Police Nationale

Salah Abdeslam

The 26-year-old French national has been identified as a key suspect, and he is the subject of a massive police manhunt.

He is believed to have rented a VW Polo car in Belgium, which was later found near the Bataclan concert hall were 89 people were killed.

On Saturday, he was in a vehicle with two other men near the Belgian border when it was stopped by police, but was released after checks.

It is unclear whether the French authorities had matched the car found at the Bataclan venue to him at the time he was stopped.

Police have described Salah Abdeslam as dangerous, and warned people not to approach him.

A neighbour who grew up with Salah expressed shock at his alleged involvement.

"He was not an angry kid," Sheikh Mohammed told the BBC.

"He was not something, someone bad, I don't know what happened. When I saw his picture was like, 'What? Really? This guy?'"

French news channel BFMTV has quoted an investigative source as saying that he and one of the other attackers were known to the authorities in Belgium, where he was based.

Mohammed Abdeslam, brother of Salah and fellow attacker Brahim (profiled below), was released from police questioning after providing an alibi proving that on Friday he was in the northern French city of Lille renovating a bar.

He told reporters massed outside his house that he was innocent of any involvement in the attacks and did not know Salah's whereabouts.

He said his family's thoughts were "with the families of the victims, we are moved by what happened, at no point we could have thought that my brothers were involved in this but you must understand that we have a mother and he [dead attacker Brahim] is still her son".

Brahim Abdeslam

Salah Abdeslam's brother died after he set off his explosives-laden suicide belt near a Paris cafe on Boulevard Voltaire, investigators say.

The 31-year-old had rented a Seat car which was found after the attacks.

He had earlier appeared in several Belgian police files alongside Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the suspected mastermind of Friday's attacks.

The documents relate to criminal cases in 2010 and 2011.
"Investigators see a link with Verviers," Belgium's De Standaard newspaper reported, referring to a Belgian town where police shot dead two militants in January and broke up a cell aiming to kill Belgian police officers, days after the Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris.

Both Brahim Abdeslam and Abaaoud lived in Molenbeek, a rundown district of Brussels with a substantial Muslim population, which is described by some Belgian officials as a "breeding ground for jihadists".

Friends and neighbours who spoke to the BBC's Newsnight team said that in October 2014, Brahim Abdeslam saved five children from a burning building.

"I'm grateful to Brahim for saving my children, but I can't understand what he did in Paris," the children's father said.

Brahim owned a bar in Molenbeek which some reports say was managed by his brother Salah (above). A police report obtained by AFP suggests it was shut down because police believed customers were smoking marijuana there.

Bataclan concert hall

Omar Ismail Mostefai

The 29-year-old French national died in the attack at the Bataclan.

Born in the poor Paris suburb of Courcouronnes, he was known to police as a petty criminal - getting eight convictions between 2004 and 2010 but spending no time in jail.

He later lived in Chartres, near Paris, where he reportedly worked as a baker and played football with fellow employees. He attended the local mosque with his father.

In recent years he appears to have travelled to Syria and may have also spent time in Algeria.

A senior Turkish official confirmed to the BBC that Mostefai had entered Turkey in 2013 and there was no record of him leaving the country.

The official - who spoke on the condition of anonymity - said that in October 2014 Turkey had received an information request regarding four terror suspects from the French authorities.

During the official investigation, he said, Turkish authorities identified a fifth individual - Mostefai - and notified their French counterparts twice, in December 2014 and June 2015.

"We have, however, not heard back from France on the matter," the official said. He added that it was only after the Paris attacks that the Turkish authorities received an information request about Omar Ismail Mostefai from France.

Samy Amimour

Image copyrightAFP

The 28-year-old was one of the suicide bombers who blew himself up at the Bataclan.

The Frenchman, who lived in the north-eastern Paris suburb of Drancy, had been known to French intelligence services.

He was charged with terror offences in 2012 over claims he had planned to go to Yemen. He was placed under judicial supervision but then dropped off the radar, prompting the authorities to issue an international arrest warrant.

In 2014, Le Monde newspaper published an account of the journey (in French) of a 67-year-old Parisian man to Syria, in the hope of persuading his son to leave IS and return to France.

Pseudonyms were used in the article but it has since been updated to reveal that the son in question was in fact Amimour.

His son refused to leave and the father returned home without him. French media have pointed out that evidently he was able to slip back into France prior to the attacks, despite the arrest warrant.

Three of Amimour's relatives were reportedly arrested after Friday's attacks.

Stade de France

'Ahmad al-Mohammad'

This man blew himself up at Stade de France stadium.

Image copyright Greek Government Image caption Ahmad al-Mohammad

At the scene a Syrian passport was found which bore this name, suggesting the man was a 25-year-old from the Syrian city of Idlib, but authorities believe this passport was a fake.

Image caption A passport was found near the body, suggesting the man was from Syria, but this is believed to be a fake

A report in a Serbian newspaper, Blic, said a passport bearing the same name and data - but a different image - had been found on another migrant, suggesting both men bought fake documents from the same counterfeiter.

Image caption Ferry tickets suggest the attacker took a ferry boat along with another man

The Paris prosecutor's office said fingerprints from the dead attacker matched those of a person who came to Europe with migrants via the Greek island of Leros. The man may have been posing as a Syrian refugee.

Records from Leros suggested he arrived on 3 October and was fingerprinted and photographed. An official there remembers the man arriving, and told the BBC's Gabriel Gatehouse that something did not feel right about him - he kept himself to himself. He said he would have highlighted his concerns to an intelligence officer, had there been one there.

Leros authorities say they simply do not have the resources to screen all the migrants effectively - or even check whether passports are genuine.

Bilal Hadfi

Image copyrightAFPImage captionBilal Hadfi

The 20-year-old has been named as one of the attackers who died at Stade de France.

The French national was residing in Belgium.

Some reports suggest he once fought with IS in Syria.

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