Seven were also arrested in seven-hour raid on
a Saint-Denis apartment; Abdelhamid Abaaoud's
fate is unknown
Amid gunfire and explosions, police raided an
apartment in northern Paris on Wednesday
where Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the suspected
mastermind of last week's attacks , was
believed to be holed up. The siege ended with
two deaths and seven arrests but no clear
information on his fate.
The dead were a woman who blew herself up
with an explosive vest and a man hit by
projectiles and grenades at the end of the
raid, which began before dawn and continued
for more than seven hours in the Paris
suburb of Saint-Denis.
Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said the
raid was launched after information from
tapped telephone conversations, surveillance
and witness accounts indicated that Abaaoud
might be in a safe house in the district.
Authorities could not immediately confirm
whether Abaaoud, a Belgian who has fought
for the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant
(ISIL) , was killed or arrested Wednesday
morning. Molins is scheduled to address the
public at 8 p.m. local time.
Abaaoud was believed to be in Syria after a
January police raid in Belgium, but bragged in
ISIL propaganda of his ability to move back
and forth between Europe and Syria
undetected.
Speaking at the scene of Wednesday's raid,
Molins said the operation began with a pre-
dawn shootout and resulted in the capture of
three people inside the apartment, the death
of a woman who set off an explosive charge,
and the death of “another terrorist who was
found at the end of the operation who was
hit by projectiles and grenades.”
He said two other people were detained while
trying to hide in the rubble, and two others
were arrested, including the man who had
provided the apartment and one of his
acquaintances. Police at the scene were seen
escorting away one man naked from the
waist down and another wrapped in a gold
emergency blanket.
“As things stand, it is impossible to give you
the identities of the people detained, which
are being verified,” said Molins.
Molins and Interior Minister Bernard
Cazeneuve did not specify whether any
suspects might still be at large..
A police official not authorized to speak
publicly said four police officers were injured
in the morning raid.
French President Francois Hollande held an
emergency meeting with senior ministers at
the Elysee Palace to monitor the raid.
Residents said an explosion shook the
neighborhood shortly after 4 a.m.
"We guessed it was linked to Friday night,"
said Yves Steux, barman at L'Escargot
restaurant 250 yards from the assault. "My
wife panicked and was scared and told me
not to leave, but I ignored her. Life goes on."
Baptiste Marie, a 26-year-old independent
journalist who lives in the neighborhood, said
a second large explosion was followed by
"two more explosions. There was an hour of
gunfire."
Another witness, Amine Guizani, said he
heard the sound of grenades and automatic
gunfire.
"It was continuous. It didn't stop," he said.
"It lasted from 4:20 until 5:30. It was a good
hour. I couldn't say how many shots were
fired, but it was probably 500. Hundreds,
definitely. There were maybe 10 explosions."
Investigators have identified 27-year-old
Abaaoud, a Belgian of Moroccan descent, as
the chief architect of Friday's attacks in
Paris, which killed 129 people and injured 350
others, dozens of them critically.
A U.S. official briefed on intelligence matters
said Abaaoud was a key figure in an ISIL
external operations cell that U.S. intelligence
agencies have been tracking for several
months.
In Saint-Denis on Wednesday, police
cordoned off the area near the Stade de
France national stadium, including a
pedestrian zone lined with shops and 19th-
century apartment buildings. Riot police
cleared people from the streets, pointing guns
at curious residents to move them off the
roads.
French media reported that some 15,000 area
residents were prohibited from leaving their
homes during the siege. Areas schools were
closed and scheduled to reopen on Thursday.
Saint-Denis is one of France's most historic
places. French kings were crowned and
buried through the centuries in its famed
basilica, a majestic Gothic church that towers
over the area. Today the district is home to a
vibrant and ethnically diverse population and
sees sporadic tension between police and
youths.
Seven attackers died in Friday's attacks,
which targeted several bars and restaurants
and the Bataclan concert hall, as well as
Stade de France. ISIL has claimed
responsibility for the carnage.
Police had said before the raids that they
were hunting for two fugitives suspected of
taking part as well as any accomplices. That
would bring the number of attackers to at
least nine.
French authorities had previously said that at
least eight people were directly involved in
the bloodshed: seven who died in the attacks
and one who got away and slipped across
the border to Belgium.
However, there have been gaps in officials'
public statements, which have never fully
disclosed how many attackers took part in
the deadly rampage.
On Tuesday, officials told The Associated
Press they now believe at least one other
attacker was involved and they were working
to identify and track down that suspect.
Surveillance video obtained by the AP also
indicated that a team of three attackers
carried out the shootings at one of the cafes.
The video was among evidence authorities
used in concluding that at least one other
attacker was at large, the French officials
indicated.
The brief clip shows two black-clad gunmen
with automatic weapons calmly firing on the
bar then returning toward a waiting car,
whose driver was maneuvering behind them.
Authorities believe the car is the same black
SEAT-make vehicle that was found Saturday
with three Kalashnikovs inside.
Police have identified one subject of their
manhunt as Salah Abdeslam, whom French
police accidentally permitted to cross into
Belgium on Saturday. One of his brothers,
Brahim, blew himself up in Paris.
On Wednesday, Belgian media reported that
the Abdelsam brothers were interrogated by
Belgian police before the Paris attacks but
they were released because “they did not
show signs of possible menace,” according to
a police official cited by the Belgian
newspaper Le Soir.
Brahim Abdeslam attempted to travel to
Syria but only made it to Turkey, said Eric
Van Der Sypt, a federal prosecutor’s
spokesman.
“We knew that they were radicalized and
could make their way to Syria but they did
not show signs of possible threat,” said Van
Der Sypt. “Even if we had warned France
about them, I doubt that we could have
detained them.”
In other developments, French fighter jets
attacked ISIL targets in Syria for a third
night. The French defense ministry said 10
jets had hit two ISIL command centers in the
group's de facto capital of Raqqa, Syria.
The Paris attacks have galvanized
international determination to confront ISIL in
Syria and Iraq, bringing France, Russia and
the United States closer to an alliance .
Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the
missile cruiser Moskva, currently in the
Mediterranean, to start cooperating with the
French military on operations in Syria.
Meanwhile, U.S. Secretary of State John
Kerry said a cease-fire between Syria's
government and the opposition could be just
weeks away. He described it as potentially a
"gigantic step" toward deeper international
cooperation against ISIL.
France — and the rest of Europe — remain on
edge four days after the attacks . Two Air
France flights bound for Paris from the U.S.
were diverted Tuesday night — one to Salt
Lake City and one to Halifax — because of
anonymous threats received after they had
taken off. Both were inspected and cleared to
resume their journeys.
In the German city of Hannover, a soccer
game between Germany and the Netherlands
on Tuesday was canceled at the last minute
and the stadium evacuated by police because
of a bomb threat.
Lower Saxony state Interior Minister Boris
Pistorius said the match was called off after
"vague" information that solidified late in the
day. No arrests have been made and no
explosives found. Pistorius said this may be
because the plot was called off after the
game was canceled.
"We won't know what would have happened
if we didn't cancel it," he said.
With the Associated Press
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