Heavily armed masked gunmen shouting “Allahu Akbar” stormed the Paris office of a satirical weekly magazine, Charlie Hebdo, on Wednesday, killing 12 people, including the paper’s editor-in-chief, deputy chief editor, and three cartoonists, before escaping in a getaway car. It was the deadliest attack in France in four decades. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.
Charlie Hebdo’s editor-in-chief Stephane Charbonnier, known as Charb, and the cartoonists known as Cabu, Tignous and Wolinski were killed in the attack on the paper, a judicial source said.
The masked attackers then hijacked a car and sped off, running over a pedestrian and shooting at police officers. Two police men were confirmed among the dead and four people were critically injured. Police said witnesses heard the attackers, who were armed with a Kalashnikov and rocket launcher, shout “we have avenged the prophet” and “Allahu Akbar.”
Video images on the website of public broadcaster France Televisions showed two gunmen in black at a crossroads who appeared to fire down one of the streets. A cry of “Allahu Akbar!” could be heard among the gunshots.
The Islamic State (ISIS) group has repeatedly threatened to attack France. Just minutes before the attack, Charlie Hebdo had tweeted a satirical cartoon of that extremist group’s leader giving New Year’s wishes. Another cartoon, released in this week’s issue and entitled “Still No Attacks in France,” had a caricature of an extremist fighter saying “Just wait — we have until the end of January to present our New Year’s wishes.”
Paris has been placed under the highest alert status after the attack on Charlie Hebdo that has sparked anger in the past among Muslims for publishing cartoons of the Islamic prophet. Television footage showed large numbers of police in the area, bullet-riddled windows and people being carried away on stretchers. The attack took place at a time of heightened fears in France and other European capitals over fallout from the wars in Iraq and Syria where hundreds of European citizens have gone to fight alongside the radical Islamic State group.
President Francois Hollande, who immediately rushed to the scene of the shooting, described it as a barbaric terrorist attack. “An act of exceptional barbarism has just been committed here in Paris against a newspaper, meaning (against) the expression of liberty,” Hollande said at the scene.
One man who witnessed the shooting said he saw two attackers shooting their way out of Charlie Hebdo around 11.30 am (4pm IST). “I saw them leaving and shooting. They were wearing masks. These guys were serious,” said the man who declined to give his name.
“At first, I thought it was special forces chasing drug traffickers or something. We weren’t expecting this. You would think we were in a movie,” added the man Just before noon, multiple masked men armed with automatic weapons attacked the newspaper’s office in central Paris, nearby worker Benoit Bringer told the iTele network. The attackers went to the second floor and started firing indiscriminately in the newsroom, said Christophe Deloire of Reporters Without Borders.
The satirical newspaper gained enmity of Islamic terrorists in February 2006 when it reprinted cartoons of Islamic Prophet that had originally appeared in Danish daily Jyllands-Posten, causing fury across the Muslim world. Its offices were fire-bombed in November 2011. Despite being taken to court under anti-racism laws, the weekly continued to publish controversial cartoons of Prophet Muhammad.
Wednesday’s attack comes the same day of the release of a book by a celebrated French novelist depicting France’s election of its first Muslim President. Hollande had been due to meet with the country’s top religious officials later in the day. This week’s front page featured the controversial author French Michel Houellebecq, whose latest book “Soumission”, or “Submission,” which imagines a France in the near future that is ruled by an Islamic government, came out Wednesday. The book has widely been touted as tapping into growing unease among non-Muslim French about immigration and the rise of Islamic influence in society.
Hollande called for “national unity”, adding that “several terrorist attacks had been foiled in recent weeks”. The White House condemned the attack in the “strongest possible terms,” while British Prime Minister David Cameron called it “sickening.”
Wednesday’s shooting is one of the worst attacks in France in decades. In 1995, a bomb in a commuter train attributed to Algerian extremists exploded at the Saint Michel metro station in Paris, killing eight and wounding 119.
On social media, supporters of militant Islamic groups praised the move. One Twitter user who identified themselves as a Tunisian loyalist of al-Qaida and the Islamic State group called the attack well-deserved revenge against France. Elsewhere on the Internet, the hashtag #JeSuisCharlie was trending as people expressed support for weekly and for journalistic freedom.
The small-circulation weekly leans toward the left and takes pride in making acerbic commentary on world affairs through cartoons and spoof reports. “We treat the news like journalists. Some use cameras, some use computers. For us, it’s a paper and pencil,” the Muhammad cartoonist, who goes by the name luz, had told The Associated Press in 2012.
Chief editor Stephane Charbonnier, among the journalists killed Wednesday, also defended the Muhammad cartoons speaking to The AP in 2012. “Muhammad isn’t sacred to me,” said Charbonnier, who used the pen name Charb. “I don’t blame Muslims for not laughing at our drawings. I live under French law. I don’t live under Quranic law.” Islam is not alone in being singled out by Charlie Hebdo’s satire. Past covers include retired Pope Benedict XVI in amorous embrace with a Vatican guard; former French President Nicolas Sarkozy looking like a sick vampire; and an Orthodox Jew kissing a Nazi soldier.