Al-Qaeda challenges Islamic State with Paris attack
Al-Qaeda's deadly terror attack in Paris may have been an attempt to restate its relevance and effectiveness in its global jihadist struggle with the Islamic State.
The deadly attack at the offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris was the realization of a long-expected nightmare — a planned homegrown terrorist attack. The two prime suspects, brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi, are French-born Muslims of North African descent. The brothers allegedly went on a killing spree that claimed 12 lives, while a third, 18-year-old Hamyd Mourad, provided the getaway car. Mourad, who has been unemployed and according to reports homeless, has since surrendered, while the brothers, at time of writing, remain at large, having reportedly robbed a service station in the north of France.
From the information available, it seems clear the Paris attack was well-planned and executed by an established terror network, or sleeper cell. The two men were well-armed with Kalashnikovs, carried out a military-style assassination of its prime target, the editor-in-chief of Charlie Hebdo, Stephane Charbonnier, and had devised an exit strategy that has so far succeeded in evading French police. Seven people connected to the suspects have already been arrested, suggesting a wider network could have helped facilitate the attack.
This differs substantially from the Sydney cafe siege in December, which was the action of a single man who, despite his professed radical Islamist leanings, appeared to be mentally unstable. According to eyewitnesses, the French brothers claimed to be members of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), which has for years maintained a foothold in parts of Yemen. Charbonnier was publicly identified as an assassination target by al-Qaeda in 2013.
This, thus, dispels early suspicions on Twitter that the attack might have been a spontaneous response by supporters of the Islamic State (IS) after Charlie Hebdo published a cartoon yesterday of IS caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. This would be extremely unlikely, given that al-Qaeda's core in Afghanistan would prefer nothing more than the elimination of its jihadist archenemy Baghdadi. Indeed, there is a strong possibility that the Paris attack might be more about IS than fighting a holy war against the West.
