French Authorities Confirm Mastermind behind Paris Attacks was killed in the Saint-Denis Raid
French authorities have confirmed that the suspected mastermind behind the deadly Paris attacks, Belgian national, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, was killed during Wednesday's raid in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis.
"We now know that Abaaoud, the brain behind these attacks - one of the brains, because we must be particularly cautious, and we know what the threats are - was among the dead," Prime Minister Manuel Valls told the National Assembly reported by the New York Times.
The prosecutor François Molins announced Thursday that a fingerprint analysis was able to conclude that the dead body was indeed Abaaoud. Molins stated that they do not know whether or not Abaaoud died from gunfire or from a grenade. During the seven-hour raid, a female suicide bomber detonated her explosive vest before the police entered the apartment. The woman was identified as 26-year-old Hasna Aitboulahcen, the cousin of the ringleader.
According to French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve, Abaaoud was linked to at least four terrorist plans in France that were averted this year. The authorities believe that he was close to Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State, which is also known as ISIS and ISIL, and that he was working out of Syria. They did not know that Abaaoud had returned to Europe. The authorities still do not know how Abaaoud planned and carried out the attacks.
NPR's Dina Temple-Raston and Peter Kenyon reported that the authorities also do not know about the fate of Salah Abdeslam, who they believe was one of the operatives in the attacks, and are looking for the associates of Bilal Hadfi, one of the terrorists that died after detonating a bomb outside of the stadium last Friday.
The Islamic State officially claimed responsibility for the Paris attacks that killed 129 people and injured more than 300. Since the attacks, France has been active at fighting ISIS by dropping bombs on specific targets in Syria that are believed to be linked to the group. French and Belgian authorities have also been conducting several anti-terrorist raids.
