Third Bataclan Assailant Identified
The third assailant in the devastating November attack on the Bataclan in Paris, France, has been identified, according to French authorities. While Prime Minister Manuel Valls would not identify the man to BFM-TV, according to the New York Times, French newspaper Le Parisien reportedly identified the Bataclan attacker as Foued Mohamed-Aggad. The 23-year-old hails from Strasbourg, which is in the northeastern part of the country, and apparently travelled to Syria in 2013 with a handful of other would-be jihadists.
Ninety people died as a result of the Bataclan attack, and Mohamed-Aggad’s identity was confirmed when his DNA was compared with other family members, according to Breitbart. Up until today, two out of three of the bodies of bombers associated with the Bataclan and Paris attacks had been identified, with Aggad’s being the mystery. The other two bombers were previously identified as Samy Amimour from Drancy and Ismaël Omar Mostefaï from Chartres.
In all, 130 people died during the terror attacks in Paris November 13. The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks shortly after they occurred.
VIDEO: Who was Bataclan attacker Mohamed-Aggad? https://t.co/aS0VeDropp
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) December 9, 2015
Mohamed-Aggad went to Syria in 2013 with his brother and some friends. Mohamed-Aggad’s older brother, Karim, is in jail in France currently, according to French authorities. The rest of the group that had gone to Syria were arrested upon their return to France.
While the third Bataclan attacker was identified, Salah Abdeslam, 26, is still at large, CBC News reports. In addition, the man believed to be responsible for recruiting Mohamed-Aggad and other terrorist attackers responsible for the Paris attack, Mourad Fares, is also under arrest.
There are still terrorist attackers who require identification. An attacker who was killed during a police raid November 18 is still unidentified, and two of the suicide bombers who detonated their vests at the French national stadium were carrying Syrian passports that are believed to be fake, rendering their identification challenging as well.
There were three suicide bombers at the stadium, commandos who shot up bars and restaurants, another suicide bomber at a restaurant, and the three gunmen who have since been identified that were behind the attack on the Bataclan.
According to Le Monde, Foued Mohamed-Aggad was a part of a group of 10 friends ranging in age from 23 to 26 who planned a Syrian trip in 2013. It is believed that Mohamed-Aggad may have adapted much better than anticipated. On one mobile phone, there was a picture of Mohamed-Aggad, smiling and clad in a headband sporting the colors of the Islamic State. His friends were apparently unsure about Mohamed-Aggad’s naivete, as they told police that at first, they believed he truly wanted to do humanitarian work, but then was swept up in the Islamic State’s “cause”.
Mohamed-Aggad’s mother apparently received a text message during the night of the attack on the Bataclan that proclaimed her son’s death as a “martyr”, according to NBC News. Shortly thereafter, she submitted a DNA sample to police in order to identify her son.
Le Parisien, according to NBC News, was told by Mohamed-Aggad’s father Said that he was devastated by his son’s decision to participate in the Bataclan attacks.
“What kind of human being could do what he did?” he asked. “If I had known he would do something like this, I would have killed him.”
All of the identified terrorist attackers, whether they descended on the Bataclan or not, have been either from France or Belgium. All were native French speakers that joined ISIS, which now controls large parts of both Syria and Iraq.
Eagles of Death Metal, the group that was playing at the Bataclan the night of the attacks, returned to the Bataclan for the first time yesterday, according to NBC News. Jesse Hughes, co-founder of the band, says the group would like to play the Bataclan when the theater is operational again.
[Photo by Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images]
