Masked terrorists toting AK-47s and shouting “Allahu akbar” carried out a commando-style raid on an Islam-mocking Paris newspaper Wednesday, methodically killing 12 people — including a Muslim cop they gunned down on the sidewalk as he pleaded for his life.
The bloodbath at the satirical paper Charlie Hebdo was precisely planned for a weekly editorial meeting at the paper’s office near the famed Bastille monument, the self-proclaimed “al Qaeda” gunmen bursting in seeking out journalists by name whom they planned to slaughter, witnesses and cops said.
The jihadis headed straight for the paper’s editorial director and cartoonist, Stephane Charbonnier — widely known by his pen name Charb — killing him and his police bodyguard at about 11:30 a.m. local time, said Christophe Crepin, a police spokesman.
Two of the men could be seen on a video that shows them as they left the newspaper building, one shouting “Allah!” and firing his assault rifle at pursuing cops.
The black-masked jihadist wounded one officer, a 42-year-old Muslim policeman named Ahmed Merabet.
The video shows the two gunmen run across the street to stalk the prone officer — who held up his arms and begged for mercy.
“Do you want to kill me?” the pinned-down cop asked.
“OK, chief,” the masked terrorist replied before shooting him dead, The Times of London reported.
A witness described the cowardly execution.
“They knew exactly what they had to do and exactly where to shoot. While one kept watch and checked that the traffic was good for them, the other one delivered the final coup de grâce,” he said.
“It was a butchery, a carnage,” said Rocco Contento, a police spokesman.
In a video clip on TV network iTELE, the men can be heard shouting: “We have killed Charlie Hebdo! We have avenged the Prophet Mohammed!”
After a massive manhunt, an 18-year-old implicated in the attack — identified as Hamyd Mourad — surrendered to cops, according to the AFP news service.
The two other killers were still on the loose. Authorities identified them as brothers Saïd and Cherif Kouachi, 34 and 32 respectively, Franco-Algerians who returned from Syria last summer. Cherif reportedly spent three years in prison for participating in an Islamist gang.
In other developments:
- Experts said the terrorists likely had sophisticated military training and possible combat experience, perhaps with the terror group ISIS on the battlefields of Syria and Iraq.
- A somber French President François Hollande stirred citizens to come together to fight terrorism. “Let us unite, and we will win. Vive la France!” he said.
- Soldiers in combat fatigues and armed with assault rifles stood guard in front of the Eiffel Tower, at the Montparnasse railway station and at houses of worship and media outlets across the country.
- President Obama called the assault a “cowardly and evil attack” that “underscores that these terrorists fear freedom of speech and freedom of the press.”
- More than 100,000 French citizens, including 60,000 in Paris, rallied in the streets, with many bearing signs reading “Je Suis Charlie” — “I am Charlie” — in a show of support. The US Embassy also changed its Twitter photo to show the phrase.
Also killed were three of the paper’s best-known cartoonists, Georges Wolinski, 80; Jean Cabut, 75, known as Cabu; and Bernard Verlhac, who drew under the name Tignous. Bernard Maris, 67, an economist and contributor, was killed along with other staffers and a maintenance man who directed the attackers to the newspaper’s door.
Witnesses said the gunmen spoke perfect, unaccented French.
Cherif was part of an Iraqi jihadi network in Paris and in May 2008 was sentenced to three years in prison with 18 months suspended in relation to terror charges.
Mourad was believed to be from Reims, though his nationality was not immediately revealed. Two were believed to be the gunmen while the third was a getaway driver, authorities said.
A witness quoted by the “20 Minutes” daily newspaper said one of the assailants cried out: “Tell the media that it is al Qaeda in Yemen!” And a police official said the men had links to the Yemeni terrorist network.
Another 11 people were wounded in the carnage, which began when the masked gunmen killed the building’s maintenance man and confronted Charlie Hebdo cartoonist Corrine Rey.
“I had gone to pick up my daughter at day care, arriving in front of the building, where two masked and armed men brutally threatened us,” said Rey, who signs her work as “Coco.”
“They said they wanted to go up to the offices, so I tapped in the [security] code,” said Rey, who hid with her daughter under a desk.
The newspaper’s editor in chief, Gerard Biard, who was in London at the time, said, “I am shocked that people can have attacked a newspaper in France, a secular republic. A newspaper is not a weapon of war.”
But Charbonnier was famously quoted in 2012 after an earlier controversy saying, “I am not afraid of retaliation. I have no kids, no wife, no car, no credit. I prefer to die standing than living on my knees.”
With Post Wires
