French Terror Suspect Was Failed Rapper-Turned-Jihadist

Published at 5:17 am, January 8, 2015

EastIdahoNews.com Staff

France 3(PARIS) — As French authorities race to capture two men who they say killed 12 in a brutal attack on a magazine in Paris Wednesday, details emerged overnight about the two suspects, one of whom appears to have been a failed rapper.

Cherif Kouachi, 32, was briefly featured in a 2005 French television documentary as an aspiring rap musician who was arrested on terror charges that put him in prison for a year and a half. At the time, Cherif had told a French court that the scandal at Abu Ghraib prison and the influence of a young religious leader convinced him to give up rapping to prepare himself for jihad abroad, according to local reports.

Now, French officials say that he and his older brother, 34-year-old Said Kouachi, both born in Paris, should be considered armed and dangerous after a ruthless attack on the satire magazine Charlie Hebdo left 12 dead, including two policemen.

Counter-terrorism experts told ABC News the Kouachi brothers appeared to be well-trained, and videos of the attack display a menacing level of skill with weapons and combat tactics as they calmly execute a police officer at point-blank range. Their efficiency in the videos of the attack is evidence of careful preparation, according to Richard Clarke, former White House counter-terrorism advisor and current ABC News consultant.

“This does not look at all like a spontaneous attack or a lone wolf attack,” Clarke told ABC News. “This looks like a team that was selected, trained, probably over the course of a long period of time, and sent in with this particular target in mind.”

Charlie Hebdo, the satirical magazine that came under attack, and Stephane Charbonnier, its editor, had long been the subject of threats from Islamic extremist groups. In 2013, al-Qaeda published a hit list with Charbonnier’s name and photo. Before that, in 2011, the magazine’s previous office was firebombed in what is seen as a revenge attack for publishing crude cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. The terror group ISIS had also threatened the magazine.

But despite publishing cartoons that offended practitioners of many religions, Charbonnier stood by the magazine and its artists’ rights to create controversial images.

“Without freedom of speech, we are dead,” Charbonnier told ABC News after the November 2011 firebombing of the Charlie Hebdo office.

Charbonnier was among the 12 killed during Wednesday’s attack, which took place during the magazine’s editorial meeting.