November 2015 Paris attacks

For other uses, see Paris attacks.

November 2015 Paris attacks
Part of Islamic terrorism in Europe and the spillover of the Syrian Civil War
Public memorials for the victims, and police near the scenes of some of the attacks
Locations of the attacks—stars denote suicide bombings
LocationParis and Saint-Denis, France
Date21:16, 13 November 2015 (2015-11-13T21:16)  –
00:58, 14 November 2015 (2015-11-14T00:58)  (CET)
Target
  1. Near Stade de France[C 1]
  2. Rues Bichat and Alibert (Le Petit Cambodge; Le Carillon)[C 2]
  3. Rue de la Fontaine-au-Roi (Café Bonne Bière; La Casa Nostra)[C 3]
  4. The Bataclan theatre[C 4]
  5. Rue de Charonne (La Belle Équipe)[C 5]
  6. Boulevard Voltaire (Comptoir Voltaire)[C 6]
Attack type
Mass shooting, mass murder, suicide bombing, hostage taking
Weapons4 Zastava M70 assault rifles,[1][2] TATP suicide belts, butcher knives (unused), 1 Bulgarian AKKS-47 rifle, 1 Chinese Norinco Type 56-1[3]
Deaths138 (including 7 attackers)[4][5][6]
InjuredAt least 416[7][8][9]
VictimsCivilians
PerpetratorsIslamic State Islamic State (Brussels cell)
No. of participants
10 (including Salah Abdeslam)
MotiveIslamic extremism,[10][11] retaliation against French airstrikes on ISIL[12][13]

A series of coordinated Islamist terrorist attacks[14][15] took place on Friday, 13 November 2015[16][17] in Paris, France, and the city's northern suburb, Saint-Denis. Beginning at 21:16, three suicide bombers struck outside the Stade de France in Saint-Denis, during an international football match, after failing to gain entry to the stadium. Another group of attackers then fired on crowded cafés and restaurants in Paris, with one of them also detonating an explosive, killing himself in the process. A third group carried out another mass shooting and took hostages at an Eagles of Death Metal concert attended by 1,500 people in the Bataclan theatre, leading to a stand-off with police. The attackers were either shot or detonated suicide vests when police raided the theatre.[18]

The attackers killed 130 people,[4] including 90 at the Bataclan theatre.[19][20][21] Another 416 people were injured,[7][22] almost 100 critically.[8][9] Seven of the attackers were also killed.[6] The attacks were the deadliest in the European Union since the Madrid train bombings of 2004.[23] The attacks came one day after similar attacks in Beirut, Lebanon. France had been on high alert since the January 2015 attacks on Charlie Hebdo offices and a Jewish supermarket in Paris that killed 17 people.[24]

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claimed responsibility for the attacks (as they had done with the Beirut attacks a day prior),[10][11] saying that it was retaliation for French airstrikes on Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq.[12][13] The president of France, François Hollande, said the attacks were an act of war by the Islamic State.[25][26][27] The attacks were planned in Syria and organised by a terrorist cell based in Belgium.[28] Two of the Paris attackers were Iraqis, but most were born in France or Belgium,[29][30] and had fought in Syria.[31] Some of the attackers had returned to Europe among the flow of migrants and refugees from Syria.[32][33]

In response to the attacks, a three-month state of emergency was declared across the country to help fight terrorism, which involved the banning of public demonstrations, and allowing the police to carry out searches without a warrant, put anyone under house arrest without trial, and block websites that encouraged acts of terrorism.[34] On 15 November, France launched the biggest airstrike of Opération Chammal, its part in the bombing campaign against Islamic State.[35] The authorities searched for surviving attackers and accomplices. On 18 November, the suspected lead operative of the attacks, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, was killed in a police raid in Saint-Denis, along with two others.[36]


Cite error: There are <ref group=C> tags on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=C}} template (see the help page).

  1. ^ "Following the Path of the Paris Terror Weapons". Spiegel.de. 24 March 2016. Archived from the original on 30 March 2019. Retrieved 27 November 2018.
  2. ^ "Paris attacks: More than 100 killed in gunfire and blasts, French media say". CNN. 14 November 2015. Archived from the original on 14 November 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2015.
  3. ^ "Armed to Kill" (PDF). Flemish Peace Institute. June 2016. Retrieved 10 July 2024.
  4. ^ a b "Paris attacks death toll rises to 130". RTE News. 20 November 2015. Archived from the original on 21 November 2015. Retrieved 21 November 2015.
  5. ^ "Suicide d'un rescapé du Bataclan : Guillaume, 131e victime du 13 novembre". Le Parisien (in French). 16 June 2019. Retrieved 16 June 2019.
  6. ^ a b Claire Phipps (15 November 2015). "Paris attacker named as Ismaïl Omar Mostefai as investigation continues – live updates". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 15 November 2015. Retrieved 15 November 2015.
  7. ^ a b "Bataclan survivor describes moment Isis gunman tried to kill her". 12 November 2016. Archived from the original on 24 December 2017. Retrieved 10 December 2017.
  8. ^ a b "Search goes on for missing". BBC News. 16 November 2015. Archived from the original on 17 November 2015. Retrieved 17 November 2015.
  9. ^ a b "Paris attacks: Everything we know on Wednesday evening". The Telegraph. 18 November 2015. Archived from the original on 19 November 2015. Retrieved 19 November 2015.
  10. ^ a b "ISIS claims responsibility of Paris attacks". CNN. Archived from the original on 14 November 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2015.
  11. ^ a b "L'organisation État islamique revendique les attentats de Paris" (in French). France 24. 14 November 2015. Archived from the original on 14 November 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2015.
  12. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Guardian1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  13. ^ a b Dalton, Matthew; Varela, Thomas; Landauro, Inti (14 November 2015). "Paris Attacks Were an 'Act of War' by Islamic State, French President François Hollande Says". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on 14 November 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2015. Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks on a social media account, but didn't provide specific information that would have allowed the claim to be verified. It said that the attacks were retaliation for French airstrikes against the group in Syria and Iraq.
  14. ^ EU Terrorism Situation and Trend Report (TE-SAT) 2016. EU Terrorism Situation & Trend Report (Te-Sat). Europol. 2016. pp. 22–28, 47. ISBN 978-92-95200-68-5.
  15. ^ Jason Chow; Nick Kostov (27 November 2015). "France honors victims of Paris terrorist attacks". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on 27 January 2016. Retrieved 21 January 2016.
  16. ^ Hugh Schofield (8 September 2021). "Paris attacks: Historic day of reckoning for night of terror". BBC. Retrieved 18 November 2021. On the evening of Friday 13 November 2015...
  17. ^ "Paris attacks: What happened on the night". BBC. 9 December 2015. Retrieved 18 November 2021. The attacks in Paris on the night of Friday 13 November...
  18. ^ Cite error: The named reference reuterstimeline was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  19. ^ "Paris attacks: What we know so far". France 24. 15 November 2015. Archived from the original on 16 November 2015. Retrieved 17 November 2015.
  20. ^ "What happened at the Bataclan?". BBC News. Archived from the original on 6 December 2018. Retrieved 27 November 2018.
  21. ^ "This Is What Happened at the Bataclan Concert Hall During the Paris Attacks". News.vice.com. 25 November 2015. Archived from the original on 30 August 2018. Retrieved 27 November 2018.
  22. ^ M. Marcus (19 November 2015). "Injuries from Paris attacks will take long to heal". CBS News. Archived from the original on 20 November 2015. Retrieved 20 November 2015.
  23. ^ "Europe's open-border policy may become latest victim of terrorism". The Irish Times. 19 November 2015. Archived from the original on 19 November 2015. Retrieved 19 November 2015.
  24. ^ Cite error: The named reference AFP summary was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  25. ^ "Paris attacks: Hollande blames Islamic State for 'act of war'". BBC News. 14 November 2015. Archived from the original on 14 November 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2015.
  26. ^ Nossiter, Adam; Breeden, Aurelien; Bennhold, Katrin (14 November 2015). "Three Teams of Coordinated Attackers Carried Out Assault on Paris, Officials Say; Hollande Blames ISIS". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 14 November 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2015.
  27. ^ "Hollande says Paris attacks 'an act of war' by Islamic State". Reuters. 14 November 2015. Archived from the original on 14 November 2015. Retrieved 14 November 2015.
  28. ^ Alicia Parlapiano; Wilson Andrews; Haeyoun Park; Larry Buchanan (17 November 2015). "Finding the Links Among the Paris Attackers". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 16 November 2015. Retrieved 17 November 2015.
  29. ^ "Paris attacks: Who were the attackers?". BBC News. 13 November 2016. Archived from the original on 28 April 2016. Retrieved 27 April 2016.
  30. ^ Traynor, Ian (20 November 2015). "EU ministers order tighter border checks in response to Paris attacks". The Guardian. London. Archived from the original on 20 November 2015. Retrieved 20 November 2015.
  31. ^ "Movements of Isis extremist prior to Paris attack raise EU security questions". The Guardian. 19 November 2015. Archived from the original on 19 March 2016. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  32. ^ "Paris attacks: EU in emergency talks on border crackdown". The Guardian. 20 November 2015. Archived from the original on 21 November 2015. Retrieved 22 November 2015. The French prime minister, Manuel Valls, said some of the killers had taken advantage of Europe's migrant crisis to "slip in" unnoticed.
  33. ^ McDonnell, Patrick J; Zavis, Alexandra (19 November 2015). "Suspected Paris attack mastermind's Europe ties facilitated travel from Syria". Los Angeles Times, in the Sacramento Bee. Los Angeles, USA. Archived from the original on 20 November 2015. Retrieved 20 November 2015. As waves of refugees from Syria converged on Europe this summer, law enforcement authorities feared this scenario: That terrorist operatives would slip in among the multitudes [...] Last week's attacks on France may have validated some of those fears. At least three of the seven known attackers and the suspected ringleader, Abdelhamid Abaaoud [...] are thought to have crossed clandestinely from Syria into Europe.
  34. ^ Andrew Griffin (19 November 2015). "France state of emergency declared for three months, allowing authorities to shut down websites and giving police sweeping new powers". The Independent. Archived from the original on 22 January 2016. Retrieved 21 January 2016.
  35. ^ Rubin, Alissa (15 November 2015). "France Strikes ISIS Targets in Syria in Retaliation for Attacks". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 15 November 2015. Retrieved 16 November 2015.
  36. ^ Aurelien Breeden; Kimiko de Freytas-Tamura (19 November 2015). "Chief Suspect in Paris Attacks Died in Raid, France Says". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 19 November 2015. Retrieved 19 November 2015.