Belgian Man Identified as Mastermind of Paris Attacks

People gather in front of Le Carillon cafe, a site of recent attacks, in Paris, Monday November 16, 2015. A minute of silence was observed throughout the country in memory of the victims of last Friday’s attack.

In the latest outpouring of worldwide empathy for the French trauma, England fans have been urged to join in a rendition of the French anthem La Marseillaise before France return to action in a friendly match against England in London on Tuesday. The two men are believed to be in Syria.

Speaking in Turkey at the same time as Hollande, Obama called Friday’s attacks a “terrible and sickening setback”, but maintained that the US-led coalition was making progress.

Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve told reporters police had arrested 23 people and seized arms, including a rocket launcher and automatic weapons, in 168 raids overnight.

“Whoever starts running starts everyone else running”, said Alice Carton, city council member who was at the square. “These operations are going to continue”.

“The reply of the republic will be solid and total”.

Paris prosecutor François Molins said that five out of seven of the dead terrorists have been identified, but police are still on the hunt for an eighth suspect named as as 26-year-old Salah Abdeslam.

A source close to the French investigation told Reuters that Abaaoud is investigators’ best lead in the Paris attacks. He is the most high profile Frenchman with ISIS and considered the “Jihadi John” of France. “He grew up in Paris suburb of Cachan”. It also threatened to attack Washington DC.

Among other things, Central Intelligence Agency Director Brennan said the attacks seem “to have been carefully and deliberately planned” over a period of months. Hafdi, who was killed in the attacks, was 19 or 20, the sources said.

“We did have strategic warning” but apparently no specific or operational details, Brennan added.

Karima Bennoune, a professor at the University of California-Davis School of Law appointed by the U.N.as an expert on cultural rights issues, said in a statement Tuesday that the claims of responsibility from the Islamic State demonstrate a “hateful worldview motivating this violence”.

Update at 7:27 a.m. ET.

Abdeslam is one of three brothers linked to the slaughter and lived in Brussels, in the rundown immigrant neighbourhood of Molenbeek, where police have made several arrests.

Panic ensued Sunday night as police abruptly cleared mourners from the Place de la Republique square, where police said firecrackers sparked a false alarm.

Julien Pearce, a journalist at Europe 1 radio who escaped by crawling onto the Bataclan stage, said he got a good look at one attacker who appeared “very young”.

Update at 6:54 a.m. ET.

Though he has not officially asked for a war declaration from French Parliament, President Francois Hollande did not mince words when addressing a “rare” joint session of the main legislative body of France. “We would go there to smoke hashish, drink alcohol, no problem”.

Update at 6:40 a.m. ET.

A suicide bomber who blew himself up outside the Stade de France stadium is believed to be Syrian Ahmad Al Mohammad from Idlib. Four were French, while the fifth man was stopped and fingerprinted in Greece in October and was possibly Syrian. Investigators are still trying to establish if the passport is genuine. That designation allows the government to strip the citizenship of French natives who are convicted of terrorism and hold a second passport.

– Brahim Abdeslam, 31, died when he denotated a suicide vest on Boulevard Voltaire. Seven of the attackers are thought to be dead, but Salah Abdeslam, 26, a French citizen born in Belgium, was questioned by a French police officer hours after the attacks and not detained and is still on the loose.