Paris mastermind boasts of freely crossing Europe's border

[Honoria]

Paris mastermind boasts of freely crossing Europe's border
By Claire Duffin and Inderdeep Bains and Tim Lamden In Brussels For Daily Mail


ISIS jihadi Abdelhamid Abaaoud has shuttled between Syria and Europe, exploiting the migrant crisis on EU borders
The mastermind of the horrific terror attacks travelled across Europe despite being on several wanted lists
He recruited two brothers he had known since childhood to carry out Friday's murders of 129 people
The jihadi was even featured in ISIS's propaganda magazine Dabiq, bragging about his terror plans for Europe


Published: 19:17 EST, 16 November 2015 | Updated: 08:22 EST, 17 November 2015

The mastermind of the Paris massacres has bragged of travelling across Europe at will to plot murder and mayhem.

Despite being on wanted lists, Abdelhamid Abaaoud has shuttled between Syria and Europe, exploiting the migrant crisis on EU borders.

The 27-year-old has been able to plan two atrocities and brainwash hundreds of young men to join Islamic State, including his 13-year-old brother.



Kingpin: Abaaoud fled Belgium for Syria and has become an ISIS executioner, recruiter and trainer and one of the world's most wanted men



Sadistic: Abaaoud is seen laughing and joking as he mercilessly toys with the bodies of his victims, dragging them along in his truck



Family: Abaaoud has been fighting in Syria for several years and even recruited his own 13-year-old brother Younes, pictured, who was believed to be ISIS' youngest fanatic

And he recruited two brothers he had known since childhood to carry out Friday's murders of 129 people. Abaaoud told an IS propaganda magazine he was arrested in Europe in January preparing a mission to kill civilians and behead policemen. Incredibly, he claims he was not detained.

'My name and picture were all over the news yet I was able to stay in their homeland, plan operations against them and leave safely when doing so became necessary,' he said. His taunts emerged as:

George Osborne warned of deadly cyber-attacks on planes and hospitals;

British police revealed they were tracking 3,000 suspects and arresting them at the rate of one a day;

They said seven plots have been stopped over the past 12 months;

David Cameron likened Islamic State to the Nazis and called for the Blitz spirit;

Francois Hollande warned European border controls must be tightened.

A Belgian of Moroccan origin, Abaaoud has been named by security services in France and Belgium as the man behind the Paris attacks.

In IS propaganda videos, he styles himself as an executioner and is seen amid piles of corpses.

His earlier plot – in January in the eastern Belgian city of Verviers – was thwarted when police raided the terrorists' hideout, killing two suspects.

Abaaoud was not found and is thought to have been in Turkey or Greece directing the pair by phone.

Police found four Kalashnikovs, four handguns, ammunition and explosives during the raid as well as a police radio and uniforms.

Two days later, officials in Athens announced they had captured Abaaoud but he had given them the slip.

Describing his return to Belgium for the beheading plot, he said he and his fellow fanatics faced a number of trials but 'were able to obtain weapons and set up a safe house while we planned to carry out operations'.

He added: 'After the raid on the safe house, they figured out that I had been with the brothers and that we had been planning operations together.

'So they gathered intelligence agents from all over the world – from Europe and America – in order to detain me. I was able to leave and come to Syria despite being chased after by so many intelligence agencies. All this proves that a Muslim should not fear the bloated image of the crusader intelligence.'

The brothers he recruited – Brahim and Salah Abdeslam – took part in the cafe and restaurant attacks on Friday night.

Brahim, 31, blew himself up in the Comptoir Voltaire bar while Salah, 26, is the subject of an international manhunt. He was stopped by police on the Belgian border but not detained.

Wanted: Police have issued an international arrest warrant for 26-year-old Salah Abdeslam, from Brussels, who is one of three brothers said to be involved in terror plot and rented their getaway

Wanted man: Serbian media says this is 25-year-old Ahmed Almuhamed, whose Syrian passport is pictured, who blew himself up at the Bataclan concert hall and is believed to have sneaked into France with another terrorist by posing as refugees from Syria

Suspect: Belgian Bilal Hadfi, 20, left, detonated his suicide vest at the Stade de France, French bomber Omar Mostefai, centre, killed himself at the Bataclan and Samy Amimour, 28, was also involved in the gig attack

The fanatics grew up in the now notorious Molenbeek district of Brussels, a hotbed of radical Islam.

Abaaoud's father Omar ran a clothes shop just a few doors down from the Abdeslam family home in the main square in Molenbeek.

Benollal Mohamet, who runs a pharmacy there, said: 'He would have known the Abdeslam brothers, they were the same age, they lived near each other – it was inevitable that their paths would have crossed. I would never have predicted this.'

Abaaoud attended one of Brussels' most prestigious schools – Collège Saint-Pierre – but he fell into trouble with the law and was jailed for theft. It is claimed he was then radicalised in Saint Gilles prison in southern Brussels and went to Syria to join IS.

In August he was linked to the terrorist behind a failed attack on a high-speed train from Brussels to Paris.

His father had reported him to police after his youngest son, 13-year-old Younes, went missing last year.

In an interview in January he told of his shame, saying his son had ruined his family. 'Why in God's name would he want to kill innocent Belgians? Our family owes everything to this country,' he added.

In July, Abaaoud was sentenced in absentia to 20 years in prison for recruiting IS fighters to Syria. Many of the 32 people charged with him remain at large.

Belgian authorities refused to comment on Abaaoud's whereabouts last night – he is believed to be in Syria – or his claim that he had been stopped by police and let go.

In a video released last year he said: 'All my life, I have seen the blood of Muslims flow. Pray that Allah will break the backs of those who oppose him, his soldiers and his admirers, and that he will exterminate them.'

Another video shows him loading a pick-up truck and a makeshift trailer with a mound of bloodied corpses. Trying to recruit others, he says: 'Are you satisfied with the life you lead, a humiliating life, whether you are in Europe, in Africa, in Arab countries or in America? Are you satisfied with this life, with this life of humiliation? Is there anything better than jihad or a martyr?'

Last night, it was claimed that Abaaoud and Salah Abdeslam once carried out a robbery together. Belgian broadcaster RTL said Salah had spent time in prison in Belgium for 'hold-ups' and the name of Abaaoud figured in the court and police documents relating to the case.

Some of 129 victims from the horrific terror attacks in Paris which have left the city in complete shock and fear

Polina was comforted by others during a candlelight vigil in Manhattan, held in memory of the victims of the Paris killings

Nick Alexander's girlfriend Polina Buckley, understood to be from New York, was overcome with grief as she sat near a makeshift vigil outside the consulate of France in Manhattan

A French couple look scared as they stand together inside the Stade de France after a terror attack

Police monitor the crowds as people are slowly evacuated from the stadium on Friday night, afraid of the violence outside the stadium

Hundreds of supporters made their way out of the Stade de France after being held there for their safety

President Hollande was thought to have been evacuated from the stadium shortly after the first suicide bomb exploded outside

A victim under a blanket lays dead outside the Bataclan theatre in Paris where 86 concert-goers were massacred by jihadi gunmen

French special forces evacuate people, including an injured man holding his head, as people gather near the Bataclan concert hall following fatal shootings

French riot police appear to hold a man down on the streets of Paris, following a series of deadly attacks in the French capital

According to the De Standaard newspaper, Abaaoud is also mentioned in files relating to Brahim Abdeslam for alleged crimes carried out in Brussels in 2010 and 2011.

Meanwhile police in Britain fear it is only a matter of time before weapons of the kind used in Paris get into the hands of terrorists in the UK. Security sources say border checks have so far kept the country relatively free of military-grade weapons that could be used in a marauding attack. But they admit privately that it is impossible to search every car and lorry entering the country through our ports.

Checks were stepped up at border points earlier this year amid fears that terrorists were seeking to get hold of automatic weapons to emulate the Charlie Hebdo attacks.

Officers seized the largest ever haul of weapons and ammunition at a marina on the River Medway in Chatham, Kent, in August.

They suspect a motor cruiser was used to deliver 22 automatic assault rifles, nine Skorpion machine pistols, 58 magazines, two silencers and around 1,000 live rounds of ammunition.

In January, a serving prisoner was convicted of masterminding a plot to smuggle Skorpion guns in from Germany. Three of the automatic weapons were intercepted by officers from Scotland Yard's Operation Trident officers but five had already been delivered.

The discovery of a car on the Austrian border with Germany with professionally-prepared hidden compartment containing explosives and weapons is a further warning sign.

Investigators said the 51-year-old driver of the cache, who was stopped on November 5, is linked to the attacks in Paris.

One source said: 'We believe the intelligence and the technology we use at our borders is second to none but the threat in Europe is growing and that means such weapons can cross the Channel and fall into the hands of terrorists.'

Since the Mumbai attacks of 2008, mobile police firearms units in every major city have been trained to deal with the threat of a 'marauding gun attack'.


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