Syria-based Oussama Atar, 32, believed to be a member of the Islamic State group, was already a suspect in the March 22nd attacks on Brussels in which his brothers participated as suicide bombers, but has now been named as the coordinator for the November 13th atrocities in Paris last year which left 130 people dead.
Mourad Hamyd, the French brother-in-law of gunman Chérif Kouachi, was arrested in Bulgaria last month suspected of attempting to join Islamic State group.
After meeting with President François Hollande, France's religious leaders called for solidarity in face of what Paris mosque rector called 'blasphemous sacrilege'.
A priest was murdered and one of his parishioners left in a critical condition by two knife-wielding men acting in the name of Islamic State group (IS) who attacked a Normandy church during a celebration of Mass on Tuesday morning. IS later claimed responsibility. The assailants, who had cut the 85-year-old priest’s throat in front of a small group of nuns and worshipers, and who attempted to cut the throat of a parishioner, were shot dead by police as they came out of the church in what is believed to be the first attack on a Catholic place of worship in Europe by Islamic extremists. Paris public prosecutor François Molins provided further details about the attack on Tuesday evening. Graham Tearse reports.
Bernard Cazeneuve, who on Friday sounded cautious note on jihadist motive for attack, said on Saturday that killer must have been 'radicalised very rapidly'.
After IS claim role in Nice truck attack, the BBC's Paris correspondent points to new danger of 'neighbourhood' loners who fall prey to jihadist propaganda.
The jihadist group claimed Tunisian who drove truck into crowd in Nice had followed its calls for such attacks; five people now in custody over the massacre.
