Photo Credit: Courtesy, French Police
Mug shots of Al Qaeda-linked homegrown radical Islamist French terrorists Said and Cherif Kouachi.

The people of France are beginning to learn what it’s like to live in the Middle East.

A dual terror siege still taking place in two locations appears to be escalating as the Sabbath approaches in Paris, and four terrorists hold numerous hostages in a kosher grocery and a printing warehouse by two sets of Al Qaeda-linked radical Islamist extremists.

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At least five, and possibly as many as 15 people are being held hostage in the grocery, with multiple injuries reported, including one gravely wounded. One person is being held hostage in the printing warehouse.

This nightmare actually began with a massive bloodbath earlier in the week.

Two days ago 10 journalists and two police officers were murdered and 11 others wounded by radical Muslim terrorists at the Paris offices of the satirical weekly magazine Charlie Hebdo.

It is believed that Said Kouachi, the older of the two brothers, met and spoke with deceased Yemen-based American Al Qaeda terror leader Anwar Al-Awlaki in 2008. These attacks are believed to be carried out to avenge his death in a U.S. drone strike in 2011. Awlaki was known for training foreign terror operations.

A day later a French policewoman was shot to death as she was dealing with a traffic accident in the Montrouge section of Paris.

Amedy Coulibaly and his girlfriend Hayat Boumeddiene are suspected of carrying out that attack. It is believed the murders were related to the Charlie Hebdo attack by Al Qaeda-linked terrorists Said and Cherif Kouachi on Wednesday.

Today (Friday, Jan. 9, 2015), the nightmare was repeated, and expanded as two attacks were carried out simultaneously.

Coulibaly and Boumeddiene stormed a kosher grocery east of Paris as Jews were completing their last-minute shopping just before the start of the Sabbath. Two people were shot and killed immediately and at least five others — possibly as many as 15 — are being held hostage by the terrorists, including women and children. One is believed to be gravely wounded.

Coulibaly has told police surrounding the location he will not surrender nor hand over his hostages intact unless the Kouachi brothers are allowed to escape free. Shortly after, he added a second threat, far more grim: “Unless you let my brothers in jihad go — if you storm my brothers — I will kill the hostages here,” he told police negotiators.

Prayers are urgently requested for:

Mordechai ben Sarah
Yosef Sibony
Dominique bat Sarah
Yohan Cohen
Sarah bat Luna
Noa bat Sarah
Zari bat Suzanne
Esther bat Bnina
Noemi bat Joëlle
Sandy bat Brigitte
Sandrine Esther bat Blanche

Chabad-Lubavitch emissary Rabbi Chmouel Lubecki reports that he and other Chabad representatives all over Paris have sent SMS messages to thousands of members of the Jewish community encouraging them to light Shabbat candles and give extra charity in merit of the hostages. There are also widespread calls for prayers, acts of kindness and recital of Tehillim(Psalms) particularly Psalm 20, on behalf of the hostages.

Across town and about 25 miles northeast of Paris, the Koachi brothers have also struck again, this time taking a single hostage at CT Creation Tendance Decouverte, a printing facility, Fox News reported.

Police have surrounded the building in Dammartin-en-Goele, a small industrial town, where the two brothers are holed up, about 10 miles from Charles DeGaulle Airport. But the terrorists have allegedly to police negotiators they are ready to “die as martyrs.”

 

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Hana Levi Julian is a Middle East news analyst with a degree in Mass Communication and Journalism from Southern Connecticut State University. A past columnist with The Jewish Press and senior editor at Arutz 7, Ms. Julian has written for Babble.com, Chabad.org and other media outlets, in addition to her years working in broadcast journalism.