OEA Team Threat Report OEA TEAM TRISA Title Mohammed Merah – Al-Qaeda LoneDate Actor in France US Army TRADOC G2 TRADOC Intelligence Support Activity (TRISA) – Threats Mohammed Merah in a home video* Publication Date: 05 April 2012 US Army TRADOC G2 Information Cut-Off Date: 05 April 2012 TRADOC Intelligence Support Activity (TRISA) – Threats 1 UNCLASSIFIED UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Purpose To inform Soldiers, deploying units, scenario developers, and trainers about murders committed by lone actor Mohammed Merah in France. To discuss the likely motive(s) for Mohammed Merah’s actions. Product Caveat: This presentation has been developed from multiple unclassified sources and is primarily intended for use as a training product for the Department of Army. This briefing should not be considered a finished intelligence product, nor used in such a manner. 2 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Executive Summary Describes the killings perpetrated by Mohammed Merah Summarizes Merah’s background Discusses Merah’s radicalization and connections to Islamic radicalism Details the weapons used by Merah Discusses possible motivations for Merah’s actions 3 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Introduction In March 2012, a series of murders shocked France. In three attacks, each four days apart, a lone gunman calmly and deliberately killed French soldiers and then Jewish children and a Rabbi before escaping each scene on a motor scooter. The principal suspects for these murders were three former French paratroopers who were previously dismissed from the army for alleged neo-Nazi beliefs. The murderer turned out to be Mohammed Merah, an unemployed Frenchman of Algerian descent with a history of petty crimes and family connections to Islamist radicals. In a more than 30-hour standoff with police, Merah claimed to be an al- Qaeda member and boasted that he had “brought France to its knees.”1 Merah’s case highlights the challenges and complexity presented by lone actors who commit acts of terror. 4 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Timeline of Attacks2 24 February 2012: Imad Ibn-Ziaten, a 30-year-old staff sergeant in the 1st Airborne Transportation Regiment, places an online ad to sell a motorcycle; Ibn-Ziaten identified himself as a soldier in the ad. 6 March 2012: Merah steals a Yamaha T-Max 500cc scooter in Toulouse. The owner of a dealership in Toulouse notified police when Merah asked how to remove the scooter's GPS tracking device. 11 March 2012: Imad Ibn-Ziaten is shot in the head with a .45 caliber pistol and killed, behind the Chateau de l'Hers school in Toulouse, while waiting to meet a man who responded to his motorcycle ad. French police traced communications related to the ad to an email account used by Merah's family. 5 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Timeline of Attacks3 15 March: Two members of the 17th Airborne Combat Engineering Regiment, Corporal Abel Chennouf, 24, and Private Mohamed Legouad, 26, both of North African origin, are killed and a third, 28- year-old Corporal Loic Liber from the French overseas region of Guadeloupe, is left in a coma after being shot while waiting in line at a cash machine in Montauban. There were numerous witnesses to the attack that occurred around 1400 hours outside a small shopping center. Before opening fire, Merah reportedly moved aside an elderly woman, who was apparently also standing in line at the cash machine. Witnesses said Merah acted calmly, stopping to change the magazine of his .45 pistol and turning over one of the wounded soldiers, who was trying to crawl away, before shooting him three more times. Merah wore a motorcycle helmet with the visor up during the attack. In video he recorded during the attack, Merah leaves the scene shouting “God is great!” 6 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Timeline of Attacks4 19 March: Merah shot and killed three children and a teacher and wounded a 17-year-old boy at Ozar Hatorah Jewish school in Toulouse. Merah opened fire with a 9mm (apparently an Uzi) then changed to a .45 caliber pistol after the 9mm jammed. He reportedly fired indiscriminately inside the school grounds. Jonathan Sandler, a 30-year-old rabbi and teacher, and his two sons Gabriel and Arieh, ages four and five, were killed. Myriam Monsonego, seven, daughter of the head teacher, was also killed after reportedly being grabbed by the hair and shot in the head. Merah wore a motorcycle helmet with the visor down during the attack. Merah was wearing a video camera in a chest harness during the attack. Jund al Khilafah [Soldiers of the Caliphate], a terror group linked to al-Qaeda and the Haqqani Network that operates in Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas, claimed credit for this attack. The group did not claim credit for the other attacks attributed to Merah. The Shumukh al-Islam forum, which is a primary means of distribution for al-Qaeda and other jihadist materials, later removed the statement from its Web site. 7 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Timeline of Attacks5 Approximately 0320 hours, 21 March: Police attempting to arrest Mohammed Merah at his apartment in Toulouse were fired upon and two police officers were wounded. Police set-up a perimeter and attempted to negotiate with Merah. 21 March: Postmarked date of a package addressed to the Paris office of Al-Jazeera, containing video from the three shooting incidents saved on a USB memory stick, along with a letter. According to a source at the Paris newspaper Le Parisien, investigators are attempting to determine if Merah placed the package in the mail on the night of 20 March or if it was sent by an accomplice on the morning of 21 March. A police source stated “It’s a video montage of the various killings set to music and readings from the Koran.” 22 March: Mohammed Merah died in a gun battle with police at his apartment after a 32 hour standoff. He was wearing body armor and barricaded himself inside his apartment, using the bathtub as additional protection. 8 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report 6 Youth Merah’s Background . Born 10 October 1988 in Toulose, France . Grew up in the Les Izards area of Toulose . Was a poor student, expelled often, and dropped out at a young age Algerian in ancestry, French citizen but also had an Algerian passport Family . Parents separated when he was five, two brothers (one named Abdelkader) and two sisters Unemployed at time of attacks, worked odd jobs intermittently Criminal record . Sentenced 15 times for petty crimes, eight while a juvenile, and seven for misdemeanors as an adult . Police psychological profile states he was “violent as a minor” . Served 18 months in prison for purse snatching; released in September 2009 . Sentenced on 24 February 2012 to a month in jail for driving without a license and striking a pedestrian on his motorbike; was to appear in April for determination of where he would serve the sentence Attempted to join the French military but was ineligible due to his 9 criminal history UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Merah’s Radicalization7 Christian Etelin, a lawyer who represented Merah since 2005, believes Merah may have been radicalized in prison. “There was a break” from the youth he knew before his imprisonment, Etelin said. “I supposed when he got out of prison that he was on the path of radicalization because while in jail there are other inmates who are very religious.” Merah told police during the standoff that he studied the Koran in prison. Merah entered Afghanistan in the fall of 2010 from its northern border with Tajikistan, and traveled south to Kandahar. He was detained at a roadblock while traveling with a group of Afghans in November 2010, nine days after entering Afghanistan, and transferred to American custody. He was questioned by Afghan intelligence and the French embassy was informed. He returned to France on his own accord on 05 December 2010. He traveled through at least eight countries on his way to Afghanistan in 2010, including Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Israel, and Egypt. He was briefly detained by police in Israel. During this trip, he visited his brother Abdelkader, who was living in Cairo at the time. Abdelkader was associated with militants in Cairo 10 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Merah’s Radicalization8 Merah visited Pakistan between August and October 2011. He returned to France suffering from Hepatitis A. While in Pakistan, he contacted a French intelligence official who had requested to interview him regarding his 2010 travels. Merah stated he was in Pakistan looking for a wife. After hospitalization in France for Hepatitis A, he was interviewed by investigators. He showed them photos that he said were from his tourism in Pakistan. During the standoff, Merah claimed to have received training from al- Qaeda affiliates in Waziristan.* He also claimed he was given €20,000 to purchase weapons. According to state prosecutor Francois Molins, Merah was “categorized as a Salafist” by French authorities monitoring him. He may have been a member of Forsane Alizza ("Knights of Pride"), a Salafist group that was officially banned in France in January 2012 for "inciting national, racial, and religious discrimination." *Analyst comment: Jund al Khilafah (JaK) claimed responsibility for the attack at Ozar Hatorah Jewish school. JaK is known to operate in Waziristan and is affiliated with al-Qaeda. This suggests Merah’s claims of receiving training and funding from al-Qaeda are true. 11 UNCLASSIFIED OEA Team Threat Report Connections to Islamist Radicals9 Merah’s mother married the father of Sabri Essid. Sabri was arrested in Syria in 2006 at an al-Qaeda safe house for militants traveling to Iraq.