The Religion of Peace Strikes Again

In Paris this time, with a savage attack on a satirical newspaper, killing 12 and leaving 4 more fighting for their lives. This was a very different attack from the shambolic siege in Sydney last month. A very organised and apparently professional assault on a specific target that was known to lampoon Islam.

The similarity is that once again a western government could have prevented this earlier if only they would take the threat of Islamic militants seriously at home before they start running around the world trying to solve problems they have no control over.

The gunmen have now been identified as Said Kouachi, born in 1980, Cherif Kouachi, born in 1982, both from Paris, and Hamyd Mourad, born in 1996. All French nationals, the younger man Hamyd Mourad has handed himself in to police in northern France. The brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi are still on the run, presumably armed and in no hurry to help police with their enquiries.

Already at this early stage it's known that Cherif was arrested in 2005 and imprisoned in 2008 for recruiting French nationals to go to Iraq and join the holy war against the Americans from his mosque in Paris, and was apprehended on route to Iraq to join them. He was arrested and charged again in 2010 in connection with a plot to break Algerian Islamist Smain Ait Ali Belkacem out of prison, where he is held for an earlier attack on a Paris commuter station.

Much less is known about the elder brother Said, except that he was living with Cherif at the time of his arrest, so at the very least can be presumed to have known about his brother's activities. What appaers to be his Facebook page here doesn't really paint him in a favourable light. And since this will inevitably disappear in the next few days, here is a screenshot

Remember that France has had two incidents in the last month of Islamist lunatics attacking the public, so you would think that they would be on their guard a bit.

So how on earth were these two allowed to drive into central Paris with assault rifles and carry out this awful attack? If I can find this information out in just an hour or so on Google how on earth can one of the world's most advanced nations with a formidable military and intelligence service and a history of Islamic terrorism that pre-dates the "war on terror" by some decades, be so utterly inept? And being this inept while the French military is busily engaged across Africa and the Middle East in conflicts that have little if anything to do with France is unforgivable. 

To be very clear about this, the blame lies only with those who perpetrated this atrocity, but the responsibility of the French government to protect it's citizens and maintain the peace was woefully neglected.