To the specially composed assize court in Paris,
Their voices should no longer resonate in the courtroom until November. A week after the opening of the trial for the attacks of November 13, 2015, the specially composed Assize Court gave the floor to the 14 defendants present at the hearing. For the first time, they were able to deliver their position on the facts with which they are accused.
A speech that ended with a long intervention by Salah Abdeslam, the last survivor of the jihadist commandos. With a calm tone, the Franco-Belgian did not hesitate to take up elements of propaganda from Daesh, justifying the attacks in Paris and Saint-Denis by the military intervention undertaken by the international coalition in Iraq and Syria. A particularly “violent” exit for the civil parties.
Propaganda assumed
“We always wondered what was in his head, now we know”, cowardly, bitter, David Fritz, survivor of the Bataclan. The last accused to speak, Salah Abdeslam bluntly claimed responsibility for the attacks that targeted France on the evening of November 13th. ” What to start with ? “, He launched by way of introduction. Referring to the words used the day before by the Belgian investigating judge in charge of the case in Brussels to qualify his associates – “jihadist terrorists” – Salah Abdeslam retorts: “These terrorists, these radicals, they are Muslims. “Putting on the same level” jihadism “and” authentic Islam “, he has long justified the attacks in which his brother perished in the fall of 2015.
“We targeted the population, civilians, but there was nothing personal about them. We targeted France (…) because the French planes which bombard the Islamic State do not make distinctions between men, women, children, they destroy everything in their path, ”he said. court. Words that surprised David Fritz with their “uninhibited” violence: “It makes me angry. I revolt easily because I am alive and there are people who are no longer there today to do so. It is a trivialization of violence, of the act of terrorism. Frankly, I don’t have the words, ”he confided to the suspension of the hearing.
Silent or innocent
But what seems even more unbearable for Sophie, another survivor of the Bataclan attack, is the promise of “truth” made to the victims by Abdeslam. “I think that the minimum that we can give them is to tell them the truth,” assured the accused. It is often said of me that I am provocative but what I want is to be sincere with these people. “A simple” show “, sweeps Sophie, who explains that she does not believe at” any time “in the” sincerity “of the accused.
With this positioning, Salah Abdeslam once again stood out from his co-defendants. With the exception of a few silent ones, like the Swedish Osama Krayem or Abdeslam’s companion Sofien Ayari, all the others have firmly denied their participation in the November 13 attacks. “I am keen to explain myself, I am ready to answer all your questions, I am innocent,” declared Yassine Atar, younger brother of the sponsor of the attacks, Oussama Atar.
The voice uncertain and the gaze lowered, the Belgian-Moroccan Farid Kharkhach explained that he “would never have believed that the false papers” for which he appears today “could lead to this massacre”, adding “that” he did not know[t] not ”and was“ not aware ”of plans to attack the cell headed by Abdelhamid Abaaoud. Visibly moved, the forty-something Abdellah Chouaa, who appeared free, said he was “shocked” by the attacks carried out in France and Belgium. “I got sick from all of these accusations against me. It made my family, my children sick. I hope that justice will be done because I am totally innocent ”, he concluded.