By now it has sunk in just how horrific the latest terror attacks in Paris are….and it is far from over just today the National Police of France had a raid trying to locate the “mastermind” of the attacks (this will be covered later in this post)……

The media is doing a fine job of report (I say that with a sarcastic tone)….to me they are giving no new information kinda feels like they are doing more speculation than reporting…..

But that aside there are a few issues about this attack that I would like to cover…..first is the report from Iraq…..

Senior Iraqi intelligence officials warned members of the US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group of imminent assaults by the militant organization just one day before last week’s deadly attacks in Paris killed 129 people, the AP has learned. Iraqi intelligence sent a dispatch saying the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, had ordered an attack on coalition countries fighting against them in Iraq and Syria, as well as on Iran and Russia, through bombings or other attacks in the days ahead. The dispatch said the Iraqis had no specific details on when or where the attack would take place, and a senior French security official told the AP that French intelligence gets this kind of communication “all the time” and “every day.”

Six senior Iraqi officials confirmed the information in the dispatch, a copy of which was obtained by the AP, and four of these intelligence officials said they also warned France specifically of a potential attack. Two officials say that France was warned beforehand of details that French authorities have yet to make public. Among the other warnings cited by Iraqi officials: that the Paris attacks appear to have been planned in Raqqa, Syria—the Islamic State’s de-facto capital—where the attackers were trained specifically for this operation and with the intention of sending them to France. The officials also said a sleeper cell in France then met with the attackers after their training and helped them execute the plan. There were 24 people involved in the operation, they said: 19 attackers and five others in charge of logistics and planning.

Not something that is being reported for it does not fit into the dialog that the media wants to have…..

I guess my question is….did the French take the warning seriously?

Next, is this psychopathic douche bag, Abdelhamid Abaaoud………

Belgian and French authorities are also investigating whether a Belgian man suspected of being the mastermind behind a foiled Belgian terrorist plot in January orchestrated Friday’s onslaught, officials familiar with the probe said.

Abdelhamid Abaaoud, who was raised in Brussels, may have escaped to Syria after police shot and killed two men in the eastern Belgian town of Verviers who were plotting to kill police officers.

A French official said Abaaoud, who grew up in Brussels, had contacts with Salah Abdeslam, a 26-year-old man born in Belgium, now the subject of a massive manhunt, whose brother was among the seven suicide bombers who wreaked havoc at a sports arena, a concert hall and through the streets of Paris, killing at least 129 people.

Please STOP using the term “mastermind” to describe this pathetic douche!  At best he is a team leader or mission leader….to call him a mastermind is giving this person more status than he should have.  Once again it looks like the media is sensationalizing this person for their own benefit….does nothing to inform the public.

Then early morning today the French police struck…….

Dramatic developments in the hunt for surviving suspects from the Paris attacks: At least two are dead and seven more arrested after a huge police raid on an apartment in Saint-Denis, north of Paris, Wednesday morning. The big question—whether alleged mastermind Abdelhamid Abaaoud is among them—remains unclear, reports the AP. He was thought to have been hiding in a safe house in the neighborhood. A woman detonated a suicide belt when police moved in, and a man was killed when a grenade went off, reports the New York Times. The police action lasted about seven hours. More:

• In a speech after the raid, French President Francois Hollande declared that ISIS is “threatening the whole world” and told lawmakers that France must “reestablish control of (its) frontiers,” reports the BBC. Fighting terrorism must be the nation’s top priority, he said, adding that France “will remain a country of liberty and culture” and “never give in to fear.”

• A source tells Reuters that the raid on the Saint-Denis apartment was launched after investigators found a cellphone in a garbage can outside the Bataclan concert hall, with a map of the area and a text message saying: “Let’s go.”
• Abaaoud was believed to have orchestrated the attacks from inside Syria, and it would be what the Washington Post calls a “startling turn of events” if he did indeed manage to slip back into Europe while being hunted by multiple intelligence agencies.
• The man whose apartment was at the center of the operation claims a friend asked him to put the guests up and he had no idea who they were. “Someone asked me to put two people up for three days and I did them a favor, it’s normal,” he told French TV channel BFMTV, per ITV. “I don’t know where they came from, I don’t know anything. If I’d known, do you think I’d have done it?”

I am sure that we will eventually get the answers we are looking for……but whether they are accurate will depend on who does the reporting.