BEIRUT, January 10. /TASS/. The Sunni extremist organization Islamic State active in Syria and Iraq has claimed responsibility for an attack on the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo that killed 12 people, the Suriya al-En news agency said on Saturday.
Sheikh Abu Saad Ansari, the head of preachers in Islamic State, reportedly said during a Friday sermon in Iraq’s Mosul that the operation in France was a message to all member countries of the international coalition, Suriya al-En said.
“Today, we began attacks in France, but tomorrow it will be Great Britain, the United States and all others,” he was quoted as saying. In his words, the terrorist attack were a response to the death in bombings of dozens of mujahideen.
The Al-Safir daily said on Friday that the Lebanese intelligence services and security services of a number of other Arab states had warned their French colleagues about possible terrorist attacks. According to the newspaper, security measures had been tightened around diplomatic missions of France and other Western states in Beirut.
The Islamic State and another extremist group, Jabhat al-Nusra, are confronting the Lebanese army and the Shiite organization Hezbollah in mountainous areas in northern Lebanon and in the Bekaa Valley bordering Syria. Since August 2014, they have been keeping hostage 26 Lebanese servicemen and policemen who were taken in an attack on the border town of Arsal (some 90 kilometres off Beirut).
In his Friday message, Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah said the terrorist activities were “a serious challenge to the Islamic nation and the rest of the world.” Hezbollah is fighting with the Syrian government army against armed groups.
Earlier on Friday, Associated Press cited a member of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula as saying that the group had directed the attack on the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris. The group said the attack on the French magazine was "revenge for the honor" of Islam's Prophet Muhammad.
On Wednesday morning, three masked gunmen targeted an office of the Paris-based satirical Charlie Hebdo magazine, which had earlier published caricature images of the Prophet Muhammed. As a result of the shooting, 12 people were killed, including 10 staff members and two policemen. Another 11 people were wounded. This was the deadliest attack in France in half a century. On Friday, the terrorists were killed in a special operation.