The Long, Slow Fuse of Jihad in France

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While in the 19th Arrondissement Network, Cherif made contact with a Tunisian terrorist, Boubaker el Hakim, who was convicted alongside him in 2008. Hakim’s brother, Redouane, who also traveled from France to Iraq, is believed to have died during a bombardment of Fallujah in 2004.

More recently, Hakim himself is believed to have assassinated two Tunisian politicians and is now a known member of the Islamic State. It’s unclear if Cherif and Hakim stayed in touch with each other in the years after the trial, so any connection to the Islamic State remains unknown, said Thomas Joscelyn, senior editor of the Long War Journal, which focuses on U.S. counterterrorism efforts.
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Corinne Ray, a cartoonist who worked at Charlie Hebdo and witnessed the shooting, has told French media that the attackers claimed to be from al Qaeda.

“The ties to the al Qaeda in Iraq network from pre-2005 show that Cherif Kouachi could easily be tied to some significant players, especially as he served jail time, which only further establishes his bona fides within jihadist circles,” said Joscelyn.
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Details about Cherif’s past also suggest that if there is a connection to an outside terrorist group, it is more likely with one of al Qaeda’s affiliates than with the Islamic State, but neither can be ruled out yet, experts say. In part, that’s because the Islamic State itself rose from the ashes of al Qaeda’s affiliate in Iraq after the 2006 death of Zarqawi.

The clearest connection to the al Qaeda universe is Cherif’s involvement with the 19th Arrondissement Network, which was directly supplying French fighters to join Zarqawi’s al Qaeda offshoot group as it fought U.S. and coalition forces.

“The question remains, did Cherif maintain ties to part of the al Qaeda in Iraq network that became the Islamic State or the one that remained loyal to al Qaeda?” Joscelyn said.
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