A suicide bomber blew herself up and a police sniper took out a second terror suspect after authorities stormed two apartments and a church Wednesday in the northern Parisian suburb that hosted one of last week’s deadly terrorist attacks.
The raid in Saint-Denis, home to the Stade de France arena that was hit by three suicide bombers Friday, targeted a suspected ringleader of the attacks, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, though it wasn’t certain he was at any of the locations, a senior Belgian counterterrorism official told CNN.
Police sources say, however, the raid was well-timed because the suspects were “about to move on some kind of operation.”
Here are the most important developments from Wednesday:
The latest
• NEW: The shootout in Saint-Denis began at 4:20 a.m. and lasted nearly an hour, Paris prosecutor Francois Molins said Wednesday. At least two people died, he said. Neither has been identified.
• NEW: Abaaoud and fellow suspect Salah Abdeslam are not in custody, Molins said.
• NEW: Seven men and a woman were arrested in Wednesday’s raids, Molins said. That tally is one higher than the one previously provided by authorities.
• Three teams of commandos carried out Friday’s Paris attacks, arriving nearly simultaneously at three locations, Molins said, providing new specifics in the investigation.
• A phone thrown into a garbage can outside the Bataclan theater contained a text message saying the attack was about to begin, Molins said. Authorities are trying to determine who the message was sent to, he said.
• Two of the terrorists in Friday’s attacks remain unidentified, Molins said.
The investigation and Wednesday’s raid
• The suicide bomber who blew herself up during the Saint-Denis raid has been identified as a cousin of Abaaoud, Belgian state broadcaster RTBF reported. CNN has not verified the report, but earlier Wednesday, a Belgian counterterrorism official told CNN that before the raid, a wiretap conducted by French and Belgian authorities led them to believe Abaaoud’s female cousin was in an apartment in Saint-Denis.
• The raids focused on two apartments on the same street, a Paris police source told CNN. The raid on one group led to a raid on another group, the source said. Witnesses reported hearing sustained gunfire about 4:30 a.m., and a CNN reporter said she heard five or six explosions at the scene, but it wasn’t clear if the explosions were controlled or otherwise.
• Investigators will use DNA analysis to determine whether Abaaoud was killed in the raid, a Belgian counterterrorism official told CNN. A French commando team used powerful munitions to neutralize suspects, resulting in the collapse of an entire floor of the building. In the rubble, investigators found body parts, the source said.
• Two suspects from the Saint-Denis raids, both of whom required surgery for arm injuries, are being treated at a hospital in Bobigny, France, according to CNN affiliate BFMTV.
• Five police officers were injured and a police dog was killed, police said.
• French police say the 7-year-old dog, named Diesel, was “killed by terrorists.” The police dog was the first to go into the apartment where the operation took place, and it’s believed Diesel died when a female suspect wearing a suicide vest blew herself up, according to reports.
• Paris attack suspects Salah Abdeslam and Abaaoud served time in prison together in Belgium in 2011, the Belgian federal prosecutor said.
• Authorities overnight in France conducted 118 searches, took 25 people into custody and confiscated 34 weapons, the French Interior Ministry said. Authorities also “found narcotics 16 times,” the statement said.
• French police are analyzing a video that shows two gunmen and perhaps a third person inside a black SEAT automobile that has been tied to the attacks, French media reported.
The scene in France
• A bomb squad destroyed a suspicious package at the Gare du Nord terminal. It was not an explosive device, but the train station was briefly evacuated.
• On Wednesday evening, French President Francois Hollande will introduce legislation that would extend France’s state of emergency for three months.
• Two Air France flights headed for Paris — one from Washington Dulles International Airport and the other from Los Angeles — were diverted to Halifax, Nova Scotia, and Salt Lake City, respectively, after bomb threats, officials say. Both flights have been searched and declared safe.
• The traditional opening of the Christmas lights in Paris, slated for Wednesday, was canceled because of the Friday terrorist attacks, organizers said.
Around the globe
• Turkish authorities detained eight Moroccan men believed to be linked to ISIS. They had flown from Casablanca, Morocco, to Istanbul, according to Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency. They were deported, back to Casablanca, police told CNN.
• As a growing number of U.S. governors said they didn’t want Syrian refugees in their states, President Barack Obama criticized them, saying he “cannot think of a more potent recruitment tool for (ISIS).” Speaking at the State Department, CIA Director John Brennan said it’s important for the U.S. to strike a balance between accepting refugees fleeing Syria and maintaining security safeguards so that terrorists cannot exploit the resettlement program.
• Thirty-three ISIS members have been killed by French and other military airstrikes in the last 72 hours, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a London-based monitoring group, said Wednesday. “Dozens of ISIS leaders and their families” are moving from Raqqa, ISIS’ self-proclaimed capital, in northern Syria, toward the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, the Observatory said.
• German officials said they haven’t made any arrests or found any explosives at a stadium in Hannover, Germany, that was evacuated just before a friendly match between Germany and the Netherlands on Tuesday.
• Muslims worldwide take to social media using the hashtag #NotInMyName to condemn the Paris attacks.