Raid Near Paris Targets Alleged ISIS Planner

A woman wearing an explosive suicide vest blew herself up as heavily armed police tried to storm a suburban Paris apartment where the suspected mastermind of last week's attacks was believed to be holed up, police said Wednesday.

A French prosecutor's office said a total of five people were arrested in the standoff, which began in the early hours of the morning and went on for about seven hours. Three suspects were taken into custody inside the building and four others outside.

A senior police official said he believed Abdelhamid Abaaoud, a Belgian Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militant believed to have planned the gruesome attack last week, was inside the apartment in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis with five other heavily armed people. Abaaoud, a well-known ISIS operative suspected of planning several attacks inside Europe, was previously believed to have been in Syria.

The identities of the those killed and arrested were not immediately available. Speaking after the raid, French officials at the scene confirmed a second suspect, a man, was found dead inside the apartment with gun and grenade wounds.
Scores of police stormed the building and were met with unexpectedly violent resistance.

Media reports suggested as many as five police officers sustained injuries in the raid, and an officer in full tactical gear was seen leaving the apartment building with the help of colleagues, but he did not appear to be seriously hurt. A police dog was reportedly killed during the raid.

Police led a handcuffed man, nude from the waist down, out of the building in handcuffs hours after the raid began.

No hostages were being held, and with officials declaring the operation over at about 11:30 a.m. local time, it appeared no further suspects were still holed-up in the building.

Residents said a first explosion shook the neighborhood at about 4 a.m. local time (10 p.m. Eastern).
"Then there was second big explosion. Then two more explosions. There was an hour of gunfire," said Baptiste Marie, a 26-year-old independent journalist who lives in the neighborhood.

Another witness, Amine Guizani, said he heard the sound of grenades and automatic gunfire.

"They were shooting for an hour. Nonstop. There were grenades. It was going, stopping. Kalashnikovs. Starting again," Guizani said.

Sporadic bangs and explosions continued, and at 6:30 a.m. at least seven explosions shook the center of Saint-Denis. Associated Press reporters at the scene could hear what sounded like grenade blasts from the direction of the standoff.

Investigators have identified 27-year-old Abaaoud, a Belgian of Moroccan descent, as the chief architect of Friday's attacks in Paris.

A U.S. official briefed on intelligence matters said Abaaoud was a key figure in an ISIS external operations cell that U.S. intelligence agencies have been tracking for many months.

Police vans and fire trucks rushed to the scene north of Paris. The site is just over a mile from the Stade de France stadium, which was targeted by three suicide bombers during Friday's attacks.
Police cordoned off the area nearby, including a pedestrian zone lined with shops and 19th-century apartment buildings. Riot police cleared people from the streets, pointing guns at curious residents to move them off the roads.

Saint-Denis Mayor Didier Paillard said public transport was suspended and that schools in the center of town would not open Wednesday.

Seven attackers died in Friday's gun-and-bomb rampage through Paris that killed at least 129 people and left over 350 wounded. ISIS has claimed responsibility for the carnage and French President Francois Hollande called it an "act of war" committed by the group.

The Associated Press contributed to this report