LIBÉRATION
‘Unity’
Terrorist barbarity has crossed a historic line with a coordinated massacre in the heart of Paris carried out with cold determination with a goal of causing multiple victims, through Iraqi-style suicide attacks at the Stade de France, and carnage at the Bataclan.
France has never experienced such a level of violence, even at the height of attacks linked to the Algerian civil war in the 1990s, which recalls the massacres of Mumbai or Madrid.
It is indeed France and its policy, along with its international role, that were chosen by the killers … The targeted places, all dedicated to entertainment, were chosen deliberately, as though to signify that the French people will from now be threatened in their most basic social life …
It’s impossible not to connect these bloody events to the fighting in the Middle East. France is playing its role there and must continue steadfastly. Only solid and determined unity, backed up by the country’s values, will allow her to rise to her greatest ever challenge.
L’EST RÉPUBLICAIN
‘Terror’
Fewer than 10 months after Charlie Hebdo and the bloody month of January, [we have] the same images and the same anguish, reaching a notch further into terror. As the hours of confusion and dread went on into the night, the toll got higher … it was an endless plunge into horror. A terrible Friday the 13th.
As France prepared for a quiet night of football, it was struck in its heart.
The worst may have narrowly been avoided at the Stade de France. But this time there’s no point in wondering about the existence of lone wolves. We are talking about orchestrated attacks with a date and places that were clearly targeted. In particular at the Bataclan, where veritable carnage took place. The crowds were sprayed with bullets before the concert hall was stormed by security forces.
These coordinated operations, involving at least seven simultaneous attacks, were meticulously prepared commando operations.
France is once again in their sights.
The initial indications have left no doubt: the terrorist threat has now taken root in French soil. It has placed us in a permanent state of war, and on the front line of a fight that knows no borders and no pity.
OUEST-FRANCE
‘We shall stand firm’
We knew that sooner or later France would be particularly targeted by terrorism. For indeed France is leading this fight in several regions of the world. What’s more, Paris will be the political hub of the world for a few days during COP21, the global conference on climate change.
We don’t yet know who the attackers were, but they were coordinated. They clearly intended to destabilise and create panic in a peaceful city. They wanted to terrify people, and weaken our government, no doubt to change its conduct.
Of course France will not allow itself to be forced to change its options by this type of violence. On the contrary, it will strengthen our determination to resist.
Every person, wherever they may be, will feel even more involved in this kind of war which has been imposed on us.
We must keep cool in these dramatic circumstances.
Let us show our resolve and determination. Once again, we must resist.
LE PARISIEN
‘This time it’s war’
Anger and disgust are the reactions to the assassins who struck inside Paris on Friday night, with the terrorists’ habitual cowardice.
They are the perfect henchmen of the ideology of hatred and massacre who sow death randomly.
These barbarians of God, soldiers on the cheap whose heroism consists of killing innocent people, carry out random massacres because they want France to be in a state of shock. To stun her, to paralyse and divide her.
But in the name of the real martyrs of yesterday, the innocent victims, and in the name of the Republic, France shall remain united and stand firm.
LE MONDE
‘Terror and sangfroid’
France is at war. At war against totalitarian, indiscriminate and incredibly murderous terrorism. We’ve known this since January, since the attacks on Charlie Hebdo and the Hypercacher in Paris …
For the first time, several of these terrorists, wearing explosive belts, did not hesitate to become human bombs. They wanted to plunge France into panic and terror. It was France that they wanted to smash.
This madness can have only one response: in the face of panic, dignity. In the face of the sowers of death, resolve. In the face of desperation, lucidity. In the face of terror, ‘sangfroid’ as the president so aptly put it last night. And above all, the unity of the nation when put to the test …
The French authorities are at war against armed Islamism because it designated France by name as one of its targets … This ‘party of the pure’ ... is taking on democracies as a priority. Remaining ourselves is one of the conditions of success in the war that must be waged against this fanaticism.
SUD-OUEST
‘France at war’
France is at war. Savages who are as determined as they are fanatical have launched on her territory – and more specifically her capital – a murderous and unprecedented offensive …
The barbarians of January took on the freedom of the press, the police and Jews. The barbarians of November attacked sport, fun and music, everything that their death cult ideology hates. For the first time, too, the president was directly confronted by one of these attacks, as he was present at the Stade de France from where he was quickly evacuated.
There will be time for questions once the situation quietens down. We will have to find out how, despite all the precautions, with all the anti-terror measures raised to their highest level, terrorists were able to commit such deadly simultaneous attacks in the centre of Paris …
But for now we must rally round the president, the government, our institutions and stand firm against the attacks. We must show the same stiff upper lip as Londoners did during the 1940 blitz.
