France Foils Terrorist Attacks

French authorities arrested five men this week in two separate French cities who were planning terror attacks in the country, said Paris prosecutor Francois Molins on Friday.The men were set to execute their attacks as early as next week, and were receiving orders from an Islamic State member based in either Iraq or Syria.Four men were arrested in Strasbourg, and one was arrested in Marseille, in the east and south of the country, respectively.While investigators are unsure of the targets for the attacks, Molins said that one of the four would-be terrorists was plotting an attack for Dec. 1.The five men were “given guidance remotely” by an Islamic State member from Iraq and Syria, including instructions to find weapons and financing.

French police find material, documents, weapons

In a home belonging to one of the men in Strasbourg, police found two handguns, two rifles, several magazines and various cartridges of different calibers.On a USB Key, investigators found instructions for handing over money and GPS coordinates related to communicating with the ISIS operative in Syria.The suspects arrested were a 36-year-old Franco-Tunisian, a 46-year-old Moroccan, a 35-year old Franco-Moroccan, and two French citizens. The four Strasbourg suspects were all long-time friends who communicated on a closed network through a dedicated telephone line. They did not, however, know the Marseille suspect.A notebook was found that contained 12 pages of references to armed jihad, death in martyrdom and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State.Three of the suspects, including the Marseille suspect, had made suspicious trips outside the country in recent years, including a trip to the Turkish-Syrian border via Cyprus in March 2015 and a trip to Turkey, where Turkish authorities prevented him from entering the country.France is still under a state of emergency after multiple terror attacks, including one in Paris where attackers killed 130 people, the Charlie Hebdo attacks, and the truck terror attack in Nice that killed dozens.