The brother of the terrorist who five years ago went on a nine-day shooting spree in the French city of Toulouse, killing three soldiers and gunning down a teacher and three children at a Jewish school, told i24NEWS in an interview on Thursday that he had warned France’s intelligence agency that his brothers were likely to commit a terror attack.
The attacks by Abdelghani Merah’s younger brother, Mohamed Merah, were at the time the first Islamist attacks on French soil since 1995 and marked the beginning of the “lone wolf” terror trend — acts carried out by isolated individuals — that would go on to plague Europe and the Middle East.
Another of his brothers, Abdelkader Merah, went on trial in France earlier this month for his role in helping to plan the days-long assault, carried out between March 11 and March 19, 2012.
Abdelghani told i24NEWS that he alerted French intelligence to the possibility that his brothers could carry out a terror attack, but that his warnings fell on deaf ears.
“In 2003, I had warned the French Directorate of Territorial Surveillance (DST) and told them that if a terror attack would take place in Toulouse, it would be committed by one of my brothers,” Abdelghani said.
“At that moment in time, they didn’t really believe me,” he said, explaining that they thought he was trying to get revenge on his brother Abdelkader, who had stabbed him multiple times because of his wife’s Jewish origins.
A woman and children are escorted by a police officer near a building where the chief suspect in an al-Qaida-linked killing spree is holed up in an apartment in Toulouse, France Thursday March 22, 2012.AP Photo/Remy de la Mauviniere
“The French DST thought I was only doing this to avenge myself,” he said.
Abdelghani, whose parents immigrated to France from Algeria, said that while French authorities had linked his brother Abdelkader and brother-in-law to jihadist networks, Mohammad, who would go on to carry out the nine-day rampage, evaded suspicion.
“Mohammed Merah played well, he was very clever and fooled everybody. At that time, we didn’t realize that terrorism didn’t have the same face anymore. Now, it would operate differently,” Abdelghani said.
Nonetheless, Abdelghani said that he was still shocked when he heard that that his brother had murdered innocent children.
“I was very surprised that Mohammed Merah killed children,” he said, adding that while authorities deemed Mohammed a “lone wolf” attacker, his targeting of children suggests to him that Mohammed was guided by a terror cell.
“Mohammed Merah really loved children. It was proof that he had been guided, because [Mohammed] used to judge terrorists who would kill young children,” Abdelghani said.
This file handout TV grab released by France 2 on March 21, 2012 shows an image of Toulouse gunman Mohamed MerahHO (France2/AFP/File)
Abdelghani Merah says he still feels guilty that he was not more persistent with French authorities and was unable to prevent the attack.
“I will feel guilty until I die,” Abdelghani says. “Yes, maybe I could have prevented Ozar HaTorah school attack. I’ll blame myself my whole life.”
“I could have insisted more, but at that moment I had a motorcycle accident, I was rebuilding myself after a handicap,” Abdelghani explains. “I could have insisted but at that time I thought a bit about myself.”
Abdelghani, who has made a conscious decision never to refer to Mohammed or Abdelkader as “my brothers”, believes that Mohammed’s radical ideology was shaped in part by the notorious anti-Semitic preacher Olivier Corel, known in France as the “White Emir.”
He also speaks out openly against the environment of hatred and anti-Semitism his family was raised in.
“The Merah family was raised with hatred of Jews, of France and everything that was not Muslim,” Abdelghani said.
“[Corel] is a very dangerous preacher and he took advantage perfectly of the fertile ground that exist[ed] in my family.”
Friends and family members gather around the bodies of the victims of Monday’s shooting in Toulouse, France during their funeral at a cemetery in Jerusalem, Wednesday, March 21, 2012.AP Photo/Sebastian Scheiner
“Mohammed Merah didn’t go the mosque because he was very afraid, he knew the French intelligence authorities and anti-terrorist groups were there,” he said. “Olivier Corel is a very impressive preacher who uses Nazi and sectarian ideas. He shaped him in his own way.”
Abdelghani said that Corel “used the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to steal their hearts and minds,” adding that he himself avoided succumbing to radical influences that enveloped the boys’ upbringing.
“I didn’t fall in[to] this trap because I couldn’t blame the French people of my generation [for] what happened between France and Algeria. I became sensitive to Jews because I was touched and saddened by what Nazis did to the Jews, by the fact that human beings were murdered just because they were Jews, especially in France,” Abdelghani says.
France invaded and occupied Algeria in the early 1800s and fought a bloody war against independence-seeking militants between 1954 to 1962, which left tens of thousands dead.
“Today, the same hatred toward Jews and non-Muslims lies in this stream of [radical] Islam,” he added.
Abdelghani also lashed out at his mother, who testified earlier this week in a Paris court that Abdelkader was not complicit in the attacks.
Zoulikha Aziri, mère d’Abdelghani, Souad, Aïcha, Abdelkader et Mohamed Merah au micro d’i24NEWS, le 18 octobre 2017“She lies to herself,” Abdelghani said. “She doesn’t realize what her kids have done, they killed men and children. We’re not talking about purse or moped-snatching. She lies to herself and she is trying to cover [for] Abdelkader, just like she always did.”
“It’s very sad to say but I know that my mother is an anti-Semite,” he said, adding that his mother refused to listen to his repeated warnings about Mohammed and Abdelkader.
Abdelghani, however, says he has no doubt that Abdelkader was a knowing accomplice in Mohammed’s atrocities.
“First of all, they share the same ideology, and as I said during my hearing in the trial, if Mohammed Merah killed children, he did not do it of his own free will,” he said. “Abdelkader Merah influenced Mohammed to kill children, especially Jewish children.”