The radicalised youth was arrested on Monday during an anti-terrorism operation carried out by the General Directorate for Internal Security (DGSI). He is suspected of planning violent attacks against several targets – schools, embassies, media outlets – on behalf of IS.
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He had named his attack plans ‘’Backfire’ or ‘An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’. According to our information, a 17-year-old youth suspected of preparing large-scale jihadist actions was taken into custody on Monday by officers of the General Directorate for Internal Security (DGSI) as part of a preliminary investigation launched by the National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor’s Office (PNAT) for ‘criminal association of a terrorist nature’. The minor, who lives in Le Mans (Sarthe), attempted to flee during his arrest, requiring the elite Raid unit to be called in for assistance.
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Even more worrying is that investigations suggest that the individual in question may have been in virtual contact with members of Islamic State in Khorasan (IS-K), the terrorist organisation’s branch based in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Although IS has been weakened since 2018 by the loss of its self-proclaimed caliphate between Syria and Iraq, it has regained strength through its subsidiary organisation in Khorasan, which is responsible in particular for the deadly attack in Moscow in 2024 (137 dead). The DGSI recently placed the terrorist threat posed by IS-K ‘at the top of its list of priorities’. Above all, its propaganda continues to incite terrorist activity in France, particularly among the youngest and most unstable individuals.
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In particular, he is said to have planned to set fire to schools, which he sees as symbols of the Western system he despises. Hence the code name ‘Retour de flammes’ (backfire). The police found a list of schools, notes on chemicals and the manufacture of explosives, as well as research on petrol stations in the region and target locations on Google Maps on his mobile phone.
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