French ISIS fighters burn passports, call for attacks on home soil in video
Islamic State has released a film showing the terrorist group’s French-speaking fighters burning French passports and urging others to join in the fight - in the streets of France.
The footage, filmed in a forest, was released by Al Hayat, the main media source used by Islamic State (also known as ISIS, or ISIL), and shows four men who are allegedly French citizens. Three of the men speak in French into the camera.
“We disbelieve in you and your passports, and if you come here we will fight you,” one of the masked fighters says, and burns his document in the fire. He is then followed by a man identified as Abu Osama Al Faranci, sitting with a rifle on his shoulder, who slams the French Muslim population for not emigrating to the IS.
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Another fighter - who holds a short sword that the IS would chop the heads of the “enemies of Islam" - pronounces the threat by saying that people “will even fear traveling to the market.”
The fourth militant, who reportedly is Abu Salman al-Faranci, says that he has pledged an oath of allegiance to IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. He says that those who can’t join their ranks should “operate within France” by terrorizing the country’s people to the extent of not letting them sleep "due to fear and horror."
Addressing French Muslims, the fighter tells them to "humiliate" others in France.
The video is just one of a number of footage, released by the terrorist group, featuring jihadists from other countries in their propaganda films. Fighters of British, German, Australian and other nationalities have been recruiting militants - both men and women - for the group.
READ MORE: Nearly 1,000 Frenchmen join jihad,
dozens of women and kids 'stopped en route'
The release of the latest footage comes against the background of two French men identified by intelligence services in France among other extremists in an IS propaganda video, which showed the killing of American hostage Peter Kassig and 18 Syrian soldiers.
The two French nationals now in the ranks of the terrorist group are a Muslim convert from northern France, Maxime Hauchard, and Michael Dos Santos from the suburbs of Paris, both 22 years old. They are now under investigation, a Paris prosecutor said on Wednesday.
This week, French military officials announced they would increase their involvement in the anti-jihadists campaign in the Middle East, sending more fighter jets to strike the Islamic State positions in the region. Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told the parliament on Wednesday that nine Rafale jets, that are already in the United Arab Emirates, will be reinforced with six Mirage fighter jets. The additional aircraft is expected to arrive in Jordan in December, military sources told AFP.
