In September 2021 a trial began in Paris. It had a nine-month schedule and its purpose was to provide some kind of justice following the terrorist attacks that took place on 13 November, 2015 in Paris, in which 130 people were killed, many others maimed - and following which at least one person who survived one of the attacks has subsequently committed suicide. In the court in 2021, twenty men stood accused of greater or lesser involvement in the attacks; many of the ringleaders were absent because they had detonated explosive vests during the attacks and blown themselves up.
The French writer and journalist Emmanuel Carrère volunteered to attend the trial for its full nine months and write a weekly column about the experience for Le Nouvel Observateur. V13 is a synthesis of those columns.
Carrère begins by explaining his reasons for taking on the task:
1. "I am interested in justice";
2. "I am interested in religions, their pathological mutations, and the question: where does this pathology begin? When it comes to God, where does the madness start? What goes on in these guys' minds?";
3. He wants to hear the survivors tell of their experiences - this will be a major part of the proceedings.
Disappointingly, but perhaps unsurprisingly, the book doesn't really provide any clear answer to the mystery of what goes on in the minds of perpetrators of terrorist acts on civilians, although Carrère's comments on the video put out by Islamic State claiming responsibility for the attacks may contain a clue: "It's pure propaganda" he says, but propaganda of a kind that "is completely unprecedented...Normally propaganda hides horror. Here it puts it on show. The Islamic State doesn't say: this is war, sadly for good to triumph we must commit terrible acts. No, it lauds itself for its sadism. It uses sadism, displays of sadism and the permission to be sadistic to recruit." Carrère also mentions regularly, in passing, the extraordinary amount of marijhuana most of the perpetrators smoked habitually; although Carrère does not make the connection explicitly, I can't help wondering whether marijhuana may not play a considerable role in warping the minds of young Islamic men, allowing them to become open to the sadism that those directing them glory in.
As to the witnessing Carrère was hoping for, the book is full of stories, mainly of the victims and their relatives, but also of courageous people who tried to prevent the attacks (notably Sonia), of survivors and of the lawyers, particularly those who are defending the men accused of terrorism - "we obviously do not defend paedophilia or terrorism, but we are prepared to defend a paedophile or a terrorist" one tells him '. I don't always see things as Carrère does - for instance, he claims that the judge's annoyance about a three-year-old who runs around screaming the whole time her Serbian mother is giving evidence would have been replaced by compassion if the child had been the daughter of a blonde woman from Bataclan, whereas I think screaming three-year-olds are always a pain, regardless of where they come from. All the same, he recounts many moving stories and introduces the reader to some intriguing details about those involved and their preparations, not least the strange fact that the computer upon which many of the perpetrators habitually watched Islamic State's videos of beheadings and torture was also used to watch "a recording of a stage production of Cyrano de Bergerac, Robert Hossein's adaptation of Les Miserables, and above all two comedies by Sacha Guitry, Royal Affairs in Versailles and The Virtuous Scoundrel ... black-and-white films...shot in the 1950s, with dated language and crackling sound."
Carrère's interest in justice might encompass, unspoken, an obvious operational question - how were the attacks allowed to happen? He certainly provides an answer of sorts, while reporting on the evidence of Bernard Bajolet, former Director General for External Security in France. Carrère tells readers that Bajolet admits the whole thing was "a cock-up", explaining to the court that both the French and Belgian police forces had the information they needed to prevent the attacks, having picked up "a petty jihadist named Reda Hame in August 2015 on his return from Syria [who] divulges what Abaaoud [the ringleader of the plot] is planning". Sadly, the two police forces took absolutely no notice of this information.
As to spiritual justice, while not as full of forgiveness as Georges Salines, a victim's father who has begun a friendship with the father of his child's murderer, Carrère is not as unforgiving as Antoine Leiris, whose wife was murdered at Bataclan. Personally, I do not judge Leiris - forgiveness is a matter for those who suffered because of the terrible events of that November evening and, if he is not ready to forgive, that is a matter for him.
V13 does not provide answers to all the questions provoked by the Paris attacks, but it is still a book worth reading for anyone curious about the Islamo-terrorism that has become part of life in the west. It is full of interesting detail, not least, for me at least, an introduction to the phenomenon called taquiya. Taquiya is a word used by Muslims to describe the Islamic tactic of living and working "like submarines in a society they hate and wish to destroy." According to Carrère, Muslims use taquiya because "to fool the unbelievers, you have to blend in with them. You have to pass yourself off as a nice Muslim who's happy to pray without bothering anyone, in full respect of the social pact." This means that "a cold monster could well be hiding behind your neighbour's familiar face."
Returning to the question of justice, Carrère ultimately comes down on the side of lenience. He is glad that some of those accused of peripheral involvement are not imprisoned, even though they are not declared innocent. He is troubled by the heavy sentence given to the terrorist who did not ignite his bomb belt and therefore is the only one of the main perpetrators still alive to be punished. Carrère seems persuaded by the idea that punishing this young man so severely will send a message to those on the point of blowing themselves up that they might as well go through with the act, as society will not be lenient to them if they back off at the last moment. I think this is naive. Anyone who has got to the point of wearing an explosive vest is beyond reason, even if they do hesitate and ultimately choose not to explode their device. Even though Carrère sat through this long trial and observed the accused and heard how keen they were to damage and destroy the society around them, he still seems to me to underestimate the threat men like them pose, living in our midst. For me his book - most particularly his insight into extreme Islam's embrace of sadism - increased my already growing suspicion that turning the other cheek against Islamic terrorism might be a misunderstanding of Christ's message and the West's most dangerous mistake.
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