EXCLUSIVE: The 35th birthday party that became the Café of Angels massacre - how ELEVEN friends who worked together at Paris eaterie were gunned down side by side
- Several of dead in Belle Equipe tragedy worked nearby at Café des Anges
- Friends were at café to celebrate the 35th birthday of waitress Houda Saadi
- She invited her closest friends and family to celebrate with a special meal
- But joy turned to horror as gunmen fired hail of bullets, killing 11 of them
A group of 11 friends and colleagues were brutally wiped out in one fell swoop when two ISIS gunmen unleashed a hail of bullets at the La Belle Equipe café on Friday night.
They had gathered together for the 35th birthday party of a waitress called Houda Saadi, who worked at the nearby Café des Anges – meaning Café of Angels.
The Tunisian woman was joined by her 36-year-old sister Halima, a mother of two young boys, and her two brothers Khaled and Bashir.
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Shrine: Friends and family of the birthday party of 11 who died at the La Belle Equipe café have put up photographs in their memory on the door of the nearby Café des Anges
Both Houda and Halima were slaughtered in the gunfire, and their brothers, who had miraculously survived unharmed, fought desperately to save their lives on the blood-smeared floor of the café.
Karim, 38, a father-of-two also of Tunisian descent, also rushed to help one of the sisters in her final moments.
'I knelt in the blood and held her, saying, ça ça, ça va, don't be afraid,' he told MailOnline.
Khaled, who also worked at the Café des Anges, began giving one of his sisters CPR but his attempts were in vain.
One of the sisters passed away on the floor of the café while the other, who had been shot in the head, died later in hospital.
Birthday: Houda Saadi was at the La Belle Equipe café celebrating her 35th birthday along with 10 friends who were also killed as celebration turned to tragedy
Slain: Tunisian Halima Saadi, a 36-year-old mother of two young boys, was killed in the La Belle Equipe café
Speaking after the massacre, he said: ‘I was inside when they came and started shooting everyone on the terrace and inside.
‘I laid on the ground on my stomach hoping to avoid the bullets. When I heard that there was no more shooting I raised my head but they started shooting again so I hid again.
‘It lasted a minute in total, but it was very long. I then went out of the restaurant and they were all dead or suffering.
‘I found Halima but she died on the spot. I tried to save my second sister Houda. I moved her with a friend of hers named Sam. We moved her to another restaurant nearby.
'I left Sam with Houda so he could talk to her and keep her awake and tell her that we were there because she was still breathing.’
The majority of the 19 tragic victims at the La Belle Equipe café were from the birthday celebrations, including five members of staff from the Café des Ange and six of their friends.
The scenes in the café were horrific, with one witness telling MailOnline that he saw a dead woman hunched over a table 'with her eyes out of her sockets'.
Those killed were the young and fashionable, cut down in the prime of their lives. Among them was Michelli Gil Jaimez, a 27-year-old Mexican woman who had lived in Paris for three years and worked at La Belle Equipe.
Just days before the massacre she had gotten engaged to an Italian, who posted a heartbreaking tribute to her on Facebook, saying: 'I love you, my love. Rest in peace.'
'Michelli was the sun of this restaurant, even when it was raining,' said her friend Juan, 34, fighting back tears.
Others who spent their final moments celebrating with Houda were the hero Ludovic Boumbas, who died sacrificing himself to save his friend Chloe Clement; Romanian Lacrimioava Pop, known as Lacri, and her partner Ciprian Calciu; Hyacinthe Koma; Djamila Houd, 41; Guillaume Le Dramp, 33; Romain Feuillade, 31; and René Bichon.
Heartbreaking: Just days before the massacre, Michelli had gotten engaged to an Italian who posted a tribute to her on Saturday on Facebook, saying: 'I love you, my love. Rest in peace'
Engaged: Michelli Gil Jaimez had gotten engaged to an Italian man (left) just days before the horrific attack
Happier times: Michelli Gil Jaimez (second left), a 27-year-old Mexican who had been living in Paris for three years, was well known as one of the smiling faces behind the bar at the La Belle Equipe
Massacre: Djamila Houd, 41, originally from Dreux, west of Paris, was killed as she celebrated with Houda
Family: Lacrimioava Pop, from Romania, was killed along with her partner Ciprian Calciu
Love: Romanian victims Lacrimioava Pop and Ciprian Calciu, had a child together
Mourned: Romain Feuillade was gunned down along with his friends at the Belle Equipe, when gunmen launched a hail of bullets at the fated cafe
Saviour: Nicknamed Ludo, Ludovic Boumbas threw himself into the path of a bullet in a selfless act of bravery that cost him his life
Survived: Khaled Saadi (left), who was working as his sister celebrated her birthday, gave one of his sisters CPR but his attempts were in vain. He is pictured with Abdullah Saadi
Chloe, who is recovering in hospital, is said to be so traumatised she keeps repeating her saviour's name.
The manager of Café des Anges, 27-year-old Virgile Grunberg, went to visit Chloe in hospital and said: 'She was on morphine and was in shock. She would barely speak.
'She felt guilty because Ludovic died for her. She just kept repeating his name again and again.'
Greg Lima, 37, a technician and acrobat, was a good friend of several of the victims, particularly Hyacinthe Koma.
'I had been sitting and chatting to Hyacinthe for three hours before he was killed,' he said. 'He didn't want to go to the birthday party, he wanted to meet a girl instead. But the others said "Come on, come on", and persuaded him.
'He went. And a few hours later he was dead.'
The friends told of their memories as ISIS issued a chilling new video warning that countries taking part in air strikes against Syria will suffer the same fate as Paris.
In the footage, gun-wielding jihadis claimed they will attack Washington D.C. next.
The specific threat against the US capital emerged as CIA director John Brennan warned that more atrocities will be committed against the West by the Islamist terror group.
But the message did nothing to distract the minds of a mourning nation. This afternoon, at 12pm, the bells tolled outside the café, which is a short walk from the fated La Belle Equipe café, and the staff and local community gathered outside to pay their respects.
This was a long way from the high profile memorial services held at the Notre Dame cathedral, at the Place de la Republique and elsewhere.
Apart from MailOnline, no media were present. This was an intimate moment for a close-knit community united in sorrow.
PARIS MASSACRE: WHAT WE KNOW SO FAR ABOUT THE DEADLIEST TERROR ATTACK TO HIT EUROPE IN A DECADE
At least 129 people are dead, and another 352 injured, after three teams of jihadis struck the Stade de France football stadium, a handful of bars and cafes, and then finally the Bataclan concert hall.
FIRST TWO ATTACKS: STADE DE FRANCE
- The attacks began at 9.20pm at the Stade de France where the French football team was hosting Germany in an international friendly.
- The game was being watched by 80,000 spectators, among them was President Francois Hollande who had to be evacuated from the stadium.
- Ahmed Almohammad, 25, from Syria approached the stadium with a match ticket. He was turned away from Gate D after being frisked by a security guard.
- He backed away from the gate and detonated his vest, killing one other person. A passport was found near his body.
- A second suicide bomber, Bilal Hadfi, 20, blew himself up near Gate H at 9.30pm. No one else was reported killed. Hadfi is said to have fought with ISIS in Syria.
THIRD ATTACK: LE PETIT CAMBODGE AND LE CARILLON BAR
- At 9.25pm a separate team of gunmen arrived in a Black Seat and attacked diners at popular Cambodian restaurant Le Petit Cambodge and Le Carillon bar in the trendy Canal Saint-Martin area of eastern Paris, killing 15. The gunmen were using Kalashnikov AK-47 assault rifles.
Timeline of events: Eight terrorists carried out the devastating attacks on Friday night, leaving 129 people dead and another 352 injured
FOURTH ATTACK: LA CASA NOSTRA PIZZERIA AND LA BELLE EQUIPE BAR
- The same unit then drove about 500 yards to La Casa Nostra pizzeria and opened fire on diners on the terrace of the restaurant, killing at least five people.
- From there, the militants drove around a mile south-east – apparently past the area of the Bataclan concert venue – to launch another attack, this time on La Belle Equipe bar in Rue de Charonne. At least 19 people died after the terrace was sprayed with bullets at 9.36pm The attackers then drove off.
FIFTH ATTACK: CAFÉ 'COMPTOIR VOLTAIRE'
- At 9.40pm, Ibrahim Abdeslam, 31, set off a suicide vest inside cafe 'Comptoir Voltaire' on the Boulevard Voltaire and close to the Bataclan theatre. He hired a black Seat car used in the attack, which was found later abandoned with three assault rifles, along with five full magazines. The killers had emptied 11 magazines, firing an estimated 330 rounds.
SIXTH ATTACK: BATACLAN MUSIC HALL
- At 9.40pm, the third group (believed to be three men and a woman) armed with AK-47s stormed the Bataclan music hall and began shooting members of the crowd. Survivors claim three blew themselves up and a fourth person was shot dead by police before they could detonate their bomb.
SEVENTH ATTACK: NEAR STADE DE FRANCE
- At around 10.15pm a third blast took place near the Stade de France, this time by a McDonald's restaurant on the fringes of the stadium. The boom caused terror among spectators who had already been attempting to flee the stadium following the first two explosions. The attacker who detonated his suicide vest was identified as a 20-year-old French man living in Belgium.
Tearful members of the public view flowers and tributes on the pavement near the scene of the concert hall massacre on Friday
AFTERMATH:
- On Saturday morning, ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks across Paris, saying 'eight brothers wearing explosive belts and carrying assault rifles' conducted a 'blessed attack on... Crusader France'.
- On Saturday morning, the world's most wanted man, Salah Abdeslam is stopped by French police along with two other men as he approached the Belgian border. He is released after he shows his ID and returns to the Jihadi hotspot of Molenbeek in Brussels where he vanishes.
- Belgian police launch several anti-terror raids after Abdeslam was identified as having rented a VW Polo used by the Bataclan killers which was found abandoned nearby.
- One of the Stade de France suspects was found carrying a Syrian passport under the name Ahmed Almohammad who travelled to France as a migrant through Greece on October 3. Ferry tickets reveal he travelled with another man named as Mohammed Almuhamed.
- However, the French minister of justice Christiane Taubira said on Sunday that the passport under the name Ahmed Almohammad was a fake.
- Omar Ismaël Mostefai, 29, from Courcouronnes, Paris was also named as a Bataclan suicide bomber. The petty criminal and father-of-one was known to police as a radical and had travelled to Algeria and Syria. He was identified by the fingerprint on a severed digit found after he detonated his suicide belt.
- Mostefai is believed to have been radicalised by a Belgian hate preacher of Moroccan descent claimed to have regularly preached at his mosque in South West France. His father, a brother and other family members have been held and are being questioned.
- The black Seat Leon used by the terrorists who murdered diners outside the Casa Nostra pizza restaurant and the La Belle Équipe cafe was found abandoned 20 minutes away in Montreuil with three AK-47s and 16 magazines - 11 of them empty.
- Seven people were detained in Belgium linked to the atrocities. Five are from the Molenbeek area of Brussels known as a 'den of terrorists'.
- Iraqi spies warned the West of an ISIS suicide bomber threat the day before the Paris atrocities, it was revealed on Sunday, as more details of major intelligence failures began to emerge. The US-led coalition in Syria was apparently told by Iraqi security sources that 24 extremists were involved in the terror operation planned in the ISIS capital Raqqa and it would involve 19 attackers including five others including bombmakers and planners. No detail was given of when or where an attack might take place.
- It has also emerged that Turkey's authorities foiled a plot to stage a 'Jihadi John revenge attack' in Istanbul - involving a high-profile British jihadist - on the same day as the deadly massacre in Paris.
- From as far back as August, France's authorities possessed information that militants were said to be planning attacks on French concert halls after a tip-off was received from a 30-year-old man who was detained on his way back from Syria.
- On Sunday night there were 42 people still said to be in intensive care in hospital following Friday's terrorist attacks.
Thousands lined the streets of Paris on Monday for a minute's silence to remember those killed in a wave of attacks on the city on Friday
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS:
- French and Belgian police are still hunting for three gunmen on the run, including Abdeslam, and an ISIS bombmaker likely to have made the suicide vests.
- An international arrest warrant has been issued for Abdeslam, 26, who is accused of renting a Volkswagen Polo used by the suicide bombers.
- It emerged on Sunday night that police found Abdeslam near the Belgian border early Saturday but let him go after he showed them his ID card. Officers pulled over the car being driven by Abdelslam on Saturday morning on the A2 motorway between Paris and Brussels. Two other men were also in the car.
- At the time, officers in Paris knew that Abdeslam had rented the car used by the killers which had been abandoned near the theatre but the information had not been transmitted to those responsible for conducting the border checks.
- On Sunday evening the French defence ministry announced that the country's warplanes had bombed Islamic State's stronghold in Syria's Raqa, destroying a command post and a training camp. Ten fighter jets were involved, dropping 20 bombs.
- French and Belgian police conducted 168 pre-dawn anti-terror raids on Monday, including a botched attempt to capture Abdeslam, who is still on the run. The raids took place at addresses in Brussels, Toulouse, Lyon, Grenoble, Calais and two suburbs of Paris. A rocket launcher, flak jackets, several pistols and a Kalashnikov assault rifle were among the cache of weapons seized in Lyon overnight.
- French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said 104 people had been placed under house arrest, while 23 suspects were detained for questioning.
- The mastermind behind the Paris terror attacks is named as one of ISIS' top executioners, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, 27, who even recruited his 13-year-old brother to fight with him in Syria.
- ISIS issue a chilling new video warning that countries taking part in air strikes against Syria will suffer the same fate as Paris and claimed they will attack Washington D.C. next.
Slaughter: Guillaume Le Dramp, 33, was one of the 19 gunned down in the night of terror in the Paris attacks
Victim: Hyacinthe Koma didn't want to go to the birthday meal because he wanted to go on a date with a woman, but was convinced to go by his friends
Already, the local people have raised more than €1,000 to go towards the bereaved families and a memorial to the victims.
'We feel sad and afraid,' said Lara, 31, who works at an architect's office nearby and was friends with many of the staff.
'Life continues but it's not the same. Everybody is going out, going to work, children are playing in the street, but you can see it in people's faces, everyone has red eyes.
'When you meet people in the street, it's difficult to look them in the eye. It is as if everyone is afraid they will start crying.'
Mothers cradled children as the bells sounded, and old men wiped tears from their eyes.
'I knew these girls so well. I came here for lunch every day,' said Thierry Garnier, 62, a local librarian, as he stared in disbelief at the photographs of the victims pinned to the door of the café.
'They were lovely girls, very expansive, always smiling. I feel like I have been hit in the stomach.'
Mourning: A group gathered together at the café this afternoon in an intimate celebration of the lives of those who they had lost in the horrific attack
Tribute: Hundreds of bouquets of flowers and colourful candles were placed outside La Belle Equipe, which is close to the Café des Anges, over the weekend
Too much: A woman breaks down in tears as she visits the cafe on the Rue de Charonne on Monday
Overcome: A woman crouches next to the tributes and appears to be overcome with the enormity of the tragic situation
Together: Three women support each other as they visit the cafe where 11 friends who worked together were gunned down as they sat side by side
Messages of support: French flags, balloons, posters and post-it notes all littered the scene outside La Belle Equipe as residents paid tribute to those who lost their lives
Confusion: A red rose with a note reading 'in the name of what?' was put through one of the bullet holes in the glass of the cafe
Memories: A woman posts a tribute on the cafe door among poignant photos of the dead
Uncomprehending: Customers and staff at the Café des Anges console each other this afternoon as they struggle to come to terms with their heartbreaking loss
Scene of sorrow: Mourners at the community gathering to mourn together this afternoon said that 'life continues, but it's not the same'
One elderly lady asked how many of the people in the pictures had been killed. When she was told that they all had perished, she took off her glasses and wept in disbelief.
As the minute's silence drew to a close, Grunberg, the manager, wiped his eyes and waved his staff back to work. They filed back into the café amid hugs and tears, and were soon getting on with the job despite their swollen eyes and grief-stricken faces.
'Today has been very hard,' added Romain Ranouil, 48, who works at a nearby restaurant and was involved with the rescue operation.
'My mind keeps flashing back to the scene where all those people were dead at the tables, their drinks still in their hands.
'They stayed like that all night before the police moved them. It is making it difficult for me to sleep.
'Paris will fight but we are afraid that this is just the beginning.'
Massacre: Victims of the attack lay on the pavement outside La Bell Equipe restaurant on Friday evening
Aftermath: Forensic police search for evidence outside the cafe on Friday night after the terrace was sprayed with bullets around 8.38pm GMT
Painstaking: A forensic officer carefully looks for evidence inside the cafe while bullet holes can be seen in the glass
Secure: Police officers keep an eye on the area, which includes the Café des Anges, on Friday night following the unprecedented terror attacks
The café is always busy. But today, many people made a special effort to dine here, as the local community came together in support.
At lunchtime, not a single table was available as diners crammed in to send a positive message to the café staff – and also to the terrorists.
'We came here for the one minute's silence for the poor innocents who were killed,' said father-of-one Rachid Nouavim, 54.
'Then we went to pay our respects at the Belle Equipe. After that, it was very touching. Everybody streamed back to eat at Café des Anges. It seemed obvious that we should eat here today.'
This was a microcosm of the mood in Paris three days after the attacks. Communities are fearful and filled with sadness, but at the same time Parisians are resolute and defiant.
Above all, they are determined that their way of life must go on.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3320630/Eleven-staff-friends-wiped-Caf-Angels-Paris-massacre.html#ixzz3rhg5cbsV
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