French counterterrorism prosecutors said on Tuesday that a foiled bomb plot against a Bank of America office in Paris may be linked to a pro-Iranian Islamist group suspected of carrying out similar attacks against Jewish targets in Britain, the Netherlands and Belgium.
In a statement, the National Antiterrorism Prosecutor’s Office said that three young men had been recruited by an older man to detonate a homemade incendiary device in front of the building in central Paris, and film the resulting explosion, in return for a payment of between 500 euros and 1,000 euros, or roughly $600 to $1,200.
The attack was foiled in part, the statement said, because the French police were tipped off about a propaganda video, posted on social media by the group, “Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiyya,” which threatened an attack on the Bank of America, accusing the bank of “serving Zionist and Israeli interests.”
“This foiled attack, thanks to police surveillance, appears to be potentially linked to the HAYI group, although this has not been formally established at this stage of the proceedings,” the prosecutor’s office said.
Investigators in multiple European countries are trying to determine whether Iran or one of its proxies is behind the group, which has promised future attacks if European countries did not distance themselves “from all American and Zionist interests, facilities, and what is affiliated with them.”
European security officials have warned that tensions over the joint U.S.-Israeli military campaign against Iran could lead to attacks on American and Israeli targets in Europe, even though European countries do not back the war and have rejected President Trump’s requests to get more deeply involved in it.
Among the targets of attacks have been two Jewish schools and several ambulances run by a Jewish charity. The French prosecutors, who said they were working with investigators across Europe, cited potential links between the Paris plotters and attacks in Amsterdam and Liège, Belgium. The prosecutors did not connect them to an arson attack in the Golders Green area of London that left several ambulances burned out.
The Paris attack was disrupted by police at about 3:20 a.m. on March 28, as one of the suspects was attempting to light the device at the building, in a fashionable district a few blocks from the Israeli embassy, as well as the Élysée Palace, where President Emmanuel Macron has his office and residence.
The police arrested the suspect, 17, but a second person, who was filming him, fled. The prosecutor’s office said the device, consisting of a cardboard cylinder with a high-powered explosive and gasoline, “could have generated a large fireball several meters in diameter at the moment of explosion.”
Police later arrested two other 16-year-olds and one adult. A second adult was detained but released because of lack of evidence. The prosecutor’s office said all the suspects denied having “terrorist intent.”
The adult told investigators that he had been recruited over a social media messaging service to plant the device in front of Bank of America as part of a “personal vendetta.” The device was delivered to his home, he said, by a person he did not know.
The plotters had planned to ignite the device early on March 27, prosecutors said, but were thwarted by a truck parked in front of the building. Two of the three young men returned the next night to try again.
The prosecutor’s office said it planned to charge them with “criminal conspiracy to commit terrorist acts,” as well as manufacturing an explosive device “in connection with a terrorist enterprise.” None of the minors have criminal records, the prosecutor’s office said. The adult has a 2005 conviction for drug trafficking.
Days before the attack, Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamiyya had posted a video on its Telegram channel, threatening the bank with what it called a “final warning.” It showed the location of the building on a map and its facade with the words “the targeted location” superimposed on it.
In another video posted on the channel later the same day, the group claimed responsibility for the fire in London that destroyed the ambulances operated by a Jewish charity, which were parked outside a synagogue.
On Wednesday, three people were arrested on suspicion of carrying out that attack. The Metropolitan Police Service said in a statement that the suspects, aged 17, 19 and 20, had been detained in east London. The youngest is a dual citizen of Britain and Pakistan while the older two are British. Two other men were arrested but later released on bail.
British officials have not formally declared the fire a terrorist attack. But the commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, Mark Rowley, said last week that the force was investigating the Islamist group’s claim of responsibility for the fire, and described the group as having “potential Iranian state links.”
Mark Landler is the Paris bureau chief of The Times, covering France, as well as American foreign policy in Europe and the Middle East. He has been a journalist for more than three decades.
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