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Terrorists Killed in Two French Police Raids; One Remaining Paris Terrorist Suspect Still At Large; Paris Terrorist Suspect Reportedly Former Roommate with Underwear Bomber; Search Continues for Downed AirAsia Plane's Black Box

Aired January 10, 2015 - 10:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

MICHAEL SMERCONISH, CNN HOST: Thank you so much for joining me. CNN's live breaking news coverage continues with Christi Paul and Victor Blackwell.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is CNN breaking news.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A man is inside the supermarket. He supposedly has hostages, as many as five.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A column of police vans heading in the direction of the shooting.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We didn't know there was even a second suspect let alone a female.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There is an early indication that the operation may be finished.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The mayor is telling CNN that the two brothers are dead.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Civilians have been seen leaving the scene of the store. The hostage-taker is dead and the hostages are alive. The female suspect is still on the loose.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

VICTOR BLACKWELL, CNN ANCHOR: Also breaking news, an 18-year-old who turned himself in shortly after the Paris attacks has been released. And now there is this intense search for Hayat Boumediene, the woman you see on your screen, after twin hostage standoffs in Paris. Three men taken down by police.

CHRISTI PAUL, CNN ANCHOR: But a woman wanted for her part in the attack that has left the city reeling, she's out there. Take a look at her picture. And she is considered armed and extremely dangerous.

So glad to have you with us this morning. I'm Christi Paul.

BLACKWELL: Good morning. And I'm Victor Blackwell. Let's take you live to Paris now, the French capital, trying to heal this morning after three days of terror.

PAUL: Yes. Our Jake Tapper is in Paris outside the headquarters of the "Charlie Hebdo" magazine. Jake, what's it like there this morning?

JAKE TAPPER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It's really remarkable. All day, Christi and Victor, crowds have been gathering and paying tribute here at the offices of "Charlie Hebdo." You have to remember that not only was this magazine, this newspaper well known, but a lot of the cartoonists were celebrities. One of them, Cabu, used to be the host of a children's television show in the 1970s. So a Frenchman I was speaking with earlier talked about how he used to watch that show when he was a kid and then he grew up and would read his cartoons.

It's very moving here. People coming, paying tribute, hundreds and hundreds of people throughout the day, thousands even, leaving flowers, leaving letters. We say a little girl writing "Je suis Charlie," leaving that little note. People drawing cartoons and taping them. There was a cellist here playing. People very, very moved, very, very emotional. But to move on with this story, more than 1,000 French troops are fanning out across Paris and the surrounding suburbs right now. They're ramping up security as there is this all out manhunt, or woman-hunt, continuing for the one know remaining suspect in these terrorist attacks in Paris. Take a look at this face, we'll show to you. That's 26-year-old Hayat Boumediene. She's on the run. She's quite possibly the world's most wanted woman right now.

She's the alleged accomplice of terror suspect Amedy Coulibaly who died in a hail of gunfire when police stormed that Paris kosher market yesterday where he was holding more than a dozen people hostage and where he killed four innocent people in that market. Police say Coulibaly gunned down those civilians at the market. We're learning their names now. They were Johan (ph) Cohen (ph), Joha (ph) Fatah (ph), Billy (ph) Braham (ph), and Francois (ph) Michelle (ph) Ada (ph).

Besides the terrorist Coulibaly two other suspect brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi, of course, the ones who allegedly carried out the attack here at "Charlie Hebdo," they died in a blaze of bullets yesterday. We are learning that Said Kouachi may have briefly lived with the infamous underwear bomber, Umar Abdul Mutallah, in Yemen. In 2011 a journalist who spoke with CNN said he met Kouachi, and Kouachi said that in 2011 that in previous year he met with and roomed with even perhaps Abdul Mutallah. That is of course in Yemen where Said Kouachi got weapons training allegedly from Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. That's at least according to one U.S. official.

Abdul Mutallah is currently serving a life sentence after trying to blow up an airliner in the United States on Christmas Day in 2009 by putting explosives in his underwear. Thankfully he failed and he is now doing life in prison.

As French police continue to search for this fourth terror suspect, Hayat Boumediene, there are growing concerns that she may at this point be trying to leave the country. And CNN's Brian Todd has more details on the missing terror suspect. Brian?

BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Jake, we know the suspect killed in the storming of that Paris market, Amedy Coulibaly, was in the same circle of terrorists as the Kouachi brothers who attacked the magazine. But it's Coulibaly's girlfriend who authorities are tracking now, and the question is, just how dangerous is she?

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

TODD: It's now her face alone on wanted posters. Twenty-six-year-old Hayat Boumediene is an accomplice of suspected terrorist Amedy Coulibaly, who is connected to the two brothers who attacked "Charlie Hebdo" magazine. Coulibaly was killed by police as they stormed the kosher market in Paris seen in this new video. There is now a massive dragnet for Hayat Boumediene who police say is a suspect with Coulibaly in Thursday's shooting in southern Paris that killed a policewoman.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In an all-points bulletin out they are looking everywhere. They are going to set up a series of checkpoints. This suspect is going to try to find someone who can help her.

TODD: A western intelligence source tells CNN Boumediene lived with Coulibaly and the two once traveled to Malaysia together.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We don't know if she was involved in sort ome type of cover or more likely she was involved because she was radicalized along with her boyfriend and got sucked in working together at some level.

TODD: The French newspaper "Le Monde" published these photos apparently of Boumediene with Coulibaly. CNN cannot independently verify the authenticity of the photos. "Le Monde" reports Boumediene once told police she and Coulibaly had practiced firing cross-bows in the countryside of the central France as apparently shown in these pictures. Hayat Boumediene had been in a relationship with Coulibaly since 2010 according to "Le Monde" and she was interviewed by counterterrorism police that same year. Analysts say while the number of female jihadists is growing, their male counterparts still consider them valuable cover.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Many of these people now have wives, have girlfriends. That enables them to do things they might not otherwise be able to do. You don't appear to be a lone, young angry man. You are walking with a woman.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TODD: We learned from the Paris prosecutor more solid information connecting Hayat Boumediene and her boyfriend to the Kouachi brother who attacked the magazine. The prosecutor says authorities are aware of more than 500 phone calls placed between Boumediene and the wife of suspect Cherif Kouachi. Jake?

TAPPER: Brian Todd, thank you so much. Hayat Boumediene managed to escape from the grocery store in Paris, officials say, as French police stormed the building. Let's go to CNN senior international correspondent Fred Pleitgen. Fred, what are officials doing to try to catch Boumediene?

FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: First of all, they are trying to find her, Jake. And that's easier said than done, because one of the things that we have to keep in mind is that it was only the police union here in France who said they believe that she was here on the scene at the kosher grocery store when that raid went down and somehow managed to escape in all the commotion afterwards.

There are various other experts who say they don't believe she was here. Also in light of the fact that many of the hostages taking out of this building after the raid were immediately brought into some police custody or police van to make sure everyone was accounted for. And there are many people who believe there is really no way she could have been on the scene and escaped. But again, no one really knows at this point.

What the French officials are doing right now is the obviously have a dragnet going. They are talking to people she was associated with. One of the things that one of our crew saw that in the Paris suburb in the south of Paris where she on Coulibaly lived before all this happened, they said there is a lot of police down there obviously also asking questions of associates.

One of the things that the French police also did when they were looking for the Kouachi brothers is obviously they talked to family members. They talked to friends. They talked to other people who might have contact and who might possibly give shelter to these people. No doubt they will be doing the same thing.

But one of the things that Bian mentioned is obviously very key to all of this, and that is the difficulty of tracing someone here in Europe. Of course Europe for a while has an open border policy, and that means if she manages to get a car and get out of Paris unseen she could drive all the way to Turkey without having any sort of border she would have to go because all the borders are open until then. So it's very difficult operation, one where the French authorities certainly are under a lot of time pressure to apprehend Hayat Boumediene as soon as possible to, first of all, put an end to this. And second of all because she could travel very far without having to go through any border controls and get far very easily, Jake.

TAPPER: Fred, in that supermarket siege, four of the hostages were tragically killed. But thankfully 15 were rescued. What are the rescued hostages saying about their experience?

PLEITGEN: Well, a lot of them are obviously very traumatized. There's a lot of them who say that they were obviously in a lot of fear. One of the things we keep hearing again and again is what stoked a lot of that fear. Obviously when Amedy Coulibaly went into the store he immediately started opening fire. There is one eyewitness account that says he told people that he was, quote, "not afraid to die," and they knew important that he knew that this was going to be his last stand and that obviously made him all the more dangerous. There's varying accounts as to how many of these four hostages were shot immediately, some say two were shot immediately, and some possibly subsequently. There were some people who were in the supermarket however, who managed to escape from him by hiding in a cooling room. And I want to listen in to what one of these people had to say.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LASSANA BATHILY, GROCERY STORE WORKER TAKEN HOSTAGE (via translator): When people came downstairs running I went toward the cold room. I opened the door and many people got into the cold room with me. I switched off the light and switched off the freezer. He asked us to all come upstairs otherwise he would kill everyone who was downstairs. I asked my colleagues what they thought? Should we go up or stay here? With me there was one person with a two-year-old baby. When I switched off the light in the cold room I closed the door. I told them "You stay calm. I am the one who is going to go out." I took the elevator and went upstairs.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PLEITGEN: So hiding inside a fridge and a freezer to try to escape a man who was heavily armed, Jake, that's how desperate some of these people were.

And I also want to mention, we're talking about how the city is trying to heal. Actually right before we went to air the imam of the mosque came here to lay down flowers and pay respects. That of course is a sign that the Muslim also wants to hear along with the Jewish community that was so savagely attacked here at this kosher store. The imam is someone who is very moderate. He tries to fight against extremism. He is also one of the first ones who came to where you are right after that attack on "Charlie Hebdo" happened and laid down flowers there, Jake.

TAPPER: All right, Fred, thank you so much.

Still to come, new details are raising questions about you how terrorist Cherif Kouachi flew under the radar of French officials and carried out this week's tragic massacre at the offices right here "Charlie Hebdo" magazine. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back to special edition of CNN Newsroom. I'm Jake Tapper live in Paris. Following the breaking news on the active hunt for Hayat Boumediene, the surviving terror suspect in this week's attacks, we're also getting some new details that raise questions about just how terror suspect Cherif Kouachi was able to fly under the radar of French officials for all these years despite his known associations and activities with jihad and terrorism. CNN's Drew Griffin has that story.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) DREW GRIFFIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: These are disturbing details emerging from court records involving the younger brother that I think will a raise a lot of questions about what the French intelligence officials knew and perhaps even dropped the ball on what appears to be a very dangerous person.

In 2005 Cherif Kouachi was caught by French authorities just as he was trying to travel to Syria in an effort to join the fight against American soldiers in Iraq. In his own words from a deposition in this 400-page court report, Kouachi describes how his perceived injustices in Iraq drive his hatred and willingness to die.

"I was ready to go and die in battle. I got this idea when I saw the injustices shown by television on what was going on over there in Iraq. I am speaking about the torture that the Americans have inflicted on the Iraqis." Kouachi is one of several men radicalized and recruited at this now demolished parish mosque. A now incarcerated radical cleric preached hatred here and told young men they had a religious duty to kill.

According to court records Cherif committed himself to this idea during Ramadan in 2004. He told his friends he was going to Syria to fight. Cherif says he came to the idea of jihad through Farid Benyettou, the well-known spiritual leader who has been long associated in France with supporting jihad and terrorism. The documents say when police interviewed his accomplices, they stated Kouachi said he was ready to firebomb and to destroy Jewish shops in Paris. When officials confronted Kouachi, documents say he told police something else. "That's not exactly what I said. I don't hide having proposed anti-Semitic ideas, but I would note that I never really would have done that."

The documents said Cherif says the wise leaders in Islam called upon him and his friends and that if they die as martyrs in jihad they would go to heaven. Under a section called "Motivation of influence" the prosecuting documents say for him, Kouachi, any place on earth where there is such injustice is justification for jihad. What was going on in Iraq was in his eyes such an injustice.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

GRIFFIN: How could a person with this kind of record, this kind of detailed hatred in French documents be allowed to slip through the cracks? One former counterintelligence official from Paris told us they were far too many of them, he said, and far too few of us. But, Victor and Christi, given all that we know now about this group, these three men that were involved in these attacks, I think the French population is going to be asking many more questions, many more questions about the intelligence gathering and the lack of execution that was done before they could carry out this attack.

TAPPER: Drew Griffin, thank you.

Terrorism expert Jean Charles Brisard joins me now. Thank you so much. Why do you think the Kouachi brothers were able to fly under the radar and pull off something like this when they were known by authorities who had interests in terrorism, in fact one of them served time for recruiting terrorists to fight in Iraq?

JEAN CHARLES BRISARD, AUTHOR, "ZARQAWI, THE NEW FACE OF AL-QAEDA": We knew that they knew each other for a long time, more than 10 years now. Some of them you saw that were in jail and made their term. When they were out there was nothing much we could do against them. We put them under surveillance and evaluation at some point decided they were no more a threat because these guys simply decided to hide their intentions, to cover up their intention. And it's very difficult in terms -- even with civilians to detect anybody hiding his intentions. That is probably what happened. It was not a sleeper cell. It was a cell that for some time disappeared totally and decided not to move and to act, and suddenly, because of the international context, decided to act upon and to do something.

TAPPER: Jean Charles, do you think the four suspects worked alone in this week's attacks? Or do you think they are just the tip of the iceberg, there are many others out there and others who gave him assistance? It seems likely, for instance, that Hayat Boumediene has had help in hiding.

BRISARD: Yes, well, it's still very difficult to say. We know there were at least three of them. We are now hearing sometimes conflicting reports about their troubles abroad, whether they were for some time in Yemen. One of them, at least I hear also from my sources that one of them was in Syria. One of them claimed he was Islamic State. And others state he was acting on behalf of Al Qaeda in the Arabic Peninsula. All this will be outlined by the investigation, whether they were inspired, incited, or directed by a group to act the way they did.

TAPPER: The cousin of the woman killed here in the "Charlie Hebdo" attack, she said that the cousin says that religion played a role. Take a listen to this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SOPHIA BRAMLY, COUSIN KILLED IN "CHARLIE HEBDO" ATTACK: They spared all the women, and she was the only one killed. And she was the only one Jewish. And also when I talked to her brother last night he was telling me that she had been getting phone calls for a while. And -- anonymous phone calls obviously. And I can't say that it was the same team of people, but the calls were saying basically, dirty Jew, you should stop working for "Charlie Hebdo" otherwise we are going to kill you. So if you put two and two together it seems like, yes, she was definitely killed because she was Jewish.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: How much do you think anti-Semitism was a motivating factor in these attacks?

BRISARD: I think the view was jihadists, they wanted to die as a martyr. They decided to launch the assault themselves before the police did. It is a clear indication of they were in the mood of the jihadist when they did the attack. They targeted "Charlie Hebdo" not only for the symbol it was due to the cartoonists, but also they attacked more generally democracy. Not only Jews, not only any other community, but the democracy as such. And similarly as they did before in the past, Madrid and London.

TAPPER: Jean Charles Broussard, merci beaucoup.

A special edition of Newsroom continues after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PAUL: Before we head back to Paris we do want to get to the search for the remaining suspects in this week's terrorists attacks, too, but there is another story that we have to talk about, a developing story this morning.

BLACKWELL: Yes, the search crews that are one step closer possibly to answering some of the questions about the crash AirAsia flight 8501. Earlier today crews were able to lift the tail section of the plane off the sea floor and load it into an a waiting ship.

PAUL: CNN's David Melko joins us live from Jakarta. David, I can imagine the emotions as they were pulling this thing up on the ship.

DAVID MELKO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, certainly, Christi and Victor, applause and cheers from members on board one of the search vessels out there as they watch this unfold. Certainly not a celebration though. An achievement of three days of the tricky work in underwater conditions with currents that divers said had them sometimes fluttering like flags. When you see the tail section raised onto that ship it really drives home the loss here.

There 162 passengers onboard that flight. The tail section hoisted up inch by inch using a crane, also giant balloons. What's interesting is when it kind of opens up on the deck, the portion of the tail, the vertical stabilizer, with the logo attached to the rear, the fuselage. You see some windows on the sides, but in the middle where there were seats and once people, there was just nothing. Images also showing at least one search worker kind of combing through, potentially looking for the black boxes. At this point from search officials there is no confirmation that they have found anything in the tail section that will help unlock the mystery.

BLACKWELL: All right, David, so the black boxes were not connected to this part of the tail. Tell us how you believe they will be able to go back and search again. This is a difficult area. Although it's shallow there is a lot of muck there in this part of the sea.

MELKO: Yes, Victor, that is right. I'm sure they are talking about moving the tail to shore and taking a closer look, but the fact that they are considering the underwater operation to continue to be a priority now indicating that they don't think they have found anything. One of the investigates here for the NTSC, which is kind of like the NTSB in the United States, saying they thought they heard possible pings again. There were some on Friday and now again on Saturday about a half mile from the tail section. The plan now to send divers into the water with underwater microphones, see if they can pick up the sounds of these pings. The batteries on the pingers have about two and a half weeks left, so still a little bit of time. Complicating the operation, though, is the number of divers, the number of ships in the area. All that can create tricky underwater conditions and acoustics in the Java Sea. Even though it's 100 feet deep, even though they know where they tail is, it could still be some tough work in the next few days.

What we are hearing though from search officials, Victor and Christi, is a shift in tone. They are optimistic they are in the right place, they are on the right track, and that they will get results soon.

PAUL: We certainly hope so.

BLACKWELL: All right, David Melko in Jakarta for us. David, thank you so much.

TAPPER: I'm Jake Tapper in Paris, and I'm outside the place where the horrific terrorist attack on "Charlie Hebdo," the French satirical magazine, took place Wednesday. It has become a place of mourning, a place of honoring the victims of that horrible attack. People have been coming here by the thousands all day putting flowers, leaving notes. We saw a little girl writing a note saying "Je suis Charlie," "I am Charlie," a message of solidarity.

People have been drawing cartoons and posting them around here, leaving them by the flowers. A cellist has been playing for at least an hour, a fitting and moving memorial as people come and honor their brothers and one sister who were killed in this horrific terrorist attack on Wednesday and the ensuing attacks as well.

We're following breaking news right now. The Kouachi brothers and along with another suspect linked to the same terror cell are dead after French police carried out two terror raids yesterday. Now French police are searching for this woman, 26-year-old Hayat Boumediene. Here is what we know about her. Authorities believe she was the accomplice of the Amedy Coulibaly in a hostage-taking incident in a kosher grocery store yesterday in which Coulibaly killed four innocent civilians. Coulibaly himself was killed when police stormed the market. He seemed to run right into the police bullets.

Now police say that they believe Boumediene was in the grocery store and escaped amidst the chaos. She also was previously wanted in as a suspect in the shooting death of a French policewoman on Thursday.

Now, earlier today French President Francois Hollande held an emergency security meeting with top government and law enforcement officials to discuss how to better secure France.

The town in northern France where two of the terrorist suspects were killed is slowly getting back to normal today, or at least as normal as it can get at least. CNN senior international correspondent Jim Bitterman has more now on how the suspects were killed. Jim?

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIM BITTERMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The police are still guarding the entrance to the factory here where in fact they headed for the two terrorists yesterday after a police assault, a very violent police assault on this factor involving helicopters and dozens and dozens of special forces that charged into the factory. Here is a look at how that went.

(GUNFIRE)

BITTERMAN: During that standoff with police yesterday, in fact the town of Dammartin virtually closed down. The schools were empty, shops were closed. People were told to stay away. And now today it's gradually coming back to life. The mayor told me that just getting things back to normal is first priority.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That is what we want to do now. Come back to the normal stage.

BITTERMAN: Getting back to normal may also mean, however, raising questions the way authorities handled this entire terror episode, how it was these terrorists were not under better surveillance, how they were able to acquire weapons.

One of the people at the mayor's office this morning confronted the mayor just on that issue and wanted to know exactly why this whole drama had to unfold in the way it did. Those questions are going to be asked a lot over the next few days here, especially after when we get past the march of unity taking place tomorrow across the nation involving hundreds and hundreds of thousands of French who wanted to show that they're unified against terrorism.

Jim Bitterman, Dammartin-en-Goele, France.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

TAPPER: Our thanks to Jim Bitterman. We of course will be bringing that unity rally to you live tomorrow on CNN.

There are new links surfacing between the Paris terrorist suspects and an Al Qaeda affiliate. The link suggests the suspects may not have acted alone when they brutally slaughtered more than 17 people over the last three days. We will talk about all of that coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back. I'm Jake Tapper live in Paris, France, outside the office of "Charlie Hebdo" where that horrific terrorist attack on Wednesday took place in which 12 people were slaughtered. Five other innocent people have been killed in the following days. And in the United States, cities across the country are ramping up security. The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security have already issued warnings, urging Americans to be on high alert. Let's bring in CNN's Sara Ganim in New York. Sara, first what can you tell us about these new warnings?

SARA GANIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Jake, the FBI and Department of Homeland Security issuing a bulletin to law enforcement in the U.S. noting the sophistication of the attacks in Paris. This according to a law enforcement source who read the report. The bulletin says that the attacks had a degree of sophistication and training that have not been seen in recent small armed attacks. It talked about how the shooters handled weapons with familiarity and competency, and how they appeared to have been trained.

It also references one of the shooters claimed an association with Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. To be clear, Jake, there is no specific information of a threat in the U.S. but the bulletin reminds law enforcement that Al Qaeda and its affiliates are the focused on attacking aviation, mass transit, government personnel, military, and certain private sector threats. Jake?

TAPPER: All right, Sara, that is the FBI response and the DHS response on the national level. What about on the city level?

GANIM: Right. In major U.S. cities, Boston, Chicago, L.A., and including here in New York, there's been no change in threat levels. The NYPD has already been extra vigilant in the last few weeks after the murder of two officers just sitting in their parole cars. To be clear, that was not linked to terrorism, but the NYPD tells us that after the attack in France, heavily armed officers were placed at sensitive areas like the French consulate. The same thing is happening in Boston. But like I said, no city has raised their threat levels because of what happened in France, Jake.

TAPPER: Sarah Ganim, thank you so much.

Listen now to what a man claiming to be Amedy Coulibaly, who was the man who held up the supermarket, took hostages, killed four innocent people, and ultimately was killed by French police, listen to what he told French television yesterday before police took him down in that kosher market.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (via translator): Are you in touch with the two brothers who perpetrated the attack at "Charlie Hebdo."

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (via translator): Yes we spoke and we're synchronized.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (via translator): Are you still in touch with them? Are you on the phone with them?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (via translator): No.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (via translator): You are synchronized in which way? Are there other events planned? Do you have a scenario in mind?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (via translator): No, we just synchronized at the beginning. They started "Charlie Hebdo" and I started the policeman.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

TAPPER: He is also suspected in the shooting death of a French policewoman on Thursday. Let's bring in terrorism expert Jeffrey Simon in Los Angeles. He's the author of "Lone Wolf Terrorism, Understanding the Growing Threat." He's also a visiting lecturer in the political science department of UCLA. Jeff, thanks for joining us. We know at least one of the Kouachi brothers, Said Kouachi, went to Yemen, got training there from Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula. The third suspect, though, also allegedly told French television that he also trained with Al Qaeda in Yemen. Does this make them different from other lone wolf terrorists we've seen who were inspired but don't seem to have any direct training, such as the Ottawa shooter?

JEFFREY SIMON, AUTHOR, "LONE WOLF TERRORISM": Yes it does. We usually think of the lone wolf in terms of the individual terrorist with no outside training, assistance, and so forth. So in this case we still don't know yet the extent of the training and the links with Al Qaeda in and Arabian Peninsula with these attacks, but they are different than what happened in Ottawa and in Australia.

TAPPER: Is this the new normal of terrorism, either lone wolves or individuals who have been trained kind of in smaller groups carrying out smaller attacks, no less horrific to those involved but not the kind of spectacular in a horrific way attack that we saw on 9/11?

SIMON: Yes, I see it as the new wave of terrorism. We have to remember, though, that Al Qaeda and other groups are still capable of perpetrating large scale attacks. But they are getting a lot of effect with these type of incidents.

And really what ties them all together, the Ottawa, the Paris, the Australia, is, as just pointed out, the simplicity of the operation. Now, the terrorists in Paris were trained. They were very efficient when they went about their killing. But if you think about it, anybody could have penetrated that building -- there wasn't that much security -- and gone about the killing of the people at the news magazine and it would have had the same effect. It's really showing how small-scale attacks, and you can include the Boston Marathon bombing in that case because there all the brothers did was set off pressure cooker bombs at the finish line of the marathon and walked away. So this is becoming a new trend in terrorist attacks.

TAPPER: When you look at the details of what happened, are you under the impression that the Kouachi brothers thought that they were going to go down in a hail of bullets on Wednesday near where I am at the "Charlie Hebdo" site? The reason I ask is because I was talking to a former FBI official who said that the getaway was very different in terms of how efficient it was than the actual terrorist attack, and that he thought -- he hypothesized they thought they were going to die here where I am.

SIMON: Yes that's a possibility because they really didn't seem to think out the escape route that carefully, having to have to hold up a gas station to try to get some gas and things along those lines. But wherever the end point was going to be I don't think they thought they were going to be captured alive.

TAPPER: Jeffrey Simon, thank you so much. We appreciate it.

New details about one of the suspects in the attack on "Charlie Hebdo." Elder brother Said Kouachi may have lived with the infamous underwear bomber while training in Yemen. We'll tell you all about that coming up next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TAPPER: Welcome back. I'm Jake Tapper live in Paris, France, as French police frantically search for the remaining terror suspect Hayat Boumediene. We are learning more about one of the other suspects.

A Yemeni journalist tells CNN that Said Kouachi was roommates with the so-called underwear bomber who tried to blow up a plane on its way to Detroit on Christmas Day years ago. They say that they were roommates while they were training in Yemen. To discuss this I want to bring in Philip Mudd. He's a CNN counterterrorism analyst and a former CIA counterterrorism official. Phil, good to see you. If indeed he was roommates with the underwear bomber, what is the significance of that?

PHILIP MUDD, CNN COUNTERTERRORISM ANALYST: Boy, there are a lot of question that opens. Obviously, Jake, we have got to deal with the timeline here. That was six years ago. That is not the timeline we had for his training which was described earlier, which was I think 2011. So we have got to deal with the timeline issue.

But let's assume this is true. Let me give you two or three questions we've got to raise. First, did the underwear bomber who presumably went through some sort of plea agreement when he pled guilty to the attempt to take down the airliner in Detroit, did he ever talk about this? If not I hope he's undergoing some questioning today Saturday to say what happened? Why didn't you talk about this?

Number two, if these two were rooming in some sort of training camp, the one most significant question I would have is a question we can't answer because this fellow was dead, and that was who else was there? I can't believe there were only two people there, the underwear bomber and this fellow. What other westerner, French, German, Italian, Spanish, New York, Washington, who else was there?

And finally, Jake, I have a question that really mystifies me. Why did it take, whether it's 2011 training or 2009 training, why did it take four, five, six years to execute the operation? What happened in the interim? Why didn't they execute the operation more quickly? That's highly unusual.

TAPPER: So those are excellent questions. Do you think that right now at his super max Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is being questioned by U.S. counterterrorism official about Said Kouachi?

MUDD: I think he should be. If this information is accurate about the potential roommate, I would think someone is going right way to say not only what happened here with Kouachi, because that tragedy has happened, Jake. My first questions would have very little to do with this operation. My first questions would have to do with whether there is another group of people or an individual out there who might have been in the same facility. Who else is there? Now, there might some explanation for this. A simple one would be for

example if they were roommates they weren't using true names. They didn't know who the other one was. But still there are little factoids that can contribute to the intelligence mosaic. Was there an Algerian with a French accent in the room? What did he look like? When did he get here? Did he have any birthmarks? Did he have any scars? That kind of information if this story is accurate should have come out earlier, and if it didn't, I would be talking to the underwear bomber this morning, saying, hey, why didn't owe tell us? What happened?

TAPPER: What can law enforcement officials do to try to convince Abdulmutallab in the super max to share information? Is this the kind of thing where he gives information he might get a more comfortable cell? How does that work?

MUDD: It could be, but I don't know. He might have shared this information already. I've seen instances where people in training camps don't have a clear understanding of who else is in the camp with them. Again, if you have pretty good operational security in the camp, the people running the camp are going to say don't tell anybody else what your name is. You have a nom de guerre. My name is Joe, my name is John, my name is Mary. So it could be he shared this information before and it was simply too fragmentary to be able to draw a conclusion.

But one quick thing, Jake, here. It is really frustrating in the past day or so as an intelligence professional to hear people say, hey you guys, people like me who are in the business, whether you're French or American, missed something. You're stupid. When you are dealing with 5,000 or 10,000 cases and have only fragmentation information, it's like going into a physician in a hospital who is undergoing highly complex surgery every day saying why did you lose one out of 1,000 patients. You cannot follow in a free society with this kind of the fragmentary information.

Hey, there was an Algerian guy who might been French in a camp. And sure you can take that information and put it together in a mosaic and come up with perfect answers every time. That ain't the way this business works.

TAPPER: That's a forceful defense of the intelligence community and the difficult work it does. Philip Mudd, thank you so much. Our special coverage of the terror attacks continues from France right after this quick break.

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TAPPER: Welcome back to newsroom. I'm Jake Tapper live in Paris, France, right outside the offices of the French satire magazine "Charlie Hebdo" where obviously that horrific terrorist attack took place on Wednesday setting off a chain of event that have left at least 17 innocent people dead and three terrorists.

I want to take a look at some of images of emotion here as people, hundreds, thousands of them have been gathering around the memorial throughout the day to honor and mourn the victims of this tragedy. I'm Jake Tapper live in Paris.

BLACKWELL: If you could for us, you have covered the attack in Boston. You have covered unfortunately similar attacks like this before. Compare the mood there for us. And give us an idea what it feels like to be there, what you are hearing from French people.

TAPPER: It's very similar to what it was like in Boston afterward, although obviously the manhunt in Boston, the attack was I believe on a Monday, and it wasn't until Thursday night, Friday morning that that shootout took place. So it took a few more days than it took here. But it's the same type of thing, people sad, maybe even a little bit scared. But a determination, a real resolve, people coming together. It is that remarkable spirit of people -- of a quiet defiance, not wanting or being willing to be cowed by these miscreants, these terrorist who attempt to use our freedoms against us and try to take advantage of the fact that this is a pluralistic society. Go ahead. I'm sorry.

PAUL: I just wanted to ask you, you talk about this quiet defiance. It may not be so quiet tomorrow. As we look ahead to this unity rally, I understand there are several prime ministers from other countries that are going to be coming in to participate in that as well. What do you know about that event tomorrow, Jake.

TAPPER: Yes, there is going to be this unity rally here in Paris. Tens, if not hundreds of thousands if not more people are expected, including the Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov, the Turkish prime minister is expected as well, invited by French president Francois Hollande. In addition, the city of London on many of its landmarks will be showing the French tricolor national flag. It should be quite a memorable day. Back to you.

PAUL: All right, Jake Tapper, thank you so much for all your great live reporting from Paris this morning. We appreciate.

And thank you all of you for being us with. I'm Christi Paul.

BLACKWELL: I'm Victor Blackwell. Fredericka Whitfield will pick up our ongoing coverage of the terror attack and this ongoing hunt for the remaining suspect right after this.

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