French police ‘prevented terror attack’ on Paris gay bar
French police thwarted a planned terror attack on a gay bar in Paris, it has been revealed.
French Interior Minister Gerard Collomb revealed the news while speaking to a committee of the National Assembly.
Mr Collomb revealed that security officers had foiled the bomb attack, which had been planned for August 22, and would have targeted gay bars in the capital.
He said the terrorists had a “plan of violent action” targeting “Parisian nightclubs and in particular gay clubs”.
The news comes after a string of terror attacks linked to the so-called Islamic State (ISIS) across Europe.
According to The Local, the official said it was among a number of attacks prevented in 2017. No specific details were given of the foiled attacks, which had not been made public until now.
Another plot targeted an air force training school, while a third attack was planned on a barracks, a police station or a supermarket.
Paris Pride (Photo by SYLVAIN THOMAS/AFP/Getty Images)
Mr Collomb said: “The threat remains high.
“What [ISIS] wants is to divide the national community and create clashes between French people. This is the trap into which we must not fall.”
ISIS has been known to target the LGBT community across the world, most notably in the attack on the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, USA.
911 recordings made public in the wake of the Pulse shooting revealed that terorrist Omar Mateen, who killed 49 people in the attack on the Florida gay bar, had pledged allegiance to ISIS and its leaders.
The revelations come as France’s President Macron seeks to expand the country’s anti-terror laws, giving authorities a string of new powers to clamp down on suspected terrorists.
Thousands of LGBT people have been displaced in Iraq and Syria, as the terrorist group known as ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria)
continues to actively target and execute gay men.
Gory clips, dozens of which have been released over several years, feature men accused of homosexuality being thrown from rooftops.
A recent report from the Human Rights Campaign highlighted how men alleged to have sex with men are hunted down by ISIL, targeted on social media and subjected to extreme violence.
Among the vicious attacks: ISIL has tied nooses around these men’s necks and dragged them behind trucks, burned them alive, thrown them off buildings and stoned them to death.
The report states: “ISIL has unleashed a reign of terror against civilians and vulnerable minorities living in areas it has seized, including barbarous violence against LGBTQ people.
“ISIL’s extreme ideology is interpreted by its followers to require the death penalty for those who engage in sexual relations outside of heterosexual marriage, including same-sex sexual relations.”
Responding to reported executions of gay men by ISIS last year, Stonewall said: “The reports coming out of Iraq and Syria are horrific and yet another reminder of the dangers posed by ISIS to anyone who doesn’t conform to their view of the world.
“ISIS are not just a threat to gay people, but a whole range of groups who simply seek to exercise their fundamental human right to be themselves.”
