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Hayat Boumeddiene, Sentenced to 30 Years, Believed Alive in Syria's Idlib Under HTS Control

Jan 9, 2025, 11:05 AM

Hayat Boumeddiene, the 36-year-old widow of Amedy Coulibaly who was involved in the January 2015 Paris attacks, including the Hypercacher attack where Coulibaly killed four Jewish shoppers and policewoman Clarissa Jean-Philippe, is believed to be still alive and living in Syria, according to the French National Anti-Terrorism Prosecutor's Office (Pnat). Boumeddiene, who fled France before the attacks, was sentenced in absentia to 30 years in prison in 2020 for her role in the terrorist activities. Recent intelligence suggests she is located in the Idlib province, controlled by the rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which now governs Syria following the fall of Bashar al-Assad. Testimonies from a jihad returnee, Sonia, indicate that Boumeddiene lived in Raqqa, the former capital of the Islamic State, and was provided with an apartment by ISIS. She reportedly remarried a Tunisian fighter and escaped from Kurdish forces in 2019.