God is depicted as a terrorist on magazine’s cover
One year ago this week, Charlie Hebdo – a satirical French magazine – was attacked by Islamist gunmen who burst into their office and shot dead 11 people.
The gunmen then went outside and killed a policeman on the street.
Charlie Hebdo, known for ridiculing religious and political leaders, lost many of its staff when their editorial meeting was interrupted with a peppering of bullets on 7th January 2015.
Over the next two days, co-ordinated attacks saw another five people slaughtered, four of which died during a siege at a Jewish supermarket in the east of Paris.
The message is clear on the cover of Charlie Hebdo’s anniversary edition – ‘the world has not moved on’.
The attacks on Charlie Hebdo were only the first in a flurry of attacks over the last 12 months; which included the slaughter of tourists in Tunisia where 38 people died, a downed Russian passenger jet in Egypt, the San Bernardino mass shootings and the Bataclan massacre in Paris where 130 people were killed.
The caption on the front cover of this month’s magazine reads: “The killer is still out there.”
The cartoon shows the bearded figure, referring to God, a gun on his back and the all-seeing eye on a triangle in the background. The cartoonist has splashed red blood over the character’s robes in a politically charged move.
Talking to the the BBC, the magazine’s editor, Gerard Biard said: “I don’t think anything changed since the 7th January [2015], except the emptiness we are suffering.
“We miss the people, the friends, the talent [but] we try to maintain the same spirit. I think we managed to.”
An editorial, released before the publication of the magazine on Wednesday, said that Charlie Hebdo would continue despite religious extremists who wanted to see it fold.
The magazine was defiant in its message: “They won’t be the ones to see Charlie die – Charlie will see them kick the bucket.”
On Sunday, a more public ceremony is planned at Place de la Republique where the President of France, François Hollande, will attend to plant a 10 metre high commemorative oak tree.
