Charlie Hebdo attacks prompt wild conspiracy theories

Millions of people marched in unity against Islamist extremism this weekend following the deaths of 17 people in Paris – but conspiracy theorists have other ideas about who was to blame. Some of the theories, as expected, come from anonymous sources on the internet, but others come from people holding positions of power...

Islamophobia to blame

Turkish prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu was among those marching in Paris on Sunday, but the next day Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan told a press conference that the wrong people were being blamed, reports the Financial Times. "The duplicity of the West is obvious. As Muslims we have never sided with terror or massacres: racism, hate speech, Islamophobia is behind these massacres," he told reporters. "The culprits are clear: French citizens undertook this massacre and Muslims were blamed for it."

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Israel behind the massacres

Still in Turkey and Melih Gokcek, the mayor of Ankara, had a different theory. He claimed that Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service, was "definitely behind such incidents" in an effort to "boost enmity towards Islam". Two co-founders of the Free Gaza Movement made similar claims, suggesting that the attack was triggered by the French National Assembly's vote to urge the government to recognise the state of Palestine, reports website WND.

US staged terror attacks

Meanwhile, in Russia a few pro-Kremlin commentators tried to link the killings to the US. A front-page headline on Komsomolskaya Pravda, one of Russia's leading tabloids, asks: "Did the Americans stage the terror attack in Paris?" The newspaper interviewed a political scientist who suggested that US intelligence services were trying to punish France for dropping sanctions against Russia, reports the Daily Telegraph. "The views are not challenged by his interviewer, but treated as a straight analysis of the attacks," says the Telegraph.

Police officer death footage faked

Earlier this week, a fake BBC News website was set up claiming that the widely broadcast video footage showing the murder of a Paris policeman was staged. The story, with the headline "Doubts raised over Charlie Hebo footage", appeared on the website bbc-news.co.uk, which is no longer online, reports Press Gazette. The story claimed that the apparent Charlie Hebdo attack was perpetrated "by the CIA and/or Mossad in a 'psy-ops' exercise to rouse hatred against Islam and support for what has been so far a failing campaign in Iraq, Syria and the Middle East".