The 2017 Cambrils terrorists had travelled to Paris the week before their August attack and had plotted to set off a truck bomb at the base of the Eiffel Tower, according to new information obtained by Spanish media.
The attackers, who killed 16 people last August in Barcelona and the town of Cambrils, are said to have travelled to the French capital a week before their attack and had already rented a large truck to carry out their bomb plot, Spanish newspaper La Vanguardia reports.
According to the paper, an accidental explosion which occurred several days before the terror attack had been caused by explosives that were originally meant to be placed in the truck and set off in Paris. A source claimed that nearly 450lbs of TATP, an explosive favoured by the Islamic State terror group, had been present in the plotters’ demolished apartment.
Investigators also looked into the internet history searches of the terrorists and found what they believed to have been potential targets as one man searched to see if the Barcelona football club was playing a game, and searched other targets such as the Sagrada Familia basilica which was revealed as a target last year.
The case bears a resemblance to information that was revealed about the 2016 Brussels attack last month. According to a captured French jihadist who had contact with senior members of Islamic State, the real target for the Brussels terrorists was not the airport but a nuclear power plant in France.
Jihadist Jonathan Geffroy confirmed suspicions that the Brussels attack had been rushed in response to the arrest of 2015 Bataclan massacre terrorist Salah Abdeslam who had been captured by police in the heavily migrant-populated district of Molenbeek.
Geffroy told French security services he had been close to the Claim brothers, the most senior French figures in the Islamic State hierarchy. He said they also told him of plans to send jihadi children to Europe, disguised as underage asylum seekers, to carry out attacks.