. we're going to get right to the breaking news that is unfolding in the manhunt for the french brothers suspected of carrying out the paris terror attack. at this very moment a massive operation is under way near is under way near paris, a town outside of paris to capture said and cherif kouachi who are surrounded by police inside a printing shop. this is happening in a small town dammartin-en-goele. a mole industrial town near charles de gaulle airport and 25 miles east of paris. shots were fired after the men stole a car. reports of one hostage. nbc confirming hostage negotiators are in talks with the brothers. the deputy mayor said the men told the negotiators quote, we want to die as martyrs. police have blocked off all entrances to the town which has 8,000 residents. one resident said they are every where, the place is jumping, they blocked the whole zones

off. we have helicopters overhead. the police presence sim oppressive. two-runways at charles de gaulle airport are closed and nearby schools are on lockdown. residents are being told to stay inside as the suspects are considered armed and dangerous. a homeland security official confirms to nbc that both men were in the u.s. terrorism database and on the no-fly list for years. one mistake led investigators to focus on them. said kouachi left his i.d. in the abandoned get kwaer. two counterterrorism officials say he traveled to yemen in 2011 to be trade by al qaeda. witnesses say the attackers pledged allegiance to the group during the massacre. no confirmation as to whether this offshoot of al qaeda is actually behind this attack. of course now, joe, the massacre that began 53 hours ago in paris at the headquarters of "charlie hebdo" with 12 dead now looking

like it will come to some sort of conclusion in this small town in paris, the question is how. >> of course if this was done for the sake of jihad, the sake of this ideology and spreading this ideology and it looks like it's going to come to the type of end they want if they want to grab the attention. i go back and think of sheik mohamed. he thought he would hijack a plane, killing everybody on board, going down on the runway and having a bloody finale at the very end. of course that didn't happen for him. but, this is with the entire world's eyes on this small french town 25 miles outside of paris this may be exactly how this hostage situation ends. >> we line up the best voices in

the business. with us we have ayman mohyeldin, president of council on foreign relation richard haas len msnbc contributor, the former special assistant agent in charge of the fbi and nypd joint terrorism task force. also in washington bbc correspondent, former defense department official now an msnbc news terrorism analyst, michael sheehan. in paris foreign editor for the daily guest, christopher dickey. christopher, we'll start with you. bring us up to date on everything you're covering there. >> reporter: well it does indeed you gave a very good introduction. it does look like these two guys are cornered in this town. i think you mentioned a couple of times that it is near charles de gaulle airport. it's really quite near. it's a ten minute drive away.

if you look at the trajectory of these men over the past 36 hours, it's interesting to see that originally they seemed to be headed north, maybe perhaps headed for the belgium border. but they turned around and came back down from the place, from the gas station where they staged a hold up and now they may well have been -- this is just speculation but may well have been headed for the airport for some kind of apocalyptic scenario. we don't know. right now they are cornered and very unlikely they will get out of this. the question is not just whether they want to die, but whether the police want to kill them. the french police actually have a long record of eliminating or as they say neutralizing terrorists in the final stages of these hostage seizures and these kind of standoffs. >> they have developed a platform for themselves and that's one of the issues we're talking about here. in terms of what we're seeing

unfold michael sheehan if i can turn to you, without surmising too much one of the questions might be how many accomplices they have and what are the plans at the airport if they are that close. >> reporter: the french are very professional but very determined when it comes to these terrorist incidents. in this case the french intelligence authorities will want to capture at least or hopefully both of these individuals so they can unravel whatever types of networks these people established. back in yemen and also both involved in recruiting potential fighters to go to iraq and syria. so i think there are some in the french intelligence that definitely want these guys captured. if they are determined to die at the end the french counterterrorism forces will get them there. right now their focus is on keeping that hostage alive, wear these people down get intelligence where they are, get position to do an assault or sniper shot and try to neutralize them as was mentioned

the term they use. >> what does their training with al qaeda have to do? how does that change how they are approached by french authorities? >> we saw what happened in the initial assault. they seem to be very deliberate. they move tactically. they had control of their weapons. very calm and deliberate. in my opinion did some reconnaissance of the target. the front end of this plan was planned out pretty well. at this point it seems a bit more ad hoc where they are making mistakes getting worn down and they are tired. this will benefit law enforcement as these guys continue to get worn down stressed tired and make mistakes and give authorities the opportunity to move in and take control of the situation. >> mike your thoughts as you look at this operation. clearly winds down. if these guys were looking for some sort of apocalyptic end,

that's one motive on part of terrorism experts not to give them that. there is a hostage involved. >> the hostage is the number one priority in terms of safety and then what the authorities will be doing is looking for the safety of the civilians in the local population. they use the four cs. confirm, clear, cordon off the area and control the area. control the vehicles and people that are coming into and going out of the area to make sure that safety is paramount. what's interesting here is we know charles dede gaulle is nearby. in situations like this helicopter assets are absolutely vital. having eyes on the target with special forces and s.w.a.t. teams is absolutely paramount because if the situation goes

what's called dynamic and the kouachi brothers make a run for it they want to control that situation. you need helicopters in the air. in order to have helicopters in the air and establish this restricted operating zone you'll need to bend the civilian traffic. that's why the runways have been shut. >> ayman, quite a road that led them. yesterday reports they were being chased throughout the country side at one point, got out of their cars stole another car. went to a gas station. held up a gas station. so what have you been following over the past 24 hours? >> yeah. i mean my assessment of this is these guys want to make a statement. they want to make a last stand type of statement and the stage success set for that. you have the media descending on the town. they have made contact. they have a hostage. what we've seen from the moment

of this incident from the killing, every one of their actions, deliberate attack on the newspaper was to make a political statement. escaping leaving the scene as we were talking earlier. these guys had an "escape plan." they were wearing masks. they looked like they were ready to fight. at the same time we were prepared to leave. the situation, the calculus of the authorities is going to have to be whether or not they give them what they want which is to become glorified martyrs in their eyes and in the eyes of their followers and what that means on the residual effect for potential followers and groups. >> at every point in these crisis it becomes a law enforcement issue and how do you deal with this tactically. maybe it's my background for me the real question is -- two questions. how did we get to this point and what do we do try to young men not to go down this path.

secondly what are we as societies that are open democratic and functioning how do we reduce our vulnerability. so right now i understand why the focus needs to be on the tactics and what's happening outside of paris. very quickly we have to take a step back and figure out what lessons do we derive what are the dos and don'ts. >> i think we can derive some of that or where they will be looking by looking at the details being uncovered about these two men. homeland security has confirmed to nbc that they were in the u.s. terrorism database. the elder brother traveled to yemen in 2011 to be trained by al qaeda and he was there for several months. said kouachi left his i.d. we have that and get a sense of his background there. the other brother is being described as an aspiring rapper and pizza delivery man who a

janitor helped convert to islam. apparently he was part of a documentary on islamic extremism in 2005. in 2008 he was sentenced to three years in prison for helping funnel militant fighters to iraq. he was released after 18 months. how many of these people do they have that they are trying to put through the system in a way that has credible evidence behind them. witnesses say both attackers pledged allegiance to al qaeda in yemen during the massacre and there is more. but their background is not short on details about trouble ahead. >> you also some of those lines there, the aspiring rapper pot smoking pizza delivery man, et cetera, et cetera, it reads from a playbook of disaffected young men, especially on the outskirts not only geographically of paris

society but also of france itself and the entire culture feeling like outsiders. >> absolutely. i think that what you have here is a problem that has three layers. one is the layer of religious leaders, muslim religious leaders who have not done good enough job of giving framework to practice religion combined with modernity whether in the west or arab and muslim countries. the other layer is the layer of disaffection of alienated youth in a country where there's racism where people don't feel they can integrate if they are not white, where there are a lot of jokes and satire directed at islam and where there's a lot of joblessness. these two kids did struggle and initially they were seen -- they were deemed inoffensive, they were not seem to be potential

dangerous terrorists but they took a path that led them to that. then the third layer which is also combined i think, in what we're seeing unfold in france at the moment is this layer of general malaise which, you know is prevalent to some extent around the world. people looking for a sense of purpose in their lives. particularly young muslims who are not well adapted in modern societies in the west. a lot of them are, don't get me wrong. some are not. those are the ones that are causing this this trouble. so those three layers combined together, i any, in what we're seeing unfold today in france. >> all right. we just are being given word here that our translator nbc translator informed our control room of a radio interview in

france with a man whose car was stolen by the suspects. he said that they seemed very professional in mission mode wearing para military gear. they were not sweating and didn't show any signs of stress. he also said they told him to say it's al qaeda in yemen when the media asked who was behind the attack. this is all unfolding inside a printing shop in a town southeast of paris, france. it all began in paris they headquarters of "charlie hebdo" newspaper where 12 people were massacred 53 hours ago. let's go there. nbc news correspondent ron allen joins us live from paris. ron? >> reporter: good morning. it's been an incredible morning. very dramatic events that seem to be bringing this awful chapter in french history to a close and the question of course, how will it end? people here in the square in the

plaza where we've been for the past day or so are angry. they want this resolved. they are also in some ways not totally surprised this has happened. this country as we've been discussing has been living with this problem of this dwis of aisaffected people for some time. these brothers history go back ten years. they were less of a priority than others and there's estimates that there are over 1,000, 1,200 or so young men who are now under surveillance or who police want to keep under surveillance of young men moving between france iraq and syria, one direction or another, a dangerous group given what we've seen here some 53 hours ago. but i think the feeling here is now people are waiting, hoping this is the end of it. there's another suspect out there as well perhaps two other suspects out there. there was another incident in the south of paris, separate

from the attack on the magazine where policewoman was shot and killed in cold blood in the streets yesterday, yesterday morning. we've not heard much about the manhunt, the search for that individual who is also described as carrying an automatic weapon automatic rival, a handgun. not just a random shooting. perhaps an event that was staged because there was a car accident. there have been other incidents in this country and elsewhere where jihadi sympathizers have tried to drive into traffic, driven into pedestrians. we don't know a lot about that. here authorities have been circumspect about releasing information about what they know from investigations for obvious reasons. much more circumspect than in the united states. so again, just an incredible morning, fast-moving events that began, of course late yesterday afternoon when police descended on this area not far from where they are now. very quiet overnight.

we all woke up this morning remarking we hadn't heard much from our own people on the ground or from authorities about what was going on overnight. perhaps a quiet night. but, obviously, they were in position, they have been watching this area this all started with we believe, a carjacking. then a gun battle. then a pursuit. now this hostage standoff. so, incredible morning and the other thing i should point out is that the president of france francois hollande has been holding a press conference speaking to the nation trying to reassure his nation calling for solidarity. >> this started where you are, ron. to review we're focusing our attention on a town northeast of paris, right near charles de gaulle airport. it's the town of dammartin-en-goele. at this moment a massive operation is under way there to

capture said and cherif kouachi. police say shots were fired after the men stole ooh car. right now at least one person they have, we have confirmed as being held hostage. nbc has confirmed the hostage negotiators are in contact with two french brothers that are expected of carrying out the massacre in paris. the operation, this comes as a massive operation is currently under way to capture these men, they are surrounded. police say shots were fired after two men stole a car and appear to took at least a hostage maybe more. this industrial town it appears where this is happening is inside a printing shop and richard you pointed out it's about 25 miles from paris but even closer to the airport? >> yes. >> two airports at the runway are closed. nearby schools have been locked down. we got word from our

correspondent, msnbc bill neely they told hostage negotiators we want to die as martyrs. we know they were using kalashnikovs at the scene of the massacre. both men were in the u.s. terrorism database. one mistake, apparently gave investigators some clues. said kouachi left his i.d. in the abandoned getaway car. so they started to get more information who they are and what their history is. part of that history is that one of them he did, traveled to yemen in 2011 to be trained by al qaeda. and witnesses say the attackers pledged allegiance to the group, al qaeda during the massacre and we heard now from witnesses who were car jacked by them that they said that again. >> that's how they wanted to be identified. don, fascinating, we've heard time and time again and saw in the disturbing video the morning

of the attack that they were acting as if they were very comfortable around weapons. they were also very comfortable with killing. and even yesterday they weren't sweating they were driving in the car that they were carjacking and very calmly told the man whose car they were car jacking to explain they were part of al qaeda in yemen. now this morning, we of course heard that they want to die as martyrs. and it does not appear there's any reason to doubt their word. how does that change the situation, though for law enforcement officers that are closing in? >> a couple of interesting things. number one, we talk at that lot about isis lately in the media but al qaeda in yes medicine aqap has been focused on external attacks. that's been their m. o. we saw this with the under wear bomb with the printer bomb. while a lot of attention on isis, aqap has been going about

their business and that's plotting against the west and it appears that's what the motivation is with these individuals. one other thing you mentioned before about training with al qaeda, clearly they had some level of weapons training. did they also have some explosives training? i bring that up because they are in a printing facility. my father was in the printing business and i used to go to work with him as a young guy and there were so many volatile chemicals inside that printing business. so if these guys even had some basic explosives training now they got some new potential weapons in their arsenal. >> ayman? >> that's a great point the difference between al qaeda and isis. isis is about territory, trying to keep the battle in iraq and siro to build up their state. al qaeda over the past several of years, with we've seen it grow. their strategy has been more on trying to carry these attacks

into the western world. they've done it with bombers they send overseas and that's more their m. o. very different than isis where we're concentrated on that stifle attack being the lone wolf type. >> the middle east angle of this is interesting. people are focusing these men are not integrated to france. the middle east is a training ground and a region where most citizens are not integrated to their own country. governments are dysfunctional. very little economic participation. no political participation. real integration problem is less in europe it's the middle east. that's where the young people are going and that's where the example success set of people taking up arms against societies they live in. >> really good point. i had the opportunity to interview a radical about a year ago and he described the

strategy, if you like in the middle east about how isis was maintaining the ground in iraq and syria and how al qaeda was pushing out from yemen and focusing on the m.o. which is about the pro se cutting of terrorist attacks overseas. the interesting bit is the fact he spoke about this list which was a number of officers that are scattered around europe which allow disenfranchised people to come in and sign up. >> just richard i want to touch on this. just coming in from reuters. one of the two brothers suspected for carrying out the attack and that is right now being surrounded in this town in northeast of paris, apparently met with the late al qaeda preacher anwar al aulaqi. this is according to many intelligence sources telling this to reuters. we'll follow that. >> he was a real magnet, a real lure and became an inspirational

figure. >> particularly for these types of the west because he was an american citizen. >> do we still have chris dickey in paris? chris let me go to you real quickly. i thought it was fascinating yesterday as you were talking about these young men, and the legend that they are fed to believe. that they can come out of terrible situations or even mundane situations and become these knights protecting women and protecting muslims who were oppressed across the globe and here i couldn't help think again what you described the situation for many muslims, millions of muslims surrounding paris and this one brother being described as a sort of a drifter, a pot smoking pizza delivery man who

now is going to become the hero for all too many young disaffected angry muslim men across the globe. it fit right into the narrative that you were describing to us yesterday. >> reporter: yeah. well, it does. but i think the pot smoking pizza delivery guy is slightly misleading in the sense that way back in 2004 he left that life behind and decided that he wanted to be martyr. we know a lot about his life ten years ago. in fact i and a colleague reported on it extensively. not about him specifically but about the group he was a part of. all these young men, several of them several went to iraq some of them were jailed in abu ghraib some of them were killed in combat in falluja. so this guy was connected to people who did real fighting not just delivering pizzas and

smoking pot. >> i understand that. but somewhere it starts and at some point in the biography of too many of these men these are not people that are raised at the feet of their fathers who were you know islamic extremists who fought anwar sadat in the 1970s. this started somewhere and all too often i was agreeing with you yesterday it begins with this sort of story. >> reporter: well, it does. it does. i don't know if i said this yesterday. but one of the things that the recruiters for islamic and particularly jihadist groups use and exploit again and again as they go into these societies. i studied this very closely in gaza with hamas. they tell young men, sometimes very young men, sometimes boys we're going to show you how to be a man. your parents are humiliated. your father may have left.

you may have been raised by your mother. you have no idea how to be a man. we'll show you how to be a man. you'll read the koran. you'll think of martyrdom. if you're worthy you'll become a suicide bomber. that's the message for these guys. and we know that got to cherif kouachi very well. that was a message that he under stood and embraced and now he may have a chance to carry out, actually. >> joining us now by phone we have nbc news reporter who is close to the scene of the hostage standoff. bring us up to date and what are you hearing and seeing? >> reporter: the town has been completely sealed off by a very very large number of police and counterterrorism forces. helicopters are circling overhead flying low towards this industrial zone. one hostage is being held by the two suspects. >> we're also hearing

two-runways of the airport have been shut down and that they are in contact with these two men, negotiators. what else are you hearing and are you able to get to anybody there at the scene to get information? >> reporter: we are about five miles from charles de gaulle airport. they haven't shut down the runways they are diverting planes a little further down the runway to make sure they are not flying in too close to the scene of this standoff. beyond that right now it's a fluid situation. a lot of police activity. a lot of counterterrorism activity. incredible security response we're seeing here on the ground. >> thank you very much. obviously, thousands of french security forces and counterterrorism experts are dealing with this situation. the small printsing shop where this is unfolding right now in this town we're looking at now, five miles from charles de gaulle airport is the location

of the two brothers who carried out the massacre at "charlie hebdo" headquarters in paris 53 hours ago. shots were fired, apparently in the early morning hours, the brothers had stolen a car. there was, the manhunt was focused on them but they did make it to this small industrial town and it appears they have taken at least one hostage. we do have confirmation of that. there is contact with the brothers with hostage negotiators and they have said natural they are willing to die as martyrs. looking for some sort of potential apocalyptic end. the concern is this one hostage. >> let's go to michael sheehan. michael, you wanted to follow up on the disaffected youth angle side of this story. >> reporter: i think it's important to understand the disaffection of these individuals. but that puts the blame on us that we haven't given them

enough opportunity. i've studied these people for the better part of the last 20 years. we cannot under estimate the importance of the narrative they signed up to the go to support groups that are in the middle east to drive out moderate regimes and replace them with radical caliphate regimes, to eliminate the borders of those regions both al qaeda and isis although they do have different types of operating principles they are still focused on that narrative. it is compelling to many young men around the world who have joined up to this cause. not necessarily because they can't gate promotion from their pizza delivery job. they signed up for this narrative. it's a compelling narrative. we must understand. and not beat ourselves over the head for not giving enough opportunity in france when they sign up to a very very important cause that has galvanized a lot of people around the world to attack the west and to attack many of these

moderate regimes that are trying modernize in the arab world that they got a long long way to go as richard haas pointed out. >> very good points made. ayman as we have been bringing up for a few days often it's not someone from the lower middle class family, the suburbs of paris sometimes it's an angry young man who comes from a middle class or upper middle class story. >> that was the 9/11 story. these are not people who were marginalized. they were succeeding in society. they chose this path. >> the point that mike makes that's absolutely true is the narrative is what lures people in but there is one point i wanted to add to what michael said. while the united states and west does not assume responsibility for not moving these people up the social lad terrify united states and its allies have made a lot of mistakes in the middle east that feed that narrative which then becomes a major lure

for these young people. these young individuals as christopher dickey was pointing out yesterday are drawn to the sense they want to help the people in the middle east they want to help these down troddened people. who are many of these regimes in the middle east that are supported for and backed by it's the west. that's a justification for them in that narrative why they want to turn around and attack the west. there's a responsibility to address the long term problems and the problems that the united states and its allies are participating in propping up in the region. >> we're at the bottom of the hour. obviously we've been following breaking news. police have now surrounded the two suspects. and they are northeast of paris. not far from charles de gaulle airport. we'll be following that obviously, all morning and as long as this story moves. but, i want to bring you in here, mike and talk about the nature of these suspects as we talk about why they may have

gotten involved. there also seems to be a far different approach than just a blindly a lyly annihilistic approach of shooting everybody. we heard women, calm down we're not going to kill you. you shouldn't do. a coped as twisted as it is there's a code of what they are doing and how and they went specifically in for targeted assassinations. in the case of the women that were not shot there, very interestingly this driver this car who they stole, they very calmly told him, if people ask him, this is who we are. they had a mission. they carried that mission out specifically and have not been it does not appear at this point to be randomly shooting people who weren't their targets. >> i think, joe, that's an

incredibly important point to allude to especially trying to contain the spread of this fear. we don't want people all over europe and in america all of a sudden to think they can't walk outside their front door for fear of being targeted by potential jihadists. you're right. this was a specific attack on the "charlie hebdo" headquarters. they had already received a fire bombing in 2011 for the nature of its work. "charlie hebdo" was about a magazine, it was about mocking not just the islamic faith but catholicism, judaism, the whole lot. but that was the nature of the beast. that clearly made him a target. there are consequences to that. should the security have been higher at the headquarters? absolutely. but i think the way in which this was carried out from the without set it's been absolutely clear it was methodical it was calm and we had an indication when we were talking about this when we saw that video footage,

we knew there was something different. this wasn't a sidney siege. this wasn't a lone wolf. this was something a little bit different and ayman and richard all of the good analysts around the table are like hang on there's been training here. there's been previous operations here. we can't put our finger on it but there's a good chance there's bean good amount of preparation that's gone into this attack and that's a really good point you bring up. >> kim? >> reporter: i want to pick up on something on how the operation was carried out. the editor-in-chief of "charlie hebdo," who was known under his pen name as charb. one of the great french carica krmpb ampbc

ature. in terms of the protection charb said he would rather die standing than live on his knees. he knew the dangers associated with what he was trying to do. they had made sure that they were taking precautions. he had police protection. they moved location. they were in a nondescript building. the two brothers made a mistake initially they went into the wrong building. they were searching for the building and had trouble finding knit shally and the last bullet proof door protecting the officers but the two brothers were able to get through it because they took one of the women hostage who was walking down the stairs i believe, and made her put in the code to get into the building. but, i just want to make one more point going back to something richard was saying. beyond what we're seeing unfold in france right now, we do need to think about the bigger picture of integration, of islam

and modernity and how europe will react to this. we're seeing signs of dissension within france about the reaction to this. there's a march planned on sunday where all the political parties are going to come together. but the national front, the right-wing party will not participate, they have not been invited. you'll see this debate get much more heated over the coming weeks and months. >> you're certainly going see the national front grow are you not, richard, most likely in france and also see in britain -- >> you have powerful anti-immigration tendencies. take a step back. already before any of this you had the recent parliamentary elections in europe. virtually every european country anti-eu, anti-immigration in part galvanized by the absence of any economic growth in europe now for several years.

this now will reinforce it. doesn't create the problem. but it reinforces it. >> what i would say is the uk has been on to this holistic approach about countering a threat for some time. it's got a strategy called contest. one of the key pillars of that is a piece called protect. goes into the community, goes into mosques, talks to the imams and address the holistic approach. it is important that there is this holistic approach but it takes a little bit of time. >> the point here is absolutely right going into the mosques. you can only go into so many mosques in the united states and uk. you need to go into the mosques of the middle east. that's where these guys are being drawn to. why they are training in yemen and al qaeda. yes they are getting weapons training but radicalized by these messages on the internet

by these mosques and sermons. you're not addressing that problem overseas you can address it in the commune here and make progress but i still don't see that transformation happening. >> that's a big problem. long standing problem. the saudis had a disproportionate impact on islamic training for decades and it's part of a larger problem, lacks of certain types of intellectual debates. >> why the sawed zblis >> they have a brand of islamic -- >> why does the saudi royalty continue to allow that? >> we know the answer but somebody casually watching saudi royalty has more to fear that brand of extremism than anybody and yet they allow it to exist. >> modern saudi arabia is based on a political bargain. essentially the royal family was given political power in exchange for giving the religious establishment control

over society and education. the deal if you will at the foundation of modern saudi arabia. >> but the proliferation of it overseas is open. one thing on have it inside the kingdom of saudi arabia. another to build in schools in pakistan, schools and clinics elsewhere. you get a package of social programs that is aimed to help and saudi arabia with its money and funds does at that lot to push development but with that development also sometimes comes this strain of teaching that has now been over the course of the last several decades a major source and major form of interpreting islam in a dangerous way. >> it's regional. not just saudi arabia. it's galvanizing the support of jordan qatar, the uae, of iran and getting that regional support not just military air strikes but the holistic approach and i'm looking at the saudis in the eye and saying what about this? you've been exporting this for years.

let's address that. >> has that changed richard over the past six to nine bhos the growth of isis? >> no. there really is no serious alternative. you would would think your point is why do people continue to do things that's not in their own long term interest. that's so much what history is about. regimes continue to do things that i say are questionable for their long term viability. these are examples rather than exceptions. >> one final point and a point, the experiment of political islam in the middle east which was an attempt to drain this, to say to people look get out of this radicalization you can have political islamic parties, there is a place for political islam in this region. >> how did that work? >> it was thwarted in a few different experiments. >> the palestinian territories, free elections and we were given hamas. then in egypt, of course we saw

what happened with the muslim brotherhood and morsi. let's just say round one did not go as the jeffersonian -- >> it never does and is not supposed to be about first election. it's supposed to be about the second election. the first election is not nearly as second one. >> the fear one was after the first one we wouldn't get to the second. >> morsi didn't want to get a second one. let's go to chris dickey. chris, you wanted to get in here? >> reporter: yeah. i was listening to this discussion of saudi arabia. it plays obviously a huge role but there's several things that need to be clarified here. first it isn't just the deal with triple digits establishment goes back to the foundation of saudi arabia, the real problem is in 1979 after the grand mosque in mecca was taken by crazy islamic radicals the saudi regime decided to try to flank them. that's where you began to see a

lot of the export of the ideology. that's where you began to see much more primeextremist in saudi arabia. one of the big risks now is that in the face of isis which is on saudi borders, basically, and also from facing the threat of al qaeda in the arabian peninsula. it's not supported by saudi arabia it's going after saudi arabia. the real scare is saudi arabia will flank them as being conservative or more conservative when it comes to morsi in egypt, his biggest enemy was, in fact saudi arabia. saudi arabia was intimately tied with the overthrow of morsi because the saudis have two big enemies. one in the arab and muslim world. one is yes, or three. one is al qaeda and those kinds of groups that are more extreme than the saudis. one is iran which totally freaks

them out and one is the muslim brotherhood which has kind of a semimodern facist political view. they are fighting on these different fronts. i'm not defending them. i'm saying that's a dynamic you need to understand and a very complicated one if you want to start analyzing what's going on in the middle east right now. hope that's not too complicated. hold on one second i want to get my crayons out. maybe i can follow you. it's been remarkable we've heard for some time richard -- >> saudis against the world what can i tell you. >> we heard for some time richard, that obviously egypt had such remarkable influence over the arab world and they have only for a couple of millennium. but over the past couple of years especially i guess,

ayman, obviously your family is from egypt >> originally, yeah. >> originally. it's remarkable the influence egypt has had as we've gone through the arab spring and don't have. as christopher was talking about, not only was morsi's biggest enemy egypt but also obviously egypt made hamas' life extraordinarily difficult over the past several years and, in fact, put a great deal of pressure on them to kill into a coalition government with the palestinian authority. >> egypt has had a tremendous impact almost by its example. anything egypt does matters because it's a third to a quarter of the arab world. the sheer size of it counts so much. egypt has become preoccupied with itself and doesn't have resources. it's not part of this larger narrative of trying to affect things beyond egypt. what happens in egypt is important. as an example. one of the reasons --

>> how much has it changed since barack obama went there in 2009 and gave a speech in cairo. is it not unbelievable the sea of change. >> egypt as an arena, as a we news as an example has both played out what's going on in the arab muslim world and had an impact. but egypt is an actor beyond its borders. doesn't have the capacity now or same position in the arab world. people aren't looking to cairo in the way they used to for leadership. psychologically and politically it's hard to under estimate what happened there. >> you can make arguments that morsi and muslim brotherhood haven't worked out. you can make arguments that tunisia elected him in power and then voted him out shows there's a desire for people once they have a right to vote to self-moderate themselves. we've seen that in turkey. turkey has a somewhat

successful -- >> turkey has? >> absolutely. >> i'm sorry, based on what reading of recent history? >> i'll tell you. done thoofb by our standards and there's a lot of problems with it. turkey's economy has grown perhaps better than any european economy in the last ten years. they have cutback corruption. i'm not defending the turks. >> they arrest journalists and the president is acting like a little putin over there, arresting anybody that dares to go against him. anything that was built in the past century is being washed away. >> here's the real test for turks about how they self-correct that. political islam doesn't necessarily -- we're talk here about the party. they would make the argument they improved a lot of things. cutback on corruption. there have been a lot of

arguments against the civil and social aspects of it. they are cutting down journalists. freedom of expression is on decline. very aggressive tactics. this is now the test for turkey. doesn't mean you turn away and walk away and bring back as we've seen in some countries like in egypt, let's bring back the military or military regime in the most authoritarian way where you nicked their resolution in the butt -- >> hard to do that because -- >> what's worrisome about turkey is the consolidation of power we're seeing and in some ways the systematic weakening of checks and balance. originally the military business communities, obviously the media. that's one of the concerns about the arab world beyond turkey more broadly is the lack of civil society. you simply -- democracy is so much more than elections. what we don't have in most of the middle east are the

pre-requisites of democracy. you don't have the distribution of power. you don't have checks and balances the potential push backs. what we're seeing too much are rotations of power but distributions of power. anything but democratic. >> if i could add to the turkey dynamic. what's really interesting as well is the way turkey has addressed ti isis situation. if you remember when isis was emerging there seemed to be or appeared this reti sense of turkey to take any action. there's a dynamic between kurds there, the kurd population huge friction. there's a dynamic there in how they dealt with that. that's a fascinating evolution. >> turkey is more worried about the kurds. >> we're following the details as we focus in on what's going on in this town dammartin-en-goele, which is outside of paris. hostage negotiators had been in contact with two brothers who apparently have one hostage.

we're now being told that by the associated press that there's phone contact established with the men, possibly an ongoing dialogue. question will be what demands they have. french television is being told the men want to die as martyrs. they made that very clear. again, this is all playing out northeast of paris in dammartin-en-goele in a printing shop. >> it's a town of about 8,000 people. within commuting distance of paris as we've reported before operations at charles de gaulle airport have been slightly disrupted the airport is about 15, 10 15 minutes away. >> a school has been evacuated right nearby. this is a printsing plant where these men are cornered holding one hostage. but they had the school on lockdown. they took the children out of that school. also we get a sense of who these men are. one of them receiving weapons

training from al qaeda. and al qaeda off shoot in yemen has a history there. met actually with the late al qaeda preacher anwar al aulaqi during his stay there according to reuters. working to check that. but now we get a sense that these guys may have started inauspiciously out of small beginnings from their lives but from descriptions and from what we saw as we watched this terrible massacre unfold in paris have had some sort of training and even a man who was interviewed on french radio whose car was stolen by the suspects yesterday said that they seemed very professional in mission mode he describes them wearing para military gear saying they were not sweating and that they didn't show any signs of stress and made clear that he should say to people that it is al qaeda in yemen when asked who is behind the attic. >> let's go to capitol hill.

we have congressman jason chaffetz. americans want to know one thing could this happen here and two things, if so what is congress doing to protect americans? >> well god bless those men and women. they show up for work and next thing they know they are in the middle of this terrorist attack and god bless them. your heart and prayer goes out to them. can that happen here in the united states? yes, of course it can. i want means overseas in particular making sure we have the very best intelligence human intelligence which is very difficult, having the signals in intelligence. i worry about our lack of intelligence particularly in north africa post-benghazi what's going on in libya has become a sanctuary where people

can go and i really do worry about that in mali and nigeria and other parts of north africa. we'll have a raging debate here at home about giving up liberty for security. you still have the right to privacy in this country and it's scary. you worry about it pup love the men and women who work on this every day, the first responders and those in the intelligence community but it's scary. we got to call it what is it. >> there's more information about the phone contact that has been established with them. officials in this town are saying the suspects were actually discussing with officials the safe evacuation of the school and the suspects agreed that the school could be evacuated. does this indicate to you beyond the fact there's some sort of ongoing dialogue where they are

negotiating and allowing children to be taken out of a school safely but there's contact. >> it goes back to what we were saying earlier on in terms of the aspects of the four cs. what they are trying to do is protect the safety of the civilian population. one of the things that the security forces will be use cigarette a grid reference graphic. a 50,000 survey map. it will have essential location where the perpetrators are and then various roads on that map. what the map will have is letters on various points on those roads where there will be checkpoints. this is basically to apprehend or make sure that the situation is contained. it gives all of the security for the s.w.a.t. team, the security force, everyone a central points of reference if the situation goes dynamic. we've been talking about the potential scenarios, the potential for this to turn intome

sort of spectacular and this is -- what the security forces are trying to sprents, trying to contain everything. we know there's a hostage. we know the safety of that hostage of paramount importance. specifically it's containment and that situation is being contained. there are negotiators on site. the unpredictability is what concerns me. we don't know how this will play out. >> let's go back to the congressman. congressman, when you were interviewed by cbs news some time back in 2013 about nsa, the wiretapping and collection of data was on the front pages, you were quoted as saying i don't fundamentally trust the federal government. yesterday i believe it was yesterday general hayden came on the show and said americans

would re-examine their concerns about some of the nsa collection practices on data after this type of accident. do you believe that looking at these sort of situations do you believe that it justifies what the nsa has done and that more americans are going to think our federal government is being more aggressive in collecting data? >> well i differentiate what's happening overseas where we want and need our nsa and cia and other intelligence efforts to make sure that we have the very best intelligence we possibly can. the signals in intelligence, the human intelligence, the satellite work we do. here domestically if you're a suspicionless american i'm not willing to give up every liberty in the name of security. and i just don't think that tracking every american through they're gps device myself and senator riden said the

government should not track your gps location. if you have cause, if there's a suspicion, if there's an are a articuable reason, then yes? should we put a camera on every corner to see what everybody is doing 24/7. >> more people will say that's who we are than not and that's always the debate. i'm more with -- i think our rights and freedoms are under siege. but there's a lot of intelligence that could be useful that has been collected. >> when you have something like this happen and you talk about overseas, but in this case in france it was a home grown terrorist. we have to suspect there are going to be home grown terrorists in this country as well. i am certain that a lot of

americans are going to want law enforcement officers to have as much data on hand as possible to begin the search so they can, when you have a fluid situation like this and it may not just be two guys with guns, it may be the possibility of home grown terrorists with devices that can kill a great number of people. do you not think that more and more americans are going be more supportive of aggressive intelligence technique when is you have stories like this don't erupt on the air waves. >> no doubt this will be a continued raging debate. it's a slippery slope. we want law enforcement to get in there and pursue those leads. we got to call terrorism for what is it. it is terrorism. we can't be mincing words about that. if there is suspicion i want to go get them. absolutely. you want to able to track them

and follow them. but for your average joe, who is just at home i don't think the federal government should be peeking at my emails. i don't think they should be looking in my living room or tracking me when i go the shopping mall. >> congressman, thank you so much. actually it's marketing people that track you when you go the shopping mall and when you go online or any website or purchase everything you are tracked, sir, whether you like it or not. >> do you have a g-mail account? >> there's tradeoffs between individual rights and electrocutive security and safety and in society such as our that will reignite that debate. but when you have suspicion then you track people. the real question is in many questions it's too late. debate is absent specific information. the whole nature of home grown

terrorism or lone wolves you don't have advance warning. if you wait for the triggers almost by definition it's too late. you can't get into the slippery slope argument it's an all or nothing debate. real debate is to be the specifics of what you're prefired do and have this debate because there are tradeoffs. >> it's top of the hour. we want to reset the breaking news that's unfolding in the manhunt for the french brothers suspected of carrying out the paris terror attack. at this very moment a massive operation is under way near paris to capture said and cherif kouachi who are surrounded by police that hour. that moment there's been contact that's been made with the brothers of hostage be

negotiators. this is happening in a town called dammartin-en-goele a small trillion town 25 miles northeast of paris. shots were fired after the men stole a car and right now there are reports of one hostage right now in their custody. nbc news confirms hostage negotiators are talking with the men. one of the men who was carjacked by these two brothers described them as calm mission like not sweating and that man was told say that al qaeda is behind all this. the deputy mayor of the town where this is happening says the men told negotiators quote we're prepared to die as martyrs. contact was initiated to safely evacuate a nearby area including the school. the suspects agreed to that. the police blocked all entrances to the town. one resident is comparing this town right now to a war zone. another person says quote they

are every where. it's jumping. they blocked the whole zones. we got helicopters overhead. police presence is impressive. residents are being told to stay inside stay away from windows and deep lights off as the suspects are considered armed and dangerous. homeland security official confirms to nbc that both men were in the u.s. terrorism database and on no-fly lists for years. one mistake did lead investigators immediately focus on them. said kouachi left his i.d. in the abandoned getaway car. two u.s. counter terrorism officials say he traveled to yemen in 2011 to be trained by al qaeda. witnesses say the attackers pledged allegiance to the group during the massacre. we're hearing incredible stories of what was actually said to people before they executed them. let's go straight to richard engel. he's on the scene this morning. richard, what can you tell us? >> reporter: we are in the small

village of dammartin-en-goele. this is where this hostage standoff now is taking place. around 9:30 this morning local time so just a few hours ago the brothers were spotted driving in this town. they were in an industrial park. they were spotted by police. a gunfight broke out. that is what initially started this hostage crisis we're told by a local city official. during this gunfight with police brothers then barricaded themselves inside a local business the first business that was available in the industry park. they are still inside, we're told. there's one confirmed hostage local officials say but there may be five or seven hostages inside. they barricaded themselves in a printing press. this is a family owned business that prints flyers menus, posters. it is run by a husband and wife

team, also their child works with them. all three of them are believed to be inside according to a local official. and perhaps several employees. there is a siege going on right now. there are checkpoints all over this town. we have been stopped at one of the checkpoints where some other reporters are. we're as close as we're able to get from a high point area. it's important to note this is all very close to the charles de gaulle airport, just about a one hour drive from the center of paris. >> so we're still unclear about the number of hostages that may be inside. richard engel reporting, late information. we had been talking about one hostage potentially as well as ongoing negotiations with these two brothers. >> i was going skrks richardask, richard,

that's much different from what we've heard from others. who are the local officials telling you there may be five to seven hostages inside? >> reporter: the mayor of the adjacent town here just spoke to a few reporters. dmoes-- he knows the owner of the printing press personally. this gunfight started at 9:30 this local official herded some of the children who were on the street into an adjacent building and then evacuated them. schools have been evacuated, the entire town is shut down. they are saying that there may be more than one hostage. initially we thought there was just the owner of this printing press. he's been spotted by a witness, someone who accidentally walked into the business and saw this hostage drama unfolding and was told to leave. he witnessed the owner and one of the brothers but according to these local officials there

could be more. the owner's family members, perhaps employees, five to seven people. this still unfolding and they don't know the exact number but they do believe in this town there's more than one hostage. >> it's still unfolding and the information coming out. there's, again, coming out in bits and pieces. i would also like to ask you a little bit more about the showdown you talked about the gunfight. what can you tell us about that from witnesses and local officials? round that around 9:30 this morning, the brothers were spotted in this town. i don't know if they had already been here just arriving they were spotted in an industrial park which is right on the edge of the town. this is quite a small, quaint little french village which you typically expect to see church spires small individual house

with tiled roofs. quite a picturesque little town. on the edge of the town closer to the highway is an industrial area. the brothers were spotted in this industrial area engaged in a gunfight. one source tells us that a police officer was wounded in that gunfight or security official i should say is wounded because both police and military are involved in this operation. we're told that injuries however, were not life threatening, and that during this gunfight that the brothers barricaded themselves in the printing press where they remain now. >> okay. mike, you get the sense that these brothers wherever they went across france were not going to be able to move more than a few miles without some police officers being on them. and here of course they appeared in this small town and immediately drew gunfire.

they really do have and had over the past several days no place to go. we've heard a lot of criticism quietly of french officials for letting them escape but, again, it appears that they have been completely covered up over the past several days and had very few options. >> really interest field goal you sort of try to study the tactical plan, if you like. one of the two key pill lowers of escape and evasion, trained in it when we were on combat operations in iraq and afghanistan. one of the two key pillars you hunker down during the day, don't move during the day or sleep because it becomes easier to be seen and seconds is you put as much distance between where you were last seen by the enemy to where you need to go. if you look at their initial attack it looked calm measured premeditated. then you hear about a gas

station being held up in broad daylight. so the last thing you want to do is bring attention yourself during daylight. yes we think they were trained but is that glaring error in what they've done. >> leaving, of course your i.d. in the getaway car. >> unless they are trying to make a statement. some of these elements may fit in that narrative. unless they want police to know and go on these kind of you know rampage to hold up a gas station to create that fear and terror. you go on this rampage across the country you spark this manhunt. >> richard engel has to go. looking at their history and what we have confirmed, richard through nbc that they were both on the u.s. terrorism database they were on a no-fly list for years, the information that we were table to derive especially since one of them left their i.d. in the getaway car is that

tell der brother traveled to yemen in 2011 and actually met with the late al qaeda preacher anwar al aulaqi during his stay there. according to reuters so far. even cherif kouachi's participation in this documentary on extremism in 2005. they made it very close to the airport, richard. >> reporter: these brothers are starting to fit a model that's very frightening for france for other countries of a home grown terrorist cell people who were born in france sons of immigrants both of these brothers are sons of algerian immigrants. their parents died. raised in a foster home. initially engaged in a life of sort of petty crime, occasional drug use according to one of their lawyers at the time and then around 2005 during the iraq war it was really cherif the

younger brother now 32 who was initially radicalized because of images acdorgd ss according to what he saw in iraq. wanted to join anwar al aulaqi's group. didn't make it however. was arrested. spent 18 months in prison. while in prison was put with one of the most notorious terrorists held in france another algerian the. was further radicalized in jail. excuse me the scrutiny -- the older, 34 traveled in 2011 when he went to yemen and reportedly got some training months of training from the al qaeda affiliate in yemen. >> nbc's chief foreign correspondent richard engel. thank you very much.

we hope to hear back from you soon. >> of course the news that richard has brought to us from local officials much different than what we originally heard and that is that instead of one hostage there may be up to seven hostages. he spoke to a local mayor that knows the family that runs that printing press. and says that the parents both worked there, including also a child, maybe working there as well. >> which changes the nature of you know the platform that they have given the number of hostages going up. kim, just to sort of add about richard engel's sort of assessment that this is developing in to a model of a profile of the home grown terror cell but this isn't a retail attack by some loner, these guys have developed skills that allowed them to murder traumaticize paris, the country of france and the entire world,

really? >> yes. unfortunately terrorism feeds paranoia and be interesting to see how the french hand tell situation in the coming weeks and months. how much be civil liberty curtailed. i want to go back to islam and what's happening in middle east. today in saudi arabia, a man will be flowinged edflogged 100 times for insulting islam. we need to see change from twin region is correct. there's a problem. i come from region. there is a problem. but the middle east has so many other problems that it is trying to deal with that i don't see in the short term the ability for people to make that change from within. we've all been talking about it

waiting for it. what i do see, however, and i was transiting from paris and i picked up the papers at charles de gaulle airport. what in see is muslim communities in europe speaking out. i'm reading an article quoting several french imams saying for example, the imam of the mosque in bordeaux saying muslims are traumatized in transand europe. we're being taken hostage by crazy people. we must make muslims go out on the street en masse to express our disgust at the confiscation of this religion of our religion by these crazy people. so it is important while we discuss the fact that a lot of muslims do feel alienated in europe there are those who want to integrate and are integrated and it's important to remember that one of the policemen was a

muslim. he was the man we saw being executed on street in cold blood. >> ayman, obviously, following up on kim's point, we've been talking for the past couple of days about westerners handful of westerners tragically being shot down. but i was reminded that muslim kprechlism poses the greatest danger and greatest risk to muslims who are savaged daily by the most extreme elements of the faith because they don't adhere to their very narrow view of what the koran says. >> i think on the very same day this happened there was a suicide bombing in yemen that killed 30 people. boko haram has taken 2,000 people hostages. pakistani school that was last month had 100 something children that were killed. that's a very important point

you make is that muslims are dying at the hands of muslims. this extremism is a problem that's not just affecting westerners. it's a point that kim made the diversity of france is reflected in this attack. if you look at the individuals one of the people one of the journalists that was killed his mothers was tunisian. he was jewish. one of the individuals who was a cartoonist was also a recently recent immigrant to france and working at "charlie hebdo." france's diverse society cust across the board. it affects everybody. as we mentioned that police officer was also muslim. >> france is very very unusual in terms of we're specifically looking at syria and iraq and talking about saudi and the regional response. i want to pick up on richard engel's points the origin or ethnicity of the kouachi brothers is nigerian north african. what france has is this islamist

movement coming from the south, boko haram and others. if you look at the soldier who was macheted on a london street the perpetrator of that he was of nigerian descent. not just about the islamist jihadist movement coming from the middle east it's north africa as well and france has roots that go back a long way in history to north africa. >> unfortunate history. it scattered the nation. >> let's go back to paris. christopher dickey is standing by with his reporting on this. impossible to deny at this point that paris and france will have a massive change in security. your seeing anything now in paris? yesterday we were speaking to a reporter on the scene who had been traveling through the city and didn't see any police officers anywhere. i can't imagine, though that they wouldn't make a change not only in how daily life is run in

paris and across france but how they handle these guys on watch lists and on databases? >> reporter: absolutely. i mean i think you'll see -- first of all now you do see police all over the place. they are at intersections. they divert traffic. it's gotten much harder to move around the city because there are not checkpoints but a lot of cops out there. i was surprised when i came to this suddeno o studio yesterday i saw two guys with machine guns sitting outside the door. there's definitely a lot more obvious physical presence of the police but in addition to that of course you can bet that the very large national police force have a lot of plain-clothes people out on the streets and especially in areas where there may be trouble. no i think there's no question this is a country that is on a very, very high state of alert

and you have to know that even in relatively normal times if you go the train station, you go the airport, there will be people walking by you in military soldiers walking by you in full battle dress with their automatic weapons poised and ready to use if they need to. this is a city and a country now i think that really is on alert. >> chris, talk if you will we talked a bit about the diversity not only across paris but across france. the ethnic diversity even that was evident in these attacks and some of the victims of the attacks. we've heard some news about political parties coming together unifying to make statements together. obviously, though some of the, one nationalistic groups being excluded from these unity meetings. can you give us an update from

two, three days after these attacks about what you are reading what you are seeing what the commentary in paris right now about the future of immigration in this country? >> reporter: well two issues. one is basic french political issue. we're still quite a ways way, a couple years away from the next presidential election. the head of the far right national front has created what is now an extremely powerful political party. and she aims to make a real run at the presidency. and the socialists are using this situation to try and draw people together, talk about unity, talk about france being one country with one purpose. at the same time that they exclude her from the major

demonstrations and events that are planned for sunday. it's already becoming an ugly situation here in france. it will create a deeper divide between muslims in france and the rest of the population. that's clearly the purpose of this kind of attack. if indeed it was masterminded by the ideologs in yemen, then i think it's pretty clear that the purpose is to do what the bolsheviks used to call exacerbate the contradictions create as much polarization as they can. we have 5 to 6 million people of arab and muslim background close to 10% of the population. while we talk about the people who are not integrated there's a

lot that are. that's why a lot of them are in the police. the one who was shot in front of the "charlie hebdo" offices was a muslim. so they want to create a situation where there's a nonmuslim backlash where muslims feel per se kutd and isolated, where the anger in the muslim communities gross. that's a revolutionary tactic. i am afraid that for all that people are warning against this a week or two from now we're going to see bad news not good news. >> all right. on that need i want to bring you back to the scene. what you're looking at on the left side of your screen is the town of dammartin-en-goele. we are looking at the outskirts

of a printing plant. they have it surrounded where two brothers cher arrive kouachi, said kouachi, the two men who carried out the massacre at the "charlie hebdo" headquarters in paris about he he 54 hours ago are said to be holed up with potentially from richard engel five to seven hostages. we're work on confirming that number. obviously the situation is unfolding and information is changing. we do know there's contact inside with two brothers inside the printing plant. and that they even agreed to allow a school that is nearby to be evacuated. some sort of negotiation is under way. very hard to get details. let's bring in bill neely. >> reporter: this small workshop is completely surround by hundreds of anti-terror police

french s.w.a.t. teams. we've seen images of them moving through this industrial area they are on roofs. there's in a sense no way these two brothers can get out of this situation, they are completely surround and there are helicopters above this building as well. there's a hostage negotiator on the scene for several hours. he's made contact with the hostage takers and see a french lawmaker, the main lawmaker for this area says that the men told police we want to die as martyrs. there was also an interesting incident where a salesman turned up at this workshop at 8 kplo:30 this morning shook hands who he believed he was a police officer. the man said get out. we don't kill civilians.

it was clear this was not a police officer. there are reports there may be more than one hostage in that building. that has not been confirmed at the moment. nbc news has spoken to one of founder members of france's anti-terror force and he says the priority at the moment is saving the life of the hostage that we know is there. the police will not move in unless that hostage is killed or unless negotiations have broken down. we understand there's a hostage negotiator. contact has been established. we're not sure of a permanent open line but they have cell phone these two brothers. >> thomas? >> bill we had an opportunity to speak earlier this morning as you were arriving on the periphery of the town and now that you've had an opportunity to get inside and we have conflicting reports of potentially more than one hostage. how many people may have been inside or arrived for work at the time these brothers took

over this printing press? >> reporter: this is a very small family run printing firm. we believe there are only five employees and the founder of the business the father is not believed to be in that building. there were reports that the hostage was a woman but that hasn't been confirmed. but we simply don't know. there's certainly at least one hostage. that's all we can say with any certainty at the moment. >> all right, bill neely, thank you so much. we hope to check back in with you momentarily. i want to go to a former special assistant to the fbi. don, given the background that we're learning about these two brothers given the way they carried themselves for the past 54 hours, we've seen some of it unfold before our eyes but also the way they are being described

by one of the people who were car jacked by them as very professional, mission-like. not sweating. in mission mode wearing para military gear. sending a mission that he should be told to say that it is al qaeda had media asks who is behind the attack. what can you tell us about what may be happening in these negotiations these guys may have inauspicious beginnings but they are trained. >> right. they were moving very methodically tactically also nonverbal communication. this is an indicator of training, in my opinion, they had done some reconnaissance of the target. it was very deliberate. they had an "escape plan." now it appears that the "escape plan" is falling apart and they are operating a bit ad hoc.

they said they wanted to die as martyrs, there's some communication with the negotiators, whether it's actual negotiations or just talking back and forth we don't know that. but this is a good thing. at least there's some dialogue that will hopefully buy time to where the authorities can wear these guys out, keep them under stress and hopefully they will make another mistake like they did initially where they dropped the identification. hopefully they will make some other mistakes that will give the french authorities to maybe do a deliberate assault to rescue the hostages. >> as hours go by thomas exhaustion sets in for everybody involved. one french interior ministry spokesman is quoted as saying they are trying to keep this dialogue going. they want to start an ongoing dialogue and that this could take hours, possibly even days. >> you make a great point. when we talk about exhaustion for these brothers entering the 54th hour at this point how

important does it play into the operations on the anti-terrorism military side of things to know what they are dealing with and the mindset and the desperation that could be setting in for the brothers. >> it gives the authorities more time to gather additional intelligence. in a situation like that, hostage situation you want to prolong it and get as much information about them about what might be the lay out of the building. who else was around there. are very volatile chemicals in the building. all these things. this is what authorities want to learn in addition to wearing these guys out. the authorities can keep bringing in fresh bodies fresh police officers, anti-terrorism. so exhaustion is going to be more of an issue for the terrorists. >> from richard engel the brothers are fitting this model of the home grown terror cell. their parents died.

entered into a foster home. they entered into a life of petty crimes. got off track and radicalized. how does that enter into the negotiations and contact going back and forth with knowing they have potentially more than one confirmed potentially more than one hostage. >> they will do anything to deep dialogue going, something they can relate to these guys. it's very interesting too we saw earlier reporting about contact with anwar al aulaqi. when i was back in the fbi virtually every case we had with these home grown extremists anwar al aulaqi was a piece of that. so these guys and their profile is very common and known to the authorities. these guys definitely fit that kind of a profile these home grown jihadist.

>> let's bring in former national security adviser for president carter mr. brzezinski. hi dad. and also chuck todd. dad, when we look at the background of these two brothers and we see that they were in the u.s. terrorism database one of them at least receiving weapons training in yemen and both of them on the no-fly list for years, clearly they may have had small beginnings but they have been developed into trained terrorists. what does this say about what is happening as the sort model of terrorism changes around the world. how does this change our way of life even here in the united states? >> it obviously threatens its essential character which is freedom, freedom of expression, sense of security and all of that. but we have to be patient and

realize that this is going to be a long haul challenge to us. and we have to also be very measured in how we conduct ourselves. the most important thing we have to do in any judgment is to avoid becoming the enemy number one of islam in the eyes of the believers in the world of islam. i think we have to draw clear lines and be patient and also be responsible. we have to preserve our reits, that is to say freedom of expression and freedom to express our views but at the same time we must avoid being provocative and unnecessarily nasty because some forms of humor directed at for example the prophet in recent times in some publications in europe were extraordinarily provocative. >> that's an extremely fine balance, ayman, that my father is trying to describe there. is point? >> he has his fingering right on the pulse of something that's

affecting the arab world. dr. brzezinski here in the united states there's a sensitivity to that. a lot of the news organizations didn't republish those cartoons even in the wake of these attacks. you talk about some of that being a bit provocative. do you feel that enough is being done in europe to not be provocative, not just on the issue of cartoons but even the former french president nicholas sarkozy made disparaging comments about the my grant communities and slums of paris when he ran for president. do you feel the european leadership speaks in the same way that someone in the u.s. speaks when it comes to trying to narrow the gap with those that are marginalized. >> we were a multiethnic society and multireligious society. so perhaps it's easier for us. it's ingrained in us that our society is a world of diversity. the european countries by and

large are ethnically and religiously more or less religiously more or less homogenous. johnson leaders have more difficulty in dealing with these problems. i don't overestimate that's the problem because obviously we are democracies, we have the freedom of expression. but it doesn't have to be measured in humor and to avoid in engaging in forms of humor and sardonnic or whatever and then becomes offensive to people who are insecure confronting modernity for the first time to find offensive and intolerable acts and can be struck up by a

fanatical movement. that's point number one. point number two in reaction against that we can't overdo what we do over there in the middle east. one of the most important things in my mind is to avoid becoming the number one enemy of the fanatics. that will turn the sharp edge of fanaticism against us and make it difficult to resolve the problems of the middle east in such a fashion that the authentic moderates in the middle east are effectively in charge. >> chuck todd fill us in on the response from president obama so far as we look at this domestically. >> i would just tell you i month the domestic security folks -- this is the type of thing that they are most concerned about. soft targets and lone wolves or small wolves a small pack like we see here which feels like a total flashback to boston when you consider watching this standoff it's two brothers

it's eerie on that front. but this is the type of thing -- the hardest thing for officials they have a lot of reporters like us who go to them and say, you know can you say definitively that is the u.s. on a higher alert because of this? and because of the difficulties in finding, breaking if it's lone wolf or a small pack and not a broad conspiracy much harder for our law enforcement to break it up. they can stop a terrorist attack that's a fairly broad conspiracy or even a small conspiracy of more than three, four five people. but when you're talking a small group of people two, three and it's brothers much harder to crack and much harder for them to reassure the public. >> dad, i'm wondering about our response in the days and weeks to come. as this comes to whatever

climatic close we'll be witnessing here in the coming hours even potentially days. but in light of what you have warned about becoming enemy number one i think you probably would have a long list of how we've already done that. what could to be done in response to this but still work to quell more attacks? >> my list, if you're referring to the french case the french are quite capable of handling it themselves. i'm thinking more of the conflict in the middle east because the conflict in the middle east is the conflict for the soul of islam. will an authentic self-assertive islamic world be moderate or will it be increasingly fanatical. the less we are engaged in anything that appears to be a struggle against islam as such the better off we'll be. years ago the previous president spoke about the war against jihadist terror. jihadist terror to islam, to

muslims means just war. a fair war. the war of convictions. we're not waging a war against jihad, jihadist terror. we're not waging a war against islam. we're first defending our own people when they get killed unfairly and two, we're helping the countries in the middle east prevail with moderate leadership at the helm. those distinctions are fundamental and that limits the scope of our engagement. >> leapt me interrupt you and report some more breaking news. nbc is reporting there's been another shooting in paris. french radio is reporting gunfire at a kosher supermarket in paris and reports of one wounded and possible hostages as well. we're hearing some side reports that this may be related to something else that happened in the hours after the massacre at

"charlie hebdo," but now new information about a new shooting incident in paris and possible hostages inside a kosher grocery store in the city of paris. >> we've been so focused, obviously, on these two suspects, that there has been almost as a side story going here the police officer shot in the early morning hours yesterday and now of course more shooting, obviously parisian authorities, french authorities have more to worry about. >> when you have one of these situations unfolding and get sewing much media attention and the person that's watching that's on the verge of saying you know go these guys they are doing the right thing and this is now my turn to help them out, enter the fight and it's too early to speculate but if that's what's happening it's a very dangerous situation for the

french authorities. >> as we look at these reports coming in of the potentially second hostage situation in paris another shooting that's just coming over the wires right now i want to bring our viewers up to date about what's happening in the industrial town about 25 miles northeast of paris just a few miles from charles de gaulle airport, dammartin-en-goele. inside there at a small printing factory, poejtentially up to seven hostages are being held. right now that printing factory is completely surrounded by air, by anti-terrorism forces and french officials all around the town. the town is in lockdown. a nearby school has been evacuated and that evacuation because the school is quite close to the location where this

latest hostage situation is being carried out, that evacuation happened with an ongoing dialogue i will say with the two brothers. french officials were able to work with them an agreeing to allow that school to be evacuated. we also know they are working on trying to solidify the dialogue with these two brothers to end this peacefully. the worry is for the hostage or hostages being held inside that printsing factory but we have two men with a history of terrorism ties with a history of being only terrorism databases and no-fly lists and that they are looking to seek a platform this period said they are prepared to die as martyrs. >> the man suspected of killing a policewoman in the southern suburb of paris on thursday before fleeing the scene was a member of the same jihadist

group as the two suspects at the attack of a local newspaper. the assailant was to believed be behind the shooting of this police officer. the man wearing a bullet proof vest carrying an assault weapon an handgun fled from the scene. two people have been arrested. again, this is -- ayman, the police shooting yesterday, the person suspected to be from the same terror cell and now, again, we have reports coming of this kosher grocery stores a shooting and reportedly a hostage taken there as well. >> we know yesterday the french authorities following that second shooting transferred that case over to the terrorism prosecutor which meant that they felt given the nature of the attack this wasn't just simply a crime or some kind of you know

criminal act simply a criminal act they felt it was terrorism related. so they immediately launched a terrorism investigation and handed over the case and the investigation to the anti-terrorism prosecutor in paris. that gives you a sense that early on they knew this was a significant shooting and not just some random act of violence. >> following the breaking news out of paris word yet of another shooting as we work on following the hostage situation in a town outside of paris involving the two brothers who carried out the massacre at "charlie hebdo" headquarters. we have with us the moderator of "meet the press," chuck todd. dr. brzezinski. and joining us from paris jeffrey goldberg. jeffrey, bring us up to date in terms of the big picture here. >> reporter: i'm getting the news that you're getting about this kosher grocery store

shooting at the same time. if this is actually happening it is part of a larger pattern. the "charlie hebdo" massacre was not the first massacre by terrorists in transin the last couple of years. there was the shooting deaths of three children and an adult at a jewish school. you know these jihadists are targeting various aspects of the french public jewish minority journalism the general public. i'm always hesitant as a reporter to tell you what the mood of an entire country is. but it does seem as if this is a shock in some ways to france over the last couple of days. on par in some ways with the shock that americans felt with 9/11 that the spanish felt

spain felt after the train attacks, london after the bus attacks, you remember. it does feel like if you will but, again, not a new, not a new phenomenon. we had last month three car attacks by lone wolves if you will, men yelling allahu akbar and driving their cars into people. there's a feeling of a siege going on. which is odd because you're in the middle of paris and paris is a delightful cosmopolitan city. >> dr. brzezinski as we've been saying this week in paris and across france there continues to be a raging debate about immigration specifically about muslim immigration. that's a battle that's been played out politically well over a decade it's not something that just magically is your passed a over the past week with

this terrible tragedy. jeffrey goldberg has written in the atlantic that the "charlie hebdo" massacre is the most direct attack on western ideas by jihadists. yet i've seen arguments advancing the idea that 9/11 represents the purrest expression of islamist rage at a specific western idea capitalism. in that case but satire and the right to express is towards modernity. >> we have to take a look more closely at the nature of the so-called satire. i've not seen what i'm about to say but i've been told by some people that some of the cartoons wereppalling and

vekt directed at the prophet. is that really humor. on three occasions some of you referred to jihadist groups jihadist terror and so forth. jihad means holy war. we're advertising them and reinforcing them in their beliefs when we talk like that. the real muslims are not waging a holy war against us. at least not yet. but the objective of the fanatics is to turn the entire muslim world against us. we have to be clever and try to avoid that while opposing these extremists, these fanatics who do not answer now, even come close to representing the world of islam. >> do you fear -- >> joe, can i? >> sure. jump in jeffrey. >> reporter: just a quick response on the point of vulgarity of cartoons.

i would just say as an american as an ad voluntary kaft of the first amendment we don't protect -- the goal is not to protect inoffensive speech we have free speech from text what many people consider offensive speech. it's immemorial whether the speech is defined as vulgar or crude. our goal in the west is to allow people to say what they want even if it's offensive and painful. that's the principle. that's sacred ideal of france. it's a sacred ideal of the u.s. on the larger point about jihad, i understand that point exactly and i've written very strongly on this point. i think that the key is to understand what's happening as in many ways a civil war within islam. there's a minority that has a certain interpretation of islam that's violent, that directs most of its violence against other muslims. other muslims make up the majority of the victims of al qaeda and isis and groups like

that and our goal should be to as the west should be to obviously defend ourselves and figure out ways to finish these groups off without growing the number of people who are attracted to these kind of groups and in france it's a perfect example. most french muslims have nothing to do with these ideology or with these groups but on the other hand we can't ignore the fact these people say they are motivated by religion and deal with the ideology as it is. >> dr. brzezinski we'll let you respond. >> i agree with that. but words are weapons and pictures can also be weapons and cartoons can be weapons and depends on how they are used. how they are defined. how they are received by people who are very sensitive, very aroused and not sometimes in our interest to promote that. so it's a matter of common sense. the basic principle is yes we value free press. >> nobody is promoting it. we're letting people express

themselves the way they want. >> look all i'm saying is why provoke people -- >> jeffrey hold on one second because we have a delay and that's causing some crosstalk here. >> and, jeffrey, we'll let you respond, go ahead. >> well, you know i -- thank you, joe. i just don't think -- yeah of course you can call on people to have common sense. i wouldn't write cartoons like that. i take blasphemy seriously. but we have to defend the principle that you don't legislate against speech that some people find as offensive, otherwise, you go down the slippery slope to.

>> reports of a shooting at a grocery store in paris. >> yes, we're looking at live video. this is the latest developing news out of paris of a second shooting. potentially related to the shooting that happened in the hours after the massacre at charlie hebdo. these live pictures show just how clearly the officers have swarmed the scene. this is at a kosher super market, we've been told. ron allen live from paris. ron, what are you hearing about this latest report of this shooting and this potential hostage situation? >> this is not happening far from us about 15 minutes from here. we saw police moving in that direction when this scene started happening ago about a half hour or so ago.

we believe the suspect is possibly the individual yesterday who carried out an attack that left a policewoman dead somewhere in the south of paris. that seeps s seems to be the indication authorities are giving us now. that individual we learned earlier today, is apparently a close friend of the kouachi brothers who are still holed up north of paris, in an area of an industrial park where they're surrounded by authorities and there's a hostage standoff going on. in the north there, with the kouachi brothers we believe there's one hostage there. at the grocery store, we're not sure. but the two events all these things do seem to be related because, again, the gunmen, the suspected gunmen appears to be a close friend of the kouachi brothers. so perhaps that's all somewhat reassuring to the public here that there are not random attacks going on but also a concern that there are more attacks going on. so a very volatile and fast-moving morning here.

the hostage standoff has been going on for a couple of hours. schools evacuated. other areas are on lockdown. it's completely cordoned off. it's unclear whether negotiations have begun. we thought there had been some communication with these suspects. but then we heard from the interior minister they were trying to establish contacts. we also heard the brothers have said they want to die as martyrs. now, how long this will all play out remains to be seen but of course the main concern is the safety of the hostage or hostages being held there right now. >> thank you so much ron. let's bring don back in. former assistant, special agent in charge of nypd joint terrorism task force. the nypd post-9/11 worked aggressively to go into mosques, muslim communities, try to figure out exactly how to stay on top of situation, to avoid

the type of thing we're seeing happening now. where you appear to have different people from within the same cell committing acts at the same time. what -- what -- what -- how do parisian authorities handle this? >> well a very difficult situation. one of the things we're hearing in this report is it's somebody affiliated with the two brothers. originally when the story unfolded, the one young man that turned himself in and said he had no part of this thing, that he was in school and apparently there are other witnesses that can attest he was at school at the time. so, you know, in my mind there's some question then who was the driver of the vehicle. could this third person be the driver? who knows. obviously speculating at this point. but it certainly is a question that needs to be asked.

to your point about, you know, gathering intelligence and trying to figure out who these people are and, you know, get them to identify them before they act, this is a tough situation for law enforcement. obviously, you need to be out in the community. you need to be doing outreach. we've kind of talked all morning about how do you really prevent these people from acting. post-9/11 we've put a lot of weight on law enforcement intelligence and military to prosecute this war on terror but only recently we've heard the word cve, the letters, counterviolent extremism. programs to get people before they enter this path of violent extremism. how do you get them to go down a different path and integrate with society. and now this is some of the things we're wrestling with in the u.s. clearly the situation is worse in europe. >> as we look at the history of these two brothers you're

looking at the history of the home grown terror cell. as we watch these pictures unfold before our eyes are their accomplishes how many people were involved in this is it worth noting these two brothers made it close to charles de gaulle airport. they are now in a small town 25 miles northeast of paris holed up in a printing factory with potentially up to seven hostages inside with them. that standoff is taking place in that small town outside of paris, where there is potentially dialogue under way. we know french officials were able to evacuate a school with their permission and say they are trying to keep the dialogue going with the the two brothers in danmartin-en-goele. now live pictures from paris, another potential hostage situation at a kosher supermarket.

it took place in literally the past 10 15 20 minutes. and there are reports this may be related to another shooting where a female police officer was killed in paris hours after the massacre at charlie hebdo headquarters. so covering multiple scenes here, that could potentially all be related. you see s.w.a.t. teams and police officers have swarmed this supermarket where this potential second standoff is taking place. so let me bring in from boston the former chief of the boston police department dan lynnski, the incident commander during the marathon bombing. chuck todd noted how similar the boston marathon bombing story with the two brothers and taking a city under siege and basically locking it down and holding it hostage, is now playing out in the city of paris. and the country of france. dan, what can you tell us about anything that might be happening with the negotiations in the small town outside paris, given the fact we know these are

trained terrorists who acted in a methodical fashion who murdered 12 people and seemed to be making their way to the airport? >> you're going to have the french officials set up an incident command for the overall country. they're going to sign an incident commander to each one. and there's two different missions going on. there's a hostage negotiation mission where hostage negotiation technicians are trying to get a rapport with these people see if they can talk themselves out of a shootout with police where they're going to die. at the same time, the tactical commanders are developing tactical plans where they can go as quickly as possible and mitigate loss of life. so there's two operations going on simultaneously. the incident commander's evaluating that. if facts and circumstances dictate the need to go in they

will. at the same time they're protecting the perimeter, keeping the public out, and also prepared to respond to other locations. this could be two of six, eight, ten attacks. this might be a signal to somebody else to move. so you need to keep forces in reserve. at the same time you need to make sure you don't have people running around and self-deploying. you have to very strategically put your teams in. and that they're doing things within their training. also you have to start worrying about fatigue. these officers have s haves have been running and gunning since the incident went on. you have to keep officers in reserve. you don't know if this is an hour or 72 hours. so you have to put some officers offline so you can put officers well rested with their minds in the game and able to implement their training. >> don. >> yeah, the chief is absolutely right. one of the things that you're trying to do with a hostage situation is you're developing two plans at the same time.

one would be an emergency assault plan. and that would be triggered by some type of a violent action by the subjects loss of life and then the team would go in much like what we saw in australia. the second plan would be a delib ralt assault plan that would be more of a choreographed plan designed to do more of a rescue type situation. >> we're watching a scene unfolding dramatically before us here. this is in paris. this is a second hostage situation potentially. we are hearing there are hostages inside a kosher supermarket in paris. this has just broken in the past 20 minutes as we've been covering the hostage situation inside of paris pertaining to the two brothers who carried out the massacre in the past 55 hours at the charlie hebdo satirical newspaper where 12 people were murdered. 25 miles northeast of paris, they are being surrounded there and negotiated with but now we are watching police s.w.a.t.

teams and anti-terrorism officials try and surround this supermarket where apparently there has been a shooting incident and a wounded -- at least one wounded and potential potentially hostages. we're haeearing this could be related to the shooting that happened hours after the massacre where a female officer was killed as well. we have multiple situation happening in paris as terrorism takes hold of the city. >> and obviously, following breaking news all morning that's unfolding in the manhunt for the french brothers suspected of carrying out the paris terror attack. again, as mika said right now, there are two standoffs. the latest one, nbc news reports, there's been another shooting in paris. there are multiple reports of gunfire at a kosher supermarket here. and reports of one wounded. and possible hostages as well. and of course meanwhile, the main story we've been covering north of the city there's a massive operation under way near

paris to capture the two brothers who were surrounded by police. this is happening at a printing press right now in a small industrial town near charles de gaulle airport. and 25 miles northeast of paris. we are nbc's richard engel on the air and he said it allspotted at an industrial park and they ran into a nearby business. there may be up to seven hostages. owned by a husband, wife and their child works there as well. hostage negotiations are under way with the brothers. >> this is obviously incredibly challenging that these two men have deep ties with terrorism. one receiving weapons training in yemen. meeting with al qaeda leaders. and also one radio interview in france with a man whose car was

stolen by the suspects on wednesday said they seemed to be profession professional, in mission mode, wearing paramilitary gear. adding they were not sweating and didn't show any signs of stress. he said the two brothers told him to say "it is al qaeda in yemen" when the media asks who's behind the attack. so a platform being developed by home grown terror cells being put together by these two brothers. and the question we have now, as we continue to cover the story, is whether or not they have accomplishes, whether or not these other locations where we have shooting incidents and even a potential hostage situation is connected. officials say the men told negotiateors "we want to die as martyrs." these are the two brothers holed up in the town outside of paris. officials say contact was initiated to safely evacuate a school. the children from the school are telling their stories of being frightened and hearing the police cars and s.w.a.t. teams

going by. the suspects did agree to allow those students to be evacuated. a 16-year-old student at a locked down school says everyone was frightened and it was shocking. take it away. >> one point i was going to say, given the nature of this second hostage situation at a kosher supermarket, you can't ignore the fact it is a kosher supermarket and that, in itself, is significant. just because of the fact it is a place where jews go to buy groceries. obviously, it could be a potential target given that. what happened this last summer in france there were a lot of riots. a kosher supermarket was also attacked back in some of the demonstrations that happened in the summer. when you try to piece all this together, that's an important piece to where this individual went to try to make a statement with the target. >> saying this is a shooting and

hostage taking attack and they have multiple hostages inside and wounded at the scene. they have top security officials at the scene. i've just asked our desk -- very curious to know -- we know how delis are run. what kind of -- what is happening inside. because they could all be watching. i'm curious to know how paris -- how french television -- how this is all playing out. >> that's a good point. >> we're looking at specific key positions right now. >> and right now a lot of the news reports coming out of the wires, don, are suggesting there's five hostages. including women and children. obviously, you now have two hot situations. one in paris at the kosher grocery store. and one 25 miles outside of paris, where you may also have as many as five six hostages.

>> very delicate and dangerous situation. and excellent point about the media coverage. we saw what happened in mum buybai, that the attackers were using the media to their tactical advantage. they knew what law enforcement was doing. they knew what was going to be going on in other locations. the french need to be careful about controlling the amount of information. obviously, public safety is important. you want the word out about what's going on in certain situations. you want to get the public informed so they can help you. but you don't want to tip your hand to the bad guys and let them know what the authorities are up to. >> you can see in some those images, there are tactical police involved. this is not just a shot from the distance that doesn't give any kind of specifics. you can see the number of force that's present. you can see some of their movement toward that destination. >> the suspected gunman at the kosher grocery store is

suspected to be an individual linked to the the two brothers. that this could be related to the shooting of a policewoman yesterday. don, these smoke signals that are going up and you don't know who's watching what and what that means in terms of a mouse trap trigger. >> right. we have to be very careful too. we've seen it so many timeses where you have these very volatile situations. the first information that comes out isn't always the most accurate information. but right now, it does appear based on the report that they're connected. and hopefully as was pointed out earlier, that may be a good thing, in that this is not just some type of a copycat that's going to build momentum where other people that are sitting on the fence will go okay now it's my turn to jump in. that would be the worst situation possible. >> let a bring in right now a former defense department official, now nbc news terrorism

analyst, michael shael. >> right now, the greatest fear for the french is that there will be copycats that people will be inspired by this act, by other media from the very media conscious al qaeda in isis that they may start to also act and create a very chaotic situation in france. but right now, hopefully they'll be able to contain both of these situation, and resolve them quickly and peacefully. or else france is going to be roiled in a major chaotic situation for quite a while. >> what you're watching again is a second dramatic scene. this one inside paris. the suspect in the grocery store shooting, and this is the scene we're looking at right here close-up shots, could be the individual who fatally shot a policewoman yesterday. that would be in the hours after the massacre that we started covering live on this show about 55 hours ago.

the suspected gunman at this kosher supermarket is believed to be holding hostages and believed to be a close friend of the kouachi brothers who are also holed up in a printing factory and a town outside of paris about 25 miles northeast of paris, danmartin-en-goele. they are heavily surrounded by air and on the ground. they are holding potentially seven hostages. we have two hostage situations unfolding. one inside paris where the massacre happened and one 25 miles northeast of paris near charles de gaulle airport. >> with us is congressman peter king. he's a member of the house homeland security committee. peter, obviously this has been an ongoing concern, not only across the west and europe but also across the united states.

these type of terror attacks. what are your thoughts as you look at what's unfolding in paris? >> you have mike sheehan on. he's the expert. my belief on this is what happened in paris could happen in the united states it could happen today, tomorrow. and that's why we constantly try to be on guard. for the last 13 years against. mike was saying in some ways this is better this is part of a concerted effort in paris rather than copycats. that's probably true for the short term. but in the long term it could show the al qaeda of the arabian peninsula has embedded itself in paris. we wonder how many other cells are in there. this is part of an overall operation, is it being directed from yemen? is there such an infrastructure in france itself they can carry out this type of coordinated attack? >> are you surprised by that peter, they are able to carry out this coordinated attack? >> this is the type of thing

you've seen on the committee? >> no i'm not surprised. this is in many ways one of our worst fears. especially in europe a country like france which has a large muslim population. and in many ways a very hostile muslim population. they're isolated from the mainstream of society. they've had so many foreign fighters go to fight with isis. they've been -- many sympathizers in the community. when i say many it's a small percentage, but as you see, 3, 56 people can carry out terrible attacks like this. we were very concerned about this being brought back. and also particularly when it comes to france because they do have this very hostile population. >> all right. on the screen, you're watching a situation unfolding at a supermarket in paris. on the right side of course danmartin-en-goele where the two brothers are holed up in a

printing factory. let's bring in nbc chief global correspondent bill neely who's about five miles from the scene, in the standoff in the small town in paris. bill what can you tell us? >> well we're now into the fifth or sixth hour of this incident but it's quite clear, these two incidents are linked. the latest as you say, developing in the last hour. there is a man with a kalashnikov in a jewish supermarket but we understand that he may be in fact a friend of the kouachi brothers who are in the siege, that i'm standing close to now. so french police who were very reluctant to link these two incidents, the shooting of a policewoman yesterday, and the massacre at the magazine two days ago, there is clearly, now, a link. we've got two sieges and at least three gunman involved in this. here it's quite clearly the end game. i mean these two brothers are

totally surrounded by french anti-terror units. by s.w.a.t. teams. there have been helicopters hovering over the buildings earlier this morning. the hostage negotiator has spoken to these men. a french lawmaker has said that the men said we are prepared and we are ready to die as martyrs. but it does look very much here like the end game, but with the hostage, that is the priority saving the hostage's life. that will be on the minds of police at the moment. >> bill neely reporting from very close to the scene, on the right side of your screen it's danmartin-en-goele. where the two brothers who carried out the massacre in paris about 50 hours ago are holed up with about seven hostages. bill neely hearing from french police there's a link between that massacre and the murder of a female policewoman in the

hours after in paris. and now to what you're seeing on the left side of your screen which is close-up shots of a hostage situation being carried out at a kosher supermarket, back in paris. kim gatis, your final thoughts as this story does not culminate in that small town anymore. >> no it is -- and i'm wondering whether french police are trying to make sure they get those two brothers alive so they can get some information from them as well. even though those two brothers say they want to die as martyrs. on my mind is actually the fact that my sister lives in paris with her two kids and husband. you know we come from beirut. you sort of wonder, you know, where do you go now to feel safe. it's important to remember that back in the '80s, france did see a string of bomb attacks that caused a lot of terror but this, what we're seeing today, is of a different register. what you had in the 80s, some of

the attacks were conducted by palestinian groups. they had a specific cause. they were considered terrorists at the time. they are legitimate partners at a negotiating table today, looking for a state. what is troubling, what is very scary, with the the two brothers we're seeing today, with some of these groups today, is that it is much more neoistic. it is apparently just about killing. i think that is very scary for people in paris and across the western world at the moment. >> kim gatis, thank you very much for being with us this morning. we're, again, watching breaking news unfolding inside the city of paris, where apparently gunman related to two brothers who carried out the massacre at charlie hebdo are holding hostagings. we're told up to five inside this supermarket. we're watching at police and s.w.a.t. teams are trying to stake out the perimeter.

at this rapidly evolving situation. you can also see they're moving now with heavily -- with weapons trying to keep their eyes on ways going on inside the supermarket. some reports indicating there are women and children inside that supermarket which would make sense given the time of day and location. this is just one of two dramatic scenes and three stories that have unfolded in the past 55 hours in and outside of paris, starting with the massacre at charlie hebdo. then a female police officer being shot in paris in the hours after. then the two brothers holing up in a printing factory in a small town outside of paris. we thought we would be witting inning the end but now word of a shooting in a supermarket and now more hostages inside paris. >> the bbc news reporting the kosher deli gunman said you know who i am and i'm going to keep these hostages until the siege

is lifted. suggesting that there is direct linkage between the brothers and this gunman in paris. >> like you've been saying all morning, this is france's worst nightmare. hopefully there's some -- we have the right outcome here and we can have some lessons coming out of this and how we can prepare for it in a way it doesn't undermined our liberties, in a way it doesn't come together, and try to fight this kind of thing. >> those negotiations just got, if it's possible even more complicated. >> extremely. you've got two volatile scenes with tactical officers trying to come up with plans on how to resolve the situation at both. the other thing that's going on behind the scenes that's just as important is gathering all of the intelligence to figure out who are the -- what does the network of these guys look like. are there others that want to

jump in and lend support? who are their inner circle, their friends and family? who else could be involved who could support these guys in any way possible? >> and if they have any communication with each other. i think that's a piece of critical information. the timing of of this does not seem to be spontaneous. almost seemed when the situation began to develop early this morning on the outskirts of paris, then this individual activated his plan to do this -- >> and that could help if in fact, they are trying to communicate, assuming the french authorities have the ability to interception those communications. >> you have talked about the possibility of copycats in france. do you think there's any concern in our government about copycats here in the states? >> i think there's always concern. any time you see a situation like this whether it's canada or australia, now here in france, you always worry about some -- somebody watching it and that's just, you know the one

final straw that's going to break the camel's back and they're going to try to do the same thing. obviously, it's a concern. law enforcement will be there, trying to make sure their intelligence networks are in place to get tipped off ahead of time. as we've seen when these guys don't convey their plans to anybody and it just -- you know watching one youtube video is what it takes to set them off. it's difficult. >> all right. we're watching a hostage situation unfolding at a supermarket inside paris now. let's bring in nbc news producer chapman bell live on the scene, niche the scene of this second shooting in paris, hostage situation in paris. >> i've just arrived here at the scene. about an hour ago. we saw multiple police officers driving through whereporte de vincent, where the memorial was

held and now there are officers in full riot gear officers with sidearms several of them in vans moving closer to the scene. they've cordoned off the area. looking down where the supermarket is you see lots of ambulances. there are many police cars. you know they're armed with shields. even backed up on the road behind the supermarket, there are rows of police vehicles heavily armed police that seem to be going in in units. so it's a high police presence here. there's a helicopter in the sky. a helicopter overseeing everything. in terms of the number of hostages we've been told it could be -- there could be as many as five people inside. but this is ongoing. it looks like police are getting in position.

i don't have any details of what their plan is. >> stay on the line with us and let us know if there's anything new to report as we watch this angle of that part of the story. the second shooting and hostage situation inside paris at a supermarket. >> we actually see right now extraordinary -- >> chilling. >> quite frankly, extraordinary that authorities are allowing these pictures to be taken. the last shot we showed just had s.w.a.t. teams lining i and taking aim, we suspect, at the grocery store, where a hostage -- where up to five hostages have been taken. the reason why the bbc reporting this, because of the siege that's going on northeast of paris. >> still with us on the phone from boston former chief of boston police department dan linski, who was the incident commander during the boston marathon bombing, which has some eerie parallels, at least one part of the story. if i can just ask you, from what

we're hearing, there's a link between what's happening at the supermarket in paris, that the attackers know each other, and the small town, the printing factory where the two brothers are holed up holding hostages as well. obviously, making negotiations very difficult. and even some indication from reporting we've heard, they're sort of playing off these two scenes against each other, which must make it a very delicate balancing act for anybody negotiating on the phone. >> the negotiator wants to cut off the outside world from the people they're talking with. so the suspects they're talking with, the terrorists they're talking with if there's a way they can cut off power, cut off any tv feeds they might have jam any phones. you don't know if they're talking to each other. there's also concern they're taking direction from yemen. we saw that during the mumbai assaults where the controllers were actually outside the country directing the terrorists on how to do it.

so one of the challenges is to cut off communications. to have them only communicating with you, if possible. the other thing, if possible we shouldn't put up tactical locations on the screen. they can use those pictures to take away the element of surprise. one of the only edges police have in these types of situations. >> okay. i'd wait. we do have breaking news coming in but we're going to double source of. of potential casualties. we have chris dickey back from paris. two hours ago when we went on it is aair, we thought we had the story surrounded. where the the two brothers were surrounded and holding hostages. one way or another, it appeared to be the culmination of this terrorist tragedy, really happening inside france. but now, we've got two live scenes and potentially some sort of communication or link between

them. which makes the story, believe it or not, even more complicated. what are you hearing? >> well, pretty much the same things that you're hearing. it is more complicated. certainly a lot worse. for all of yesterday, after the initial killing of a policewoman in south paris, early in the morning, there was a lot of talk that maybe it wasn't related, maybe it didn't have any link. maybe superficially, a lot of ties. now it seems pretty clear it was tied. there are these two parallel actions going on. among other things the question is, are there more people out there? this kind of thing could be organized. particularly if it's got a mastermind, whether in yemen or any other place, who is able to pull all this together. then we are looking at really a very dangerous situation. and it also shows that how with minute pal meanenpal, with minimal

means you can attract the world's attention and basically put a whole continent on edge. >> although we don't know the extent of minimal at this point, we know we have three potentially, three men involved with ties to training in yemen. both of the two brothers holding hostages outside of paris have links to al qaeda. and carried out an attack that was not clearly the attack of a crazy set of lone wolves but developed trained terrorists. and now potentially a second hot spot where hostages -- >> let's go back to our nbc news producer chapman bell who is on the scene. a lot of activity. tell us about it. >> yes, it's just moments ago, about -- at least ten more police vans filled with heavily armed police. they're all lined up. along the road. there must be at least 20 more

vans filled with the same number of police behind me. they're just setting up to be ready for -- there are also reports two people have died in this so far. to be ready for whatever may come. the helicopter, monitoring this situation. they're being very strict people kept at a distance. as i've own the phone with you now, there appear to be two ambulances holing up inside of the location. it appears one of them may be leaving the scene now. yeah, it looks like it's leaving the scene. two french ambulances are pulling away from inside. so i don't know if it's -- if it's possibly the injured or

those who have been killed. but they're pulling away. it looks like they're leaving the scene now. >> they're pulling away now. don barelli, afp we saw broke, had breaking news several minutes ago that two people had been killed inside the kosher grocery store. if that is the case and it appears that officials on the scene are confirming that it is tell us how that changes how the hostage taker is addressed by law enforcement once people start dying. >> the rules of engagement are going to be very narrow at that point. if this person has already shown himself to kill hostages the french authorities are not going to want to lose any more hostages. so it's likely the rules of engagement would be something along the lines of if you -- you know, if there's any more shots

fired, any more lives taken, go ahead and launch a deliberate assault. that's probably why you saw so many officers moving into position to be able to do an assault like that. it takes a lot of tactical officers to launch a rescue situation. depends on the size of the location. how hard it is to breach the doors. all these things takes specialized training. >> i also wonder if this kosher supermarket is in a residential building, like they are here in new york where you can have the supermarket in the same building as a residential area and some of these buildings you see on screen they certainly look residential. there may be some deliberate hostages. if there's anything else in the building -- >> you talked about terrorists who are trained for the assault and how it appeared to be relatively well trained terrorists. do you think they're at all trained for this kind of siege, the terrorists themselves how to handle a situation like this?

>> it's very difficult to say. it seems like the plan has started to fall apart after the initial assault on the newspaper. clearly, they're dedicated, they have weapons training and they weren't afraid to engage with the police. most kind of, you know people that look to take on a soft target would see a police vehicle and move on to a different soft target. but that did not deter these guys. they were not afraid to take on the police. >> i wonder if it's a sense of fatalism or part of their strategy. >> it could be part of both actually. >> they have kind of said according to the reports, that they want to die, in some of the initial contact they've made. what we've seen in these extremist elements who have taken situations like this in the past their success is based on martyrdom. this is what they want to happen. this showdown. >> which makes negotiating kind of difficult at this point. it's 8:30 eastern time in new

york city. 2:30 paris time. we are following breaking news in now three areas in and around paris. we'll start in a town 25 miles northeast of paris. danmartin-en-goele, france right near charles de gaulle airport, the two brothers who carried out the massacre at charlie hebdo are holed up in a small printing factory in this industrial town of about 8,000 people. that is where the show began at 6:00 eastern time, when we thought the culmination of the massacre and manhunt was coming to an end in this small town. up to seven hostages there. and word of some negotiation with the two brothers inside who have ties with terrorist groups al qaeda and weapons training. we have discovered. and were on databases as well as no fly lists. these two brothers talking with hostage negotiators about evacuating a nearby school and about what happens next. and then we find that there was

another shooting that happened hours after the massacre where a female paris police officer was murdered. we didn't know if that was isolated. we now find out that may be related to what we're looking at right now in paris at the scene of this hostage situation. on the location of a kosher supermarket, which is unfolding dramatically right now in the past few moments. we're getting word of two people killed. and potentially police officers armed in sniper gear. the one manholed up there, potentially killing two, linked to the two brothers in the small town in paris who carried out the massacre apparently friends with them. according to some reporting we've read the two scenes and the hostage takers at both scenes playing those scenes off each other as negotiators try to bring this to a peaceful end.

>> a lot coming at you right now from obviously breaking news on two fronts in france. what's your take? >> the irony here is this started off with a terrorist attack on a free press. and now that same free press is giving these terrorists exactly what they want. the coverage of this incident is amplifying the attack of these two, three persons, enjoying a showdown. radical islamists. and apparently our media is amplifying what they want. i think the authorities are going to understand that and will probably pressure them to move rapidly to resolve this situation. >> we've seen that in france. also, we were commenting on this new show several years ago about how two brothers with a crude home

homemade bomb held an entire american city a great american city hostage for several days. literally shot this city down. and had weeks and weeks of nonstop coverage on it. >> this is a very eraerily similar situation. the fact they're brothers is not a coincidence. they trust family members and are suspicious going beyond that because they may run into an informant. the parallels are exactly that. and right now, like paris, shutting down a major western city in paris, just two or three individuals. they really need to resolve this as quickly as possible especially since hostages have already been killed in a second incident. i think they're going to move on this i would imagine fairly quickly. >> don, would you agree, that french authorities are not going to allow this to go around the clock, especially with two people killed already at this kosher grocery store in paris?

>> absolutely mike is spot on. negotiation negotiations. we use the term negotiation like maybe there's progress being made but this seems to be more of a stall tactic just to get media time. for every minute the world watches this the terrorist strike up a little mini win. i think the french will want to get this thing resolved. >> ron fornier, what do the media do? >> do not fall into the trap. again, certain networks camped out in boston for a month after that tragedy took place. it was two brothers with crude bombs, home made bombs, that shut that city down. >> let's not forget it was two brothers with homemade bombs that shut the city down not the

media. if we didn't cover them if we didn't shine a light on what these monsters are doing, we would not be doing our job. so we shouldn't be showing shots that give away tactic advantage to the terrorists. we should not hold these monsters up as heroes. there's no bravery going on with these terrorists. i wouldn't use words like that. we have to be responsible in how the perpetrators the monsters work with police so we're not undermining their jobs. people have a right to know what's happening. >> the questions we will be asking in the days and weeks to come will be how these brothers flew under the radar, literally. because they were being monitored to an extent. both were on the u.s. no fly database. there were attempted terrorist

attacks in paris in the weeks before this so the city was on alert to an extent. we are hearing the elder brother trained to yemen to be trained by al qaeda. one source saying it lasted several months. cherif kouachi is the older break was part of a documentary on islamic extremism back in '05 and in '08 he was sentenced to three years in prison for helping funnel militant fighters to iraq. release, though after 18 months. so they have a history. they're not randoms from, you know a small town somewhere that sort of just obsessed with the internet. these are trained terrorists. >> michael, the united states even had our focus on them and our eyes on them. questions obviously will be raised about why the french didn't keep them more closely in hand. >> no question about it. they'll probably have something -- some similar investigation like our 9/11 report that you can expose the errors that they had, but it's

very difficult. we knew about the boston bombers. the russian intelligence service tipped them off about them. so it's not unusual that the terrorists that operate around the world and conduct successful attacks are known to law enforcement. we're just going to have to get better at tracking these people and perhaps enlisting more law enforcement personnel in order to keep them under surveillance 24/7. it's impossible for the fbi with the amount of agents they have in the united states to track everyone. they're going to need some help i think from other agencies. >> ammon, you're looking at a report, french authorities have now named two other people wanted by french police. >> that's right, these are two individuals, a man and woman they believe are connected in yesterday's homicide with the terrorist, the one that involved the policewoman shooting. they've been identified, their names have been and they released pictures. two individuals who police are now issuing a bulletin letting

people know they're armed and dangerous. >> this is a quote from the police. we invite anyone having information about the whereabouts of these two individuals that we are about to show you to contact the paris police department. this is how they describe them. we're about to show you. these people expected to be armed and dangerous are wanted. this may also mean have warrants for arrest. someone's going to have to confirm this. they're wanted in connection to a terrorism related homicide. that would be the murder of the female police officer. >> in montrouge yesterday. >> right, just hours after the massacre. it appears the people wanted in that homicide are also in this grocery store. >> this is a bigger -- >> holding hostages. >> that is all the initial indicate based on some communication that has come out

from the grocery store. and the situation, as our bill neely was reporting, they believe there's a linkage. if there's a linkage between the grocery store and the incident outside of paris, we also know that in some capacity, yesterday's shooting was linked to the shooting situation that is unfolding today. >> we're showing a picture of two suspects right now. one obviously early 30s. and actually one in her late 20s. obviously, the young woman does not fit the -- fit what we've been talking about over the past couple of days about young angry disaffected males. >> it's unusual to have a woman as part of their cell. but this is very troubling. it's showing that the cell is broader in nature. that they've been around for a while, planning out this

operation. really, very much in the interest of the french to capture at least one or two of these people alive. if all four end up dead they'll have questions to uncover. >> the problem is that's part of their plan, to die as martyrs. >> this goes back ton the french authorities wanting to end this as quickly as possible obviously. that is not going to line up with the hope of being able to keep one or two alive. >> all of the actions the french authorities take is going to be based on the safety of the hostages first. second if they can launch some type of an attack or some type of an operation to not only rescue the hostages but to capture these people alive and

to figure out, you know, what their intelligence, what their network is. seems like it keeps growing. that just points to the fact they really need to get their hands around this cell. is it 4, is it 8, is it 10? is it all local in france? a lot of questions. >> ron fornier, we've been talking about the impact of actually airing these sort of stories, whether it's boston whether it's sydney whether it's paris. we do live in a global village now. and what happens in the streets of paris impacts our debate on nsa. what happens in the streets of australia impacts on what americans -- we had jason on earlier today talking about how he didn't trust the government to have too much authority. we had general hayden on yesterday, saying those wonderful debates we had a year

year and a half ago, on nsa and data collection he said i'm guessing americans are waking up this morning saying they want authorities to have as much data as possible so they can move as quickly as possible. hard not to believe after the isis beheadings that every one of these stories doesn't have a profound impact on the american electorate and what they're willing to let their intelligence authorities do to keep the country safe. >> we've seen after 9/11 how far we've lurched after each one of these events. we're going to be spending the next 10 or 20 years having this debate about how far do we go to protect ourselves and how much of our liberties do we have to give up. you know, we're talking about france here. it's interesting. they knew these guys were bad. they knew they had to be under surveillance.

they didn't have enough human intelligence. enough boots on the ground to put them under surveillance. at the same time we're putting all this money into metadata. we have to think about our priorities as a society. >> the boston bombing still happened. there are going to be questioned about -- because these are attacks -- i think you were saying there's a certain degree of simplicity about it. they've been able to wreak this havoc with a few weapons, a car and some magazines, ammunition. this is not sophisticated car bombs, sophisticated explosives. the degree of sophistication of spectacular attacks, madrid bombings, london bombings showed a certain amount of sophistication to get the bomb in, to detonate them. in this case it will be interesting to see if there is meta intelligence about how they were communicating, how they got

their weapons. >> obviously, it's not an either/or. my concern is it's so much easier to invest money into technology and grab our technologies. it's harder to invest money in men and women, get them on the ground, risk them. the more we get scared the more incidents like this happen the better chance we'll make easy or bad decisions. >> we certainly have watched a story unfold in i don't know 55 hours ago, start with potentially two home grown terrorists to maybe a home grown terror cell to potentially looking at the development of a network that has more dynamics and dimensions than we previously thought. when you look at these two photographs that have been released according to french radio by french police. a woman and a man both born in their -- in the '80s. two french last names, for whatever it's worth.

from what we surmise, from french radio, there's a connection between the murder of a female french police officer hours after the massacre at charlie hebdo with these two suspects and what's going on inside the supermarket right now that you see pictures of where two people apparently have been killed and hostages are being held by suspects who have links to the two brothers who carried out the massacre at the satirical newspaper in paris where this all began. and those two brothers are holed up inside a printing plant in a town 25 miles outside paris, near charles de gaulle airport. and they apparently are holding hostages as well. so every time we find ourselves talking about sort of these smaller radicals that are sort of inspired by -- we're finding more that there are deep-seated links to al qaeda. >> and you can tell from the name of that woman that she's obviously of arab descent. that's an arab name 100%. the gentleman, i'm not so sure

about. his identity could possibly be west africa mali. a large muslim population. >> hayat boumeddrene, isn't that french? >> it's a arab name but it's been frankized, if you will. >> obviously, the president has always been, the life of the hostages is paramount, but given how hard it is to get this intelligence, is it possible that the impetus for the necessity to keep somebody alive could start becoming more of a concern than even the life of the hostages? how much is the need for that intelligence factoring into the minds of those on the ground? >> i think it's a need but i think the life of the hostages trumps every other aspect. >> the lives of the tactical officers involved.

when you go into a situation like this if you are facing hostile fire, you're not trying to shoot somebody in the leg with the hope of keeping them alive. so you can talk to then late. you're trying to neutralize the threat. and that means, you know kill shots. while they would like some type of operation where they can use flash bang grenades or use other kinds of diversion tactics, incapacitate them and that is so dangerous. >> that's what happened in australia when they stormed the sydney cafe. then we realized in that operation there were hostages that were killed in addition to the individuals. >> joy, you point joe, you pointed out something earlier that shows their power base and platform has grown exponentially since the story first broke, if you can even believe it given the fact they carried out a massacre

in a newsroom. the links between the two sets of hostage takers sort playing off these negotiations playing off these two scenes. >> yes, it certainly is again, don, one of the great concerns. that you don't have the situation that we had in sydney australia where you had a lone wolf or where you had a man who was mentally off kilter to begin with who had gotten in trouble repeatedly, who had these grand visions of -- of himself. in this case you have two brothers who have been -- >> in operation. >> fairly coordinated and also calculated. reports from the man whose car was hijacked that even yesterday, when they'd been pursued by law enforcement officers for well over a day, they were calm calculated weren't sweating and gave the

man clear direction. this is, again, this is so far -- so different than what we saw in boston or what we saw in sydney. >> absolutely. we've seen these guys have a -- display a level of training weapons, discipline, these type of things. the chief made a good point earlier about cutting off the communications. one of the things you would not want to have is that in an action is taking place at one location, that would spark a second reaction. so i'm assuming the french have done everything they need to do to basically put these two situations in isolation. >> we have clarity now from the press officer at the prosecutor's office through an nbc producer saying there is a link between the shooter of the female police officer in montrouge and the two responsible for the charlie hebdo shooting the massacre but also the hostage taker we're

watching in the scene right now is most probably the montrouge shooter, the person who shot the police officer. >> she couldn't confirm how many hostages were in the grocery store but confirmed there were many there because it was the shopping morning before the sabbath, amman moyadin told us earlier this morning, brought up the attacks this summer of synagogues. obviously, this puts paris on higher alert. >> well it isn't just that joe, it's not just this isn't part and parcel of the anti-semitism people worry about here in france. this is actually out of a standard -- almost out of a standard terrorist playbook. three years ago, there was a terrorist down in the south of france mohammad mera who started out killing french soldiers that he would lure to various places and murder them. when he felt that the police were after him, he thought,

well, what's the best target i can go to. i can go to a jewish school and massacre some children and adults there. which is exactly what he did. even in mumbai in mumbai one of the targets was a jewish target. and i think there's an understanding among the terrorists that that is one of the ways of amplifying their message. within their particular world, they think that may gain them sympathy but they know it gains them headlines. >> we're getting word from folks from nbc news on the phone in danmartin that french tv is reporting one hostage was released. richard engel is efforting inging confirmation on that but that would show some sign of negotiating happening if that's true. >> what we've been asking our guests about, the hostages and how that impacts the situation here tell us how, how, what

your take is. >> well they've shown they're not unwilling to kill hostages. your tactical commander needs to be ready to go in. but you have to balance the need to go in and make a quick attack against the safety of other hostages. they might have just released that hostage from the scene. they want to drag this out as long as they can. so maybe if they gave a hostage up they figured they'd buy themselves some time. the first opportunity you can to make a tactical assault that's the safest because you're never going to ensure the safety of your troops. the safest alternative for your troops. and maximizes the potential of hostages not being injured. these are also going to draw large crowds. and the challenge for the french police is going to be protect their franklanks and their perimeter.

if these two individuals they're looking for come up behind this crowd with weapons or a device we're going to have more situations on hand. you have to be thinking ahead. thinking like the terrorists. i'd put up protection around the hospitals to make sure if people are injured and they go to the hospitals, which you'll see a large influx of people that that doesn't become a terrorist location to attack as well. you have to stay ahead of where these guys are thinking and try and get in there as quickly as possible to end this siege. >> mikey kay, we have seen the crowds beginning to build. >> yes, absolutely paramount for the security forces. then the seat ofafety of the hostages civilians. one thing that's absolutely paramount is the contagion aspect. what we don't want is this situation to occur for too long and people to get the idea tactically they can start

getting away with this. at the strategic level, it needs to be nipped in the bud as soon as possible. because if people feel fuelling this sort of ideology if people feel they can get away with this, that's not a great thing, not just for paris but other urban centers around europe. >> does time favor the hostage takers or does it favor the police? we're going to be heading into nighttime nighttime. does that play an advantage? do you expect them to use nighttime vision to do that? >> now that they've been able to -- a hostages that has been released, they'll get as much intelligence from that hostage as possible and try to figure out the mind-set of these guys. the other dynamic everybody's touched on here is that as time goes to a certain point and others might feel like okay

now it's my turn to jump in and be inspired by this that's a risk. trying to find that sweet spot of how long to drag this on how long to gather intelligence and try to watch an operation that's going to be done in say, as safe a manner as possible -- >> because of the nature of this attack, who do you think makes that decision? how high in the french government is a decision like that will go? >> i would say all the way to the top. >> if i could close the loop on something you talked about. you said one of the priorities of authorities here is to cut off communications between the two sets of terrorists. without talking specifically about sources and methods, how effective can authorities be now in cutting off all the different ways of communicating now a days? do you think it's 100% they'll be able to cut them off? >> they can do things like cut

electricity and things like that but you don't know, you know, who has cell phones do the hostages have cell phones and ipads and whatever. in terms of completely cutting off -- >> is there electric jamming -- >> sure they can do things like that. there's technical equipment that can be used to cut communications. >> this is 100% effective or -- >> listen i would never, ever say everything is 100% effective. sometimes technology fails you. there's something out there that's unforeseen. you want to leave yourself a margin of error. >> all right dan linski we appreciate your help with the coverage. about three hours ago, we went on the air, covering the standoff taking place in the small industry town about 25 miles northeast of paris. that town is danmartin en goele, where inside a small printing factory, the two brothers who

carried out the massacre of 12 people in a new paper in paris, charlie hebdo, the satirical newspaper, had fled led them to the printing factory in danmartin, france. we thought we were covering the end of this story, but there are reports that one hostage has been released. we can't confirm that yet. but what we can tell you is there is an open phone line between hostage negotiate es sors and those two brothers as terrorism experts and police try to bring that scene to a close. within the past three hours, two other stories developed that link to what is going on inside that printing factory. there was a shooting at a kosher supermarket in paris. and hostages now are being held inside that supermarket as well. there is word that two people may have been killed inside that supermarket. we did watch ambulances rush in and out of the scene.

we also were given pictures of two people -- >> there are also local reports that at least six hostages have been taken there. and police say the man on right is the gunman and that both individuals are suspects in the murder of a female police officer. the man is believed to be a close friend of the french brothers suspected in the charlie hebdo attack. and at this hour those two are surrounded by police at a printing business about 25 miles from paris. >> but back to paris, where the supermarket is under siege and hostages are being held we can tell you that we have been told from french television reports that the hostage takers inside that supermarket are related to the murder of a female french police officer that happened in paris as well just hours after the massacre. so what we're looking at now are three developing scenes. two hostage situations taking place right now. one inside a supermarket in paris. the other, the scene where the

two brothers are holed up in a printing factory in danmartin en goele, just miles from charles de gaulle airport, raising questions about other accomplices and just how big this team or this network may be. so that finishes our coverage here on "morning joe." we now hand things off to jose diaz-balart. stay with msnbc for the very latest on this developing story. good morning. breaking news on "the rundown" coming in from france. two standoffs involve inging police. the first is in danmartin en goele, a town 25 miles northeast of paris. the second is inside paris, the eastern part of the french capital. that's where a gunman has taken hostages inside a grocery store. there's also been a shooting. the french media reporting at

least two people have been killed. massive police presence in the area of eastern paris. as this situation unfolds. the french media is identifying the gunman in this attack as the same man police are seeking in the shooting incident that left a policewoman dead on thursday. and when police released a wanted poster linked to that shooting, it also included a 26-year-old woman. well, all that has been going on. there's another hostage situation unfold sing outside paris. that's where cherif and said kouachi, two men previously identified in the shooting that killed 12 people at charlie hebdo offices, had apparently been cornered. initial reports they were holding one hostage but there may be as many as seven, possibly including the owners that run the business. the building is surrounded by hundreds of anti-terrorist police and s.w.a.t. teams. officials say they are in contact, full pho