PARIS (CNN) — A pair of dramatic raids Friday in France led to the killing of three terrorists – one suspected in the fatal shooting of a policewoman, the other two in the massacre at the offices of Charlie Hebdo magazine — and to the freeing of at least some of those they were holding hostage.
The French government's work is not over. There's still a lot of healing to do, a lot of questions to answer about how to prevent future attacks, and the fact that a woman wanted in the policewoman's shooting remains at large.
Still, as Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said, "The nation is relieved tonight."
Three of the four suspects in a pair of deadly terror attacks this week have been killed. The other – 26-year-old Hayat Boumeddiene – remains at large, with French authorities working to find her.
The day's drama began in Dammartin-en-Goele, where brother Cherif and Said Kouachi ended up in a print shop in an industrial area.
A salesman, who identified himself only as Didier, told France Info radio that he shook one of the gunman's hands around 8:30 a.m. Friday as they arrived at the business. Didier told the public radio station that he first thought the man, who was dressed in black and heavily armed, was a police officer.
As he left, the armed man said, "Go, we don't kill civilians." Didier said, "It wasn't normal. I did not know what was going on."
What was going on, very soon, was a hostage situation.
The gunmen told police that they wanted to die as martyrs, Yves Albarello, who is in France's parliament, said on French channel iTele. Meanwhile, the area was locked down — with children stuck in schools, roads closed and shops shuttered.
The relative silence was pierced shortly before 5 p.m. by gunshots and at least three large explosions.
Soon after, men could be seen on the roof of the building where the Kouachi brothers had holed up, and four helicopters, including a medical helicopter, landed nearby.
Then came the word that the brothers were dead and that their lone hostage, a man, was safe, said Bernard Corneille, the mayor of nearby Othis.
That spurred Dammartin-en-Goele Mayor Michel Dutruge, as he told France Info radio, to breathe "a big sigh of relief."
Meanwhile, in a very different setting near Paris's Porte de Vincennes about 40 kilometers (25 miles) away, a similar crisis was playing out at a kosher grocery store.
That's where Amedy Coulibaly — the same man who, authorities said, is suspected with Boumeddiene of killing a policewoman Thursday in Montrouge south of Paris — went Friday, taking a number of hostages of his own.
Like Cherif Kouachi, a man claiming to be Coulibaly called BFMTV on Friday. At the scene, witnesses heard Coulibaly demand freedom for the Kouachi brothers, according to police union spokesman Pascal Disand.
Law enforcement swarmed the area. Dozens of schools went on lockdown. And people waited for a resolution.
It came a few minutes after the Dammartin-en-Goele climax, in the form of explosions, then gunfire, then the sight of up to 20 heavily armed police officers moving into the store. They came out shortly after with a number of civilians alongside them.
But not everyone made it. French President Francois Hollande said four people were killed, though it wasn't immediately known if that number includes Coulibaly.
Meanwhile, Boumeddiene remains on the loose.
