Le Logeur Du Daesh

About

Le Logeur du Daesh (Daesh’s Landlord in English) is a nickname given to Jawad Bendaoud, a man who lended his apartment to terrorists who were linked to the 2015 Paris Attacks. Following the events of the police raid in Saint-Denis ion November 18th, Bendaoud was interviewed by BFM TV shortfly before he was taken into custody, explaining that he never suspected the three people he accomodated to be terrorists. After the intverview was released online, a novelty twitter account was launched spawning dozens of parodies mocking Bendaoud’s defense on the French Twitter hub.

The interview

On the morning of November 18th, 2015, the French police raided an apartment in Saint-Denis, a town north of Paris, France, which allegedly sheltered several people linked to the November 13th terrorist attacks In Paris.The assault resulted in two people dead and eight more arrested. Among them was Jawad Bendaoud, the tenant of the apartment. Shortly before his arrest, Bendaoud was interviewed by a BFM TV News crew (shown below), giving his side of the story on the fact that he didn’t know he was sheltering terrorists^[1].

Transcript:

- Did you learn that it was happening at your apartment?
- Yes, I did.
- What do you mean?
- Well, I learnt that it was my apartment, that the persons were hiding away in my apartment and that’s it. I didn’t know that they were terrorists.
- And… please explain, where do you live?
- I live Rue Du Corbillon, where there was all the shooting.
- And how do you explain that these people ended up in your apartment?
- I have been asked to help out and that’s what I did, sir. I’ve been asked to give shelter to two persons for three days and I helped out. I don’t know where they were from. I don’t know anything, sir. Do you think I’d have lended them my apartment if I did?
- Did you know they were coming from Belgium?
- No. The police told me about it this morning.
- Ok.
- I learnt about it the same way as you.
- Did you know those people?
- No, I didn’t know them at all. Not even before that.

Bendaoud is seen being taken away by policemen

Spread

On Twitter, a novelty account under the name Le Logeur du Daesh^[2] was submitted, curating dozens of tweets using a screenshot of Bendaoud’s face from the interview and coupling it with parody excuses about the event, mocking the perceived weak arguments given by the man when defending himself on camera. The account gained more than 14 000 subscribers less than 16 hours after its creation.
Following its surge in popularity, many online outlets reported on the twitter account and its derivatives. This includes Hitek^[3], Konbini^[4], Démotivateur.fr^[5] but also more mainstream news outlets such as Direct Matin^[6] or 20 Minutes^[7], which spotlighted several instances in an article referencing humorous and heartwarming tweets about the Paris tragedy.

On November 19th, French viral news site MinuteBuzz made a parody video^[8] on Facebook (shown below), inserting cuts of French comedy movie La Cité de la Peur inside the interview footage. It accumulated to more than 1 million views in the first hours of its upload.

Another video parody was posted to the Mikl Officiel page (shown below), reaching more than 3 million views in the first day of its upload.

Various Examples

External References

^[1]BFM TV – Assaut à Saint-Denis: le logeur des terroristes condamné pour la mort d’un homme en 2008

^[2]Twitter – Le Logeur Du Daesh

^[3]Hitek – JAWAD, L’HÉBERGEUR DESTERRORISTES, CIBLE DE NOMBREUX DÉTOURNEMENTS SURTWITTER

^[4]Konbini – Quand la Toile se moque génialement de l’hebergeur des terroristes

^[5]Demotivateur.fr – Quand le Web se moque de Jawad Bendaoud, dit «le logeur des terroristes», en 10 tweets à lire

^[6]Direct Matin – Internet se déchaîne avec humour contre le logeur des terroristes

^[7]20 Minutes – Attentats à Paris: L’humour pour surmonter l’horreur

^[8]Facebook – Tu Bluffes Martoni !