Netanyahu Urges Unity to Fight 'Scourge' of Radical Islam

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for global unity to fight the "scourge" of radical Islam, after an  attack on a satirical French newspaper killed 12 people on Wednesday.

Speaking at a crisis center in Jerusalem set up to deal with severe winter storms battering the Middle East, he expressed Israel's condolences for the "brutal act in the heart of Paris today."

"The attacks of radical Islam know no boundaries... and the response has to be international," he said.

"The terrorists want to destroy our freedoms and our civilization and, therefore, all... the civilized societies have to band together to fight this scourge.

"If we stand together, we can defeat this tyranny."

Earlier, French President Francois Hollande condemned as a "terrorist attack" the massacre at Charlie Hebdo, which has been in confrontation for years with Islamists who accused it of attacking their religion.

On Wednesday morning, heavily armed men shouting "Allahu Akbar" (God is greatest) stormed the newspaper's Paris headquarters in the deadliest attack in France in decades, killing their victims in cold blood.