The French aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle will be operational in the eastern Mediterranean "by the end of the week," Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told parliament on Wednesday.

The Charles de Gaulle left the southern port of Toulon earlier on Wednesday to take part in intensified air strikes against Islamic State targets. 

The body representing Muslims in France said it would ask all 2,500 mosques in the country to condemn "all forms of violence or terrorism" in prayers this Friday, following the Paris attacks.

The message will condemn such acts "unambiguously", the French Muslim Council (CFCM) said.

French opposition leader Nicolas Sarkozy took aim at President Francois Hollande on Wednesday, claiming he had failed to take adequate security measures after the jihadist attacks in January.

The latest attack on Friday night which left 129 people dead has increased political tensions just weeks ahead of regional elections, and the brief semblance of national unity has quickly frayed.

French and Russian air strikes in northern Syria have killed at least 33 jihadists with the Islamic State group in the last 72 hours, a monitoring group said on Wednesday.

Dozens of IS fighters were also wounded in the raids on weapons depots, barracks and checkpoints in the jihadists' de facto Syrian capital of Raqa, said Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

Police on Tuesday stepped up a Europe-wide hunt for the Paris attackers after video confirmed a ninth man may also have taken part in the worst attacks in French history.

Investigators are hunting the suspect for his part in the carnage that left 129 people dead, after footage showed a third man in a car used in one of the attacks on bars and cafes in central Paris.

The FBI on Tuesday arrested a man who allegedly made a threat against a Florida Islamic center because he was angry about the Paris attacks, authorities said.

Shortly after learning of the attacks in the French capital that left at least 129 people dead, Martin Alan Schnitzler left a message late Friday with the Islamic Society of Pinellas County, according to the criminal complaint against him.

A Syrian journalist who lives and works in the war-scarred city of Aleppo was awarded the Reporters without Borders Prize in France on Tuesday for her defense of press freedom.

The Paris-based media rights group singled out Zaina Erhaim for her "determination and courage" in covering the conflict in Syria, which is deemed the most dangerous country in the world for journalists.

Prime Minister Tammam Salam is expected to attend the climate summit set to be held in France at the end of the month, reported al-Joumhouria newspaper on Wednesday.

The summit is scheduled to be held on November 30.

The fate of the suspected mastermind of the Paris attacks, Abdelhamid Abaaoud, was unknown Wednesday after a massive police raid in a suburb of the city that left at least two dead, including a female suicide bomber.

Intelligence led investigators to believe the Belgian suspect was in an apartment in Saint-Denis to the north of Paris, triggering a ferocious seven-hour shootout there with police that began before dawn.

French warplanes pounded Islamic State targets and Russia vowed to ramp up its bombing campaign in Syria on Tuesday as the devastating attacks on Paris galvanized international resolve to destroy the jihadists and end the Syrian war.

In a grieving Paris, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said a "big transition" in Syria was probably only weeks away as he expressed solidarity with the French nation after IS gunmen and suicide bombers massacred 129 people in the capital on Friday night.