Strasbourg Cathedral bombing plot: what Wikipedia removed
The Strasbourg Cathedral bombing plot was an al-Qaeda plan to bomb the Strasbourg Christmas market in 2000, foiled by French and German police. Through 2015 the opening said that in December 2004, ten others suspected Islamic militants were jailed in Paris for their part in the failed plot. Today the opening says fourteen people were convicted, without describing them as Islamic militants, though militant survives twice in the body. A reader arriving now learns fourteen people were convicted and not that Wikipedia once described the ten convicted in Paris as Islamic militants.
The word “militant” appeared 1 times in this article’s opening at its peak, in 2010. Today the opening carries none; the body carries 2. Checked against the full current article on 2026-08-01.
The tracked words, snapshot by snapshot
Section titled “The tracked words, snapshot by snapshot”| word | 2005 | 2010 | 2015 | 2020 | 6 October 2023 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| militant | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| terror | 0 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| islamist | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Counts are of the opening paragraph only, the part most readers, search engines and AI training sets ever quote.
What was taken out
Section titled “What was taken out”- The opening’s original definition naming the plot an al-Qaeda plan to bomb the Christmas market, replaced with softer discovery-focused phrasing.
- The detail on four suspects sentenced to between 10 and an unspecified number of years, dropped from the opening.
How it opened then, and now
Section titled “How it opened then, and now”2005 (revision 16481248):
The Strasbourg cathedral bombing plot was a plan to blow up a cathedral in Strasbourg , France by members of Al-Qaida . In December 2000 , German police uncovered the plot in Frankfurt and raided an apartment building, where they found arms and explosives . In London , England , United Kingdom , an Islamist preacher named Abu Qatada was arrested for the attack, but was released on a lack of evidence. Italian police said that they wiretapped a telephone call related to the failure of the plot. This is the transcript. Sami Ben Khemais : “There is danger. Members of the bin Laden cell in Frankfurt have been captured. I am warning you that they got half the group in Germany.” Tarek Maaroufi : “N…
2025 (revision 1294489516):
Foiled bombing plot in France In December 2000, an al-Qaeda -linked plot to bomb the Strasbourg Christmas market , at the feet of the Strasbourg Cathedral , on New Year’s Eve was discovered. The plot was foiled by French and German police after a terrorist network based in Frankfurt , Germany, the ” Frankfurt group ”, was unravelled. A total of fourteen people were convicted as part of the plot; four in Germany and ten in France, including the operational leader, Mohammed Bensakhria ( a.k.a. “Meliani”), thought to be a European deputy to Osama bin Laden . The alleged mastermind of the plot was thought to have been Abu Doha , who was detained in the United Kingdom .
Related
Section titled “Related”- The drift report: what changed across all 61,944 watched articles
- The case file for this article, with every snapshot and every marked removal
- Who made the cuts: removals grouped by the account that made them
- The live article on Wikipedia
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