Cryptic tweets suggest that ISIS may have known the Charlie Hebdo offices were going to be attacked prior to Wednesday's bloody massacre in Paris which left 12 dead.
The two men suspected of carrying out the mass slaughter have been linked with the Yemen-based Al Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) in the days following the attack.
But a jihadi who fights within ISIS-controlled territory in Iraq and Syria posted a tweet hinting at the killing a day prior to the attack.
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The fighter's first tweet (pictured), posted a day before the attack, cryptically referred to 'snail-eating people'
His second message (pictured) was posted only hours after the massacre and boasted he was aware of the planned attack
The two masked gunmen pictured as they shoot their way through the streets of Paris on Wednesday
Police officer Ahmed Merabet lies on the ground in the seconds before one of the gunmen executed him
The fighter, who operates under the Twitter handle 'PaladinofJihad,' tweeted: 'Snail-eating people' and an emoji picturing a face crying with laughter on Tuesday.
Then hours after after the gunmen systematically shot dead 12 people in and around the French magazine's offices on Wednesday, the fighter wrote: 'You heard it here first. #SnailEaters ate France is in mourning after the attack in which two gunmen executed a police officer on the street and killed 11 others - including editors, journalists and cartoonists - at the offices of a Paris satirist magazine.
A massive manhunt is underway to catch the two suspected gunmen, who marched through magazine building killing staff with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades.
The suspects have been named by French police as the brothers Cherif, 32, and Said Kouachi, 34, with the men reportedly radicalised by Al Qaeda.
But the ISIS fighter's tweets now raise questions about what role, if any, ISIS may have played in the massacre, with the two suspects previously linked only to Al Qaeda.
Pictured is Cherif (left) and Said Kouachi (right), the two men accused of carrying out the Paris attack
A senior U.S. official said Thursday the elder Kouachi brother had traveled to Yemen, although it was unclear whether he was there to join extremist groups like AQAP.
Cherif was convicted of terrorism charges in 2008 for his links to a network sending jihadis to fight American forces in Iraq.
Both men had been flagged as a terrorist threat and placed on a U.S. no-fly list.
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