A few days after the assault on Paris, it is hard to name the businesses that were singled out by the terrorists. The public venues — the Bataclan theatre and the Stade de France — are memorable. The cafés and bars of eastern Paris — Le Carillon, Comptoir Voltaire, La Belle Equipe — were not symbolic in themselves. They were simply places for people to gather.
Nor, despite the terrible bloodshed, have the attacks had a deep physical impact on the fabric of the city. There are broken windows and some bomb damage but Paris otherwise survives largely as before. In terms of disrupting physical infrastructure or the economy — the energy supplies, communications and supply chains of France — Isis might as well not have bothered.
Al-Qaeda’s transnational operating model has been compared with global franchising: its brand is adopted by semi-independent groups that organise and carry out their own attacks.