Paris (CNN)A picture of French journalists on the roof of Charlie Hebdo's offices sounded the first alarm. They had taken shelter from three armed men who had just opened fire against their colleagues during the weekly satirical newspaper's editorial committee. Events unfolded very rapidly from then on. French President François Hollande was very quick on the scene, the terrorist nature of the events was confirmed almost immediately and so was the shocking number of casualties: 12 dead and 11 injured, some critically. The operation appeared to have been prepared in a military style with weapons of war. What can cartoonists with their pen and paper do against killers with automatic weapons?
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Gunmen attacked the office of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris Wednesday
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Agnes Poirier writes that the names of four cartoonists killed were known to millions
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Their deaths left people in tears and unable to speak, Poirier writes
Today, a @placeholder imam called the dead journalists and cartoonists of Charlie Hebdo "martyrs of freedom."