4th October, 2014
Islamic State jihadists mounted brutal offensives on both the Syrian battlefield and in their online propaganda war Friday, murdering a British hostage and attempting to storm a key border town.
In a video released by the group in response to US-led air strikes against it, a masked IS fighter beheads British driver Alan Henning and threatens a US captive, aid worker Peter Kassig.
The footage, almost identical to three previous execution films released by the group, inspired revulsion around the world and drew a stark warning from Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron.
“We will do all we can to hunt down these murderers and bring them to justice,” he said, declaring that the apparent murder “shows just how barbaric and repulsive these terrorists are.”
US President Barack Obama condemned the “brutal murder” and warned that the US-led coalition “will continue taking decisive action to degrade and ultimately destroy” IS.
The UN Security Council said the video serves as a “tragic reminder of the increasing dangers volunteer humanitarian personnel face every day in Syria.”
The IS video, found online by US-based private monitor SITE, opens with a news report about the British parliament’s vote last week to authorize air strikes against jihadist targets in Iraq.
Then it cuts to Henning, on his knees against a desert backdrop and wearing an orange prison-style outfit, with a masked militant standing over him wielding a combat knife.
Henning, a 47-year-old volunteer driver who went to Syria with a Muslim charity, explains to the camera that, as a member of the British public, he is being made to pay for the parliamentary vote.
Then the jihadist, who has the same British accent as the killer in previous IS execution videos, directly addresses Cameron.
“The blood of David Haines was on your hands, Cameron. Alan Henning will also be slaughtered, but his blood is on the hands of the British parliament,” he declares, then cuts the hostage’s throat.
Kassig, a former US army soldier and Iraq veteran in his twenties who returned to the Middle East to found an aid agency, is then shown alive and threatened by the knife-wielding militant.
“Obama, you have started your aerial bombardment in Sham, which keeps on striking our people,” the militant says, using the Arabic term for Syria and the Levant.
“So it is only right that we continue to strike the necks of your people.”
The jihadists have previously released videos showing the murders of American journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff and of British aid worker David Haines.
Henning’s apparent murder came as other IS fighters besieged the Syrian town of Kobane on the Turkish border, where Kurdish militiamen are mounting a desperate defence.
Huge plumes of smoke were seen rising from Kobane as its outnumbered defenders came under fire from IS fighters who have advanced to its gates despite US-led air strikes against them.
At least 60 mortar rounds rained down on the town, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which described it as the heaviest bombardment since mid-September.
It said a Chechen IS fighter was leading the assault on the town, which is considered a strategic prize.
The fierce fighting came a day after the Turkish government won authorisation from parliament to take military action in Syria and Iraq.
“We will do whatever we can so that Kobane does not fall,” Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said, adding that about 186,000 refugees had come across from Syria in less than two weeks.