Medieval Cruelty in Modern Times: ISIS Thugs Behead American Journalist

The group known as ISIS has murdered American journalist James Foley, beheading him as if he were a captive taken in medieval combat. It posted a YouTube video designed for a 21st-century audience and threatened to kill another journalist hostage, Steven Joel Soltoff, if the United States continues its airstrikes against ISIS positions in Iraq.

The murderers, who now call themselves “knights” serving the “caliph” of the self-declared Islamic State that straddles northern Syria and Iraq, had Foley make a statement before he died.

But first the video showed President Obama’s press conference this month explaining his reasons for intervening against the group he calls ISIL. Then Foley was shown was on his knees, his body erect—even proud—clad in an orange tunic with no collar, and his head shaved. Beside him, brandishing a short knife, was his executioner clad in black, his face covered, his voice unmistakably British.

“I call on my friends, family, and loved ones to rise up against my real killers, the U.S. government,” said Foley. He called on his parents not to accept any “meager compensation” for his death. The U.S. bombing campaign against ISIS was “the last nail in my coffin” he told the camera. He called on his brother John, a member of the U.S. Air Force, to “think about what you are doing, think about the lives you destroy. … I died that day, John, when your colleagues dropped that bomb on those people they signed my death certificate. I wish I had more time. I wish I could have the hope of freedom and seeing my family once again. But that ship has sailed. I guess all in all I wish I wasn’t American.”

Then the British-accented executioner makes a little speech claiming any aggression against the Islamic State is an aggression against Muslims everywhere—whom this sinister pseudo-ninja seems to think he represents. Then he begins to saw at Foley’s throat. The screen goes black for a second.

One can surmise that the IS video producers thought the actual act of decapitation with a six-inch blade would be too gruesome for the kind of audience they want to reach—the video-game generation of wannabe jihadis around the world. Those kids might be too squeamish to watch the many extant ISIS videos of Christians and Shia being decapitated, photographs of which have been published even on sites like Catholic.org as ISIS wages its campaign to incite a global religious war and its victims and enemies fall into their trap.

Then, in the Foley video, which was quickly taken down from YouTube but doubtless has been spread around, we see a shot of Foley’s body with its severed head resting on it. And then Soltoff is presented to the camera and Obama is challenged to save him by halting the bombing.

“We have seen a video that purports to be the murder of U.S. citizen James Foley by ISIL,” said a statement from the National Security Council. “The intelligence community is working as quickly as possible to determine its authenticity. If genuine, we are appalled by the brutal murder of an innocent American journalist and we express our deepest condolences to his family and friends. We will provide more information when it is available.”

Although there is little question about his final moments, the matter of how Foley came into the hands of ISIS is more than a little mysterious. Foley was a risk taker who reported from the front lines, fully aware of the dangers that might entail. He was taken prisoner in Libya in 2011 before being released.

In Syria, he was picked up by gunmen from what the Federal Bureau of Investigation called an “organized gang” shortly after he left an Internet café on November 22, 2012. In May 2013, GlobalPost President Philip Balboni said that “with a very high degree of confidence, we now believe that Jim was most likely abducted a pro-regime militia group”—that is, one loyal to President Bashar Assad—and that he was being held near Damascus by the Syrian Air Force intelligence service. “Based on what we have learned,” said Balboni, “it is likely Jim is being held with one or more Western journalists, including most likely at least one other American.”

Several groups fighting against Assad have claimed that there is—or was — a tacit collaboration, at least, between his intelligence services and ISIS, since it served the savage Assad regime well to claim it was fighting a terrorist enemy even more brutal than its own forces.

GlobalPost is reporting that the beheading of Foley is “unconfirmed” and that the FBI is evaluating the video’s contents.

Decapitations are an old strategy for jihadists aiming to impress the West. The 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohamed, now in Guantanamo Bay, has claimed that he personally beheaded Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Pakistan in 2002. A decade ago Abu Musab al-Zarqawi built his international infamy in Iraq with videos of Western men and women having their heads severed. Zarqawi was killed in 2006 by U.S. forces, but the organization he founded continued to evolve into this one calling itself Islamic State, which is much more sophisticated in almost every respect, and much more successful gaining territory.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articl...n-times-isis-beheads-american-journalist.html


This is getting really out of control now, we're probably gonna go back to Iraq regardless now.

But what's your guys opinions.

 

@Supernatural-Knight I understand, I never actually expected it to actually pop up into the video, it was just meant to take you away to the actual site.

 

All I can say is that this has gotten way out of hand. The sad thing is that it is going to get worse before it gets better.

 

Air strikes alone doesn't seem to be doing the trick considering their methods of warfare via guerilla tactics and just being able to blend within civilian population.

 

As an actual Muslim, I find it my responsibility to stop lurking around the forums and provide a more in-depth point of view on this so here goes.
This matter does not even require discussion. These people are using religion as an excuse to go around killing people, as many have done before. I would use several sources to clarify why this is so, but I will make it a short summary by saying that what they are doing is against human rights and Islam would obviously be against anything as oppressive as what ISIS is doing.

On a side note:

Don't get me wrong, I'm against ISIS, and I'm also against all of the violence that goes on in certain countries within the Middle East. But using that kind of comparison is historically inaccurate and frankly offensive. By making this note, I am slightly digressing from the topic at hand, but since it concerns the Middle East, I hope this doesn't derail the discussion. During the Dark Ages that Europe went through because of the plague and whatnot, the Middle East, and by extension, the entire Arab World (actual geographical term, look it up) went through its most productive, tolerant period full of scientific breakthroughs and other sorts of enlightenment. So saying The Middle East has remained in the Dark Ages is eurocentric, because it assumes that because Europe was going through a hard time, the rest of the world was, and frankly, if the Middle East had stayed in the "Dark Ages", I'm pretty sure they would be better off.

 

I want to leave my opinion, but ita a pacifist opinion and only people off.