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| This undated family handout photo shows British man Alan Henning, who was held hostage by the Islamic State group. An Internet video released Friday purports to show an Islamic State group fighter beheading British hostage Alan Henning and threatening yet another American captive, the fourth such killing carried out by the extremist group now targeted in U.S.-led airstrikes. The video mirrored other beheading videos shot by the Islamic State group, which now holds territory along the border of Syria and Iraq. It ended with an Islamic State fighter threatening a man they identified as an American. |
CAIRO (AP) --
The Islamic State extremists who have beheaded another Western hostage
are deaf to reason and must be destroyed, British Prime Minister David
Cameron said Saturday as Muslims worldwide were urged to pray for the
victim on one of Islam's holiest days.
Cameron,
speaking after a security briefing at his rural retreat Chequers, said
Friday's slaying of 47-year-old English aid worker Alan Henning
demonstrated that Islamic State militants were committed to inflicting
horror for horror's sake.
Asked whether he
believed Islamic State fighters would kill more hostages, Cameron said
they would have to be hunted down to be stopped. He declined to say
whether Britain would extend its involvement in U.S.-led airstrikes on
the Islamic State group to Syria, where the hostage killings are
believed to have happened.
"The fact that this
was a kind, gentle, compassionate and caring man who had simply gone to
help others, the fact they could murder him in the way they did, shows
what we are dealing with," Cameron said. "This is going to be our
struggle now. ... We must do everything we can to defeat this
organization."
Henning, a taxi driver from the
town of Eccles in northwest England, was abducted minutes after his aid
convoy entered Syria on Dec. 26. He was the fourth Western hostage to
be killed by Islamic State since mid-August, following two American
journalists and another British aid worker. In their latest video,
Henning's killers linked their action to a vote Sept. 26 in British
Parliament to deploy the Royal Air Force against Islamic State positions
in Iraq, but not Syria.
Henning's widow,
Barbara, said the family was devastated at the loss of a "decent, caring
human being" and that they were proud of the work he did in helping
others.
"There are few words to describe how
we feel at this moment ... all of Alan's family and friends are numb
with grief," she said in a statement through Britain's Foreign Office.
Muslim
leaders across Britain urged worshippers worldwide to pray for Henning
and peace in the Middle East as they gathered at mosques to celebrate
Eid al-Adha, or "Feast of Sacrifice," a major holiday in Islam.
"Millions
should be praying today for Alan Henning, a good and honorable man,"
said Muslim peace activist Shaukat Warraich, speaking outside a mosque
in the central English city of Birmingham.
Egypt's
Foreign Ministry denounced what it called a "barbaric and savage act
that fully contradicts Islamic religion tenets and the simplest human
and ethical rules."
Britain's former army
chief of staff, Gen. Richard Dannatt, called for British air power to be
deployed in
Syria as well as Iraq, but not for Western ground forces.
"This is a fight for the soul of Islam. This is their fight," Dannatt
said, pointing to Jordan and Turkey as countries which need "to get
stuck into this fight."
Farooq Siddique,
former leader of a British government initiative to combat extremism,
said Western involvement plays into the extremists' hands. "Saudi Arabia
has 700 jets. They are using only 10 of them.
Why do they need the West
to go and help them?" Siddique said.
The
video mirrored other beheading videos shot by the Islamic State group,
and ended with a militant threatening a 26-year-old American hostage,
Peter Kassig.
"Obama, you have started your
aerial bombardment of Sham (Syria), which keeps on striking our people,
so it is only right that we continue to strike the necks of your
people," the masked militant in the video said.
National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden confirmed that Islamic State militants had Kassig.
"We
will continue to use every tool at our disposal - military, diplomatic,
law enforcement and intelligence - to try to bring Peter home to his
family," Hayden said.
In Indianapolis, Kassig's parents released a video message on Saturday, pleading with their son's captors to
free him.
In
the family's video, Ed Kassig says his son, who now goes by the first
name Abdul-Rahman after converting to Islam during his captivity, was
captured on Oct. 1, 2013, in Syria, where he was providing aid for
refugees fleeing that country's civil war.
"We
implore those who are holding you to show mercy and use their power to
let you go," Paula Kassing said in the video, holding a photo of her
son.
The militant video on Friday was the
fourth such video released by the Islamic State group. Previous victims
were American reporter James Foley, American-Israeli journalist Steven
Sotloff and British aid worker David Haines.
FBI
Director James Comey says American officials believe they know the
identity of the masked militant, who speaks in a London accent. Comey
has declined to name the man or reveal his nationality.
According
to his military record, Kassig served in the U.S. Army's 75th Ranger
Regiment, a special operations unit, was deployed to Iraq from April to
July 2007 and medically discharged later that year at the rank of
private first class.
On Friday, Ed and Paula Kassig issued a statement calling for the world to pray for their son.
They
said Kassig had been working for the relief organization he founded,
Special Emergency Response and Assistance, or SERA, when he was captured
a year ago on his way to Deir Ezzour in eastern Syria. He converted to
Islam while in captivity and the family has heard from former hostages
that his faith has provided him comfort.
The
Islamic State group has its roots in al-Qaida's Iraqi affiliate but was
expelled from the global terror network over its brutal tactics and
refusal to obey orders to confine its activities to Iraq. It grew more
extreme and powerful amid the 3-year civil war in Syria, launching a
lightning offensive this summer that captured territory in both
countries.
Islamic State militants may hold
many more hostages. On Friday, the father of John Cantlie, a British
photojournalist held by the group, appealed for his release in a video,
describing his son as a friend of Syria.
