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David Haines’ widow says she wants ISIS militant Jihadi John to be caught alive.
Dragana Haines says the “last thing” she wants for the man who killed her husband is an “honourable death”.
Jihadi John, pictured in the videos of the beheadings of Western hostages, has been named as Mohammed Emwazi, a Kuwaiti-born Briton from west London.
David Haines’ daughter said she wanted to see “a bullet between his eyes”.
Mohammed Emwazi, who is in his mid-20s and was previously known to British security services, first appeared in a video last August, when he apparently killed American journalist James Foley.
He was later thought to have been pictured in the videos of the beheadings of British aid worker David Haines, American journalist Steven Sotloff, British taxi driver Alan Henning, and American aid worker Abdul-Rahman Kassig, also known as Peter Kassig.
In a recent interview with BBC, Dragana Haines said she wanted Mohammed Emwazi to be caught alive and not have an “honorable death” by being killed in action.
A spokesman for the family of Steven Sotloff said: “We want to sit in a courtroom, watch him sentenced and see him sent to a super-max prison.”
Steven Foley’s mother Diane told the Times that she forgave her son’s killer.
“It saddens me, [Mohammed Emwazi’s] continued hatred,” she said.
“He felt wronged, now we hate him – now that just prolongs the hatred. We need to end it.
“As a mum I forgive him. You know, the whole thing is tragic – an ongoing tragedy.”
In each of the videos, Jihadi John appeared dressed in a black robe with a black balaclava covering all but his eyes and top of his nose.
Speaking with a British accent, he taunted Western powers before holding his knife to the hostages’ necks, appearing to start cutting before the film stopped. The victims’ decapitated bodies were then shown.
Earlier this month, Jihadi John featured in a video in which the Japanese journalist Kenji Goto appeared to be beheaded.
Hostages released by ISIS said he was one of three British jihadists guarding Westerners abducted by the group in Syria. They were known collectively as “the Beatles”.
Mohammed Emwazi known as Jihadi John:
- 1988: Born in Kuwait, moves to UK in 1994
- 2009: Completes computing degree at University of Westminster
- Aug 2009: Travels to Tanzania with two friends, he says for safari, but refused entry at Dar es Salaam. Put on flight to Amsterdam. After questioning there, returns to Dover
- Sept 2009: Travels to Kuwait to stay with father’s family
- July 2010: Returns to UK for short stay but told he cannot return to Kuwait as visa denied
- 2012: Passes Celta English language teaching course
- 2013: Changes name by deed poll to Mohammed al-Ayan. Tries to travel to Kuwait but is stopped. Disappears. Parents report him missing. Police tell family four months later he has entered Syria
Source: Cage, London-based campaign group
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Islamic State (ISIS) militants have released a video purporting to show the killing of British hostage Alan Henning.
Taxi driver Alan Henning, 47, was delivering aid to Syria in December when he was kidnapped then held hostage by ISIS.
ISIS had threatened to kill Alan Henning in a video showing the killing of Briton David Haines last month.
The UK Foreign Office said it was trying to verify the video, and if true it was a “further disgusting murder”.
On September 30, Alan Henning’s wife Barbara appealed for his release, saying: “He is innocent.”
ISIS has previously released videos showing the apparent killings of two US journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, and Briton David Haines.
The video released on October 3 is yet to be verified, but it appears to show Alan Henning kneeling beside a militant, dressed in black, in a desert setting.
The footage ends with an ISIS fighter threatening a man they identify as an American.
The UK Foreign Office said in a statement: “We are aware of the video and are working urgently to verify the contents.
Alan Henning was delivering aid to Syria in December 2013 when he was kidnapped then held hostage by ISIS
“If true, this is a further disgusting murder.
“We are offering the family every support possible; they ask to be left alone at this time.”
Earlier this week Barbara Henning had asked for “mercy” for her husband, saying his family was continuing their attempts to communicate with the group.
She also she had received an audio message of her husband pleading for his life.
“Muslims across the globe continue to question Islamic State over Alan’s fate,” she said.
Barbara Henning had said some people thought her husband was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but she said: “He was in the right place doing the right thing.”
She said her family was “at a loss” as to why ISIS leaders could not “open their hearts and minds to the truth about Alan’s humanitarian motives for going to Syria”.
Last month, two high-profile imams in the UK made a direct appeal to ISIS to release Alan Henning.
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ISIS militants have released a second video showing British journalist John Cantlie, who is being held hostage by the jihadist group.
It comes less than a week after John Cantlie’s first appearance on screen following his kidnapping in Syria in 2012.
The release of the video showing John Cantlie comes as the US and its allies launch the first air strikes against ISIS in Syria.
Islamic State has killed three Western hostages and has threatened to kill another.
On September 22, the US and several Arab allies launched the first air strikes against the militants in Syria. UK forces are not involved but the government says it has not ruled itself out.
An experienced journalist and photographer, this is John Cantlie’s second time being held captive in Syria. Having been kidnapped in July 2012 and handcuffed and blindfolded for a week, he escaped with the help from the Free Syrian Army.
John Cantlie returned to Syria towards the end of 2012 and it was during this trip that his second kidnap occurred.
ISIS militants have released a second video showing British journalist John Cantlie, who is being held hostage by the jihadist group
The video, which lasts for almost six minutes, follows a similar pattern to the first video featuring the journalist.
It is introduced with the title Lend Me Your Ears and Messages From The British Detainee John Cantlie: Episode 1.
Dressed in an orange outfit like other ISIS hostages seen in videos, John Cantlie repeated that he had been abandoned by his government.
Reading from a pre-prepared script, John Cantlie also said Western governments “were caught napping by the sheer speed of the Islamic State’s growth” and they have underestimated “the strength and fighting zeal of the opponent”.
“Not since Vietnam have we witnessed such a potential mess in the making,” he says.
Islamic State has taken control of large areas of Syria and Iraq, imposed a harsh brand of Islam, and declared a caliphate.
The group has beheaded three Western hostages since August – US journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, and British aid worker David Haines. Their deaths were all filmed and posted online.
In the latest video showing the killing of David Haines, the militants threatened to kill Alan Henning, a taxi driver. Alan Henning, from Eccles in Salford, was seized while on an aid mission to Syria in December.
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Barbara Henning, the wife of British taxi driver Alan Henning who is held hostage by Islamic State (ISIS), has pleaded with the militants to “see it in their hearts” to release him.
Alan Henning, 47, was seized while on an aid mission to Syria in December 2013.
In a statement released via the UK’s Foreign Office, Barbara Henning said her husband had been driving an ambulance stocked with food and water at the time.
Barbara Henning said she had sent messages to ISIS but had received no response.
The ISIS militants issued their threat to kill Alan Henning in a video released last Saturday, September 13, which showed the killing of another British man, David Haines.
The full statement released from the Henning family read: “I am Barbara Henning, the wife of Alan Henning.
“Alan was taken prisoner last December and is being held by the Islamic State.
“Alan is a peaceful, selfless man who left his family and his job as a taxi driver in the UK to drive in a convoy all the way to Syria with his Muslim colleagues and friends to help those most in need.
“When he was taken he was driving an ambulance full of food and water to be handed out to anyone in need. His purpose for being there was no more and no less. This was an act of sheer compassion.
The ISIS militants issued their threat to kill Alan Henning in a video released on September 13
“I cannot see how it could assist any state’s cause to allow the world to see a man like Alan dying.
“I have been trying to communicate with the Islamic State and the people holding Alan. I have sent some really important messages but they have not been responded to.
“I pray that the people holding Alan respond to my messages and contact me before it is too late.
“When they hear this message I implore the people of the Islamic State to see it in their hearts to release my husband Alan Henning.”
Alan Henning, nicknamed Gadget by the men he was travelling with, was abducted the day he arrived in Syria to help those affected by the country’s civil war.
In video footage filmed as he stopped en route in Turkey he said “no sacrifice we do is anything compared to what they’re going through every day”.
Barbara Henning’s written appeal comes a day after two high-profile imams in the UK had called for Alan’s release in a video posted on YouTube.
Haitham al-Haddad, an imam from the Islamic Sharia Council, said executing the British hostage would be “totally haram (forbidden), impermissible, prohibited according to sharia for a number of reasons”.
Shakeel Begg, imam at Lewisham Islamic Centre in south London, said he wanted to make it clear he stood “with Alan Henning” and added: “I urge you to understand the nature of this prisoner you are holding – a man of peace.”
The scholars’ appeal to release Alan Henning came after more than 100 British Muslim imam organizations and individuals expressed their “horror and revulsion” at the “senseless murder” of David Haines, and the threats to Alan Henning.
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The Islamic State (ISIS) group has released a new video showing British man John Cantlie believed to be held hostage by the jihadist militants.
Dressed in orange, John Cantlie, who in 2012 escaped an earlier kidnapping in Syria, asks why he and others have been abandoned by the US and UK governments.
ISIS has recently killed three hostages and, in a video showing the death of UK aid worker David Haines, threatened to kill British man Alan Henning next.
No ISIS militants are seen in the video, which is entitled Lend Me Your Ears and is addressed to the Western public.
In it John Cantlie says other European governments have negotiated for the release of their hostages but says the US and UK have done things differently.
“After two disastrous and hugely unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, why is it that our governments appear so keen to get involved in yet another unwinnable conflict?” he says.
He also says this is the first of several of what he calls programs in which he will explain the philosophy of ISIS.
From comments on the tape, it is clear it was made this year, but not precisely when.
The video featuring John Cantlie has been released nearly a week after footage depicting the death of David Haines, the first British hostage to be killed
The video featuring John Cantlie has been released nearly a week after footage depicting the death of David Haines, the first British hostage to be killed.
It was in that video that the life of Alan Henning, 47, from Salford, was threatened.
Alan Henning was a volunteer on an aid convoy in December 2013 when he was seized just after crossing into Syria.
Earlier, British Muslim leaders called for his immediate release, saying anyone undertaking a humanitarian act should be held in the highest esteem.
The video of David Haines’s death followed the killings of US journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff – which were also shown in videos – in August and earlier this month respectively.
On September 16, IS released a separate video, which was described by analysts as a video response to US air strikes.
The slickly produced, Hollywood-style trailer for a film entitled Flames of War refers to US President Barack Obama’s insistence that US combat troops would not be returning to fight in Iraq.
In an apparent taunt, it depicts wounded US troops, masked executioners standing over kneeling captives, and declares at the conclusion: “Fighting has just begun.”
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PM David Cameron said that the UK will take “whatever steps are necessary” to keep safe after a video showing the killing of hostage David Haines was issued by Islamic State (ISIS) militants.
David Cameron the UK would “hunt down” the killers of the aid worker, whom he called a “British hero”.
He said the “menace” of ISIS had to be destroyed in a “calm, deliberate” way.
In the video released by ISIS militants, they also threatened to kill a second Briton, who has been named as Alan Henning, 47.
Alan Henning, a married father-of-two from Salford, worked as a taxi driver and was a volunteer on an aid convoy.
Speaking at Downing Street after a meeting of the UK emergency committee Cobra, David Cameron said of ISIS, also known as ISIL, “they are not Muslims, they are monsters”.
“We will do everything in our power to hunt down these murderers and ensure they face justice, however long it takes.”
In the video, a masked man who appears to have a British accent was pictured beside David Haines holding a knife.
Masked ISIS militant pictured beside David Haines
David Cameron said the country was “sickened” that a Briton could have carried out the “despicable” killing.
“We cannot just walk on by if we are to keep this country safe,” he said.
“Step by step, we must drive back, dismantle and ultimately destroy ISIL and what it stands for.
“We will not do so on our own, but with working with our allies, not just in the United States and in Europe, but also in the region.”
He said the organization posed a “massive threat” to the entire Middle East and said it would be defeated through a “comprehensive and sustained counter-terrorism strategy”.
The prime minister added: “This is not about British combat troops on the ground. It is about working with others to extinguish this terrorist threat.”
US officials later said several Arab countries had offered to take part in air strikes against ISIS militants in Iraq – subject to approval from the Iraqi government.
Secretary of State John Kerry – speaking in Paris after a whirlwind tour of the Middle East trying to drum up support for action against ISIS – said he was “extremely encouraged” by such promises.
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