ISIS Show Beheading of U.S. Journalist Steven Sotloff

ISIS Show Beheading of U.S. Journalist Steven Sotloff

Posted by Unknown on September 3, 2014

BAGHDAD—The extremist group Islamic State posted a video purporting to show the beheading of American journalist Steven Sotloff, bringing calls for the U.S. to more forcefully confront the militants in both Iraq and Syria.
If verified, it would be the group's second publicized killing of a captured American journalist in two weeks. Islamic State, also known as ISIS and ISIL, said the American was killed in retribution for U.S. airstrikes on its positions in Iraq. The video appeared days after U.S. airstrikes helped break a two-month siege by the Sunni militants on the Shiite town of Amirli north of Baghdad.

"Obviously destroying ISIL is the goal of not just the United States but many countries around the world have," State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Tuesday. "We want to do it as quickly as possible, but we're not naive about their capabilities, about the growth of their support, about their efforts around the world."

Rep. Ed Royce (R., Calif.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, called for more aggressive action against the group, saying the threat from Islamic State seems to grow daily.

"Working with key allies, the United States needs to be acting urgently to arm the Kurds on the ground who are fighting them, and targeting ISIS from the air with drone strikes," he said. Forces from the semiautonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq have played an important role in several ground operations backed by U.S. airstrikes to wrest back territory from Islamic State.

The U.S. has conducted more than 120 airstrikes on Islamic State targets in Iraq since Aug. 8 and is considering expanding its campaign into Syria, where the group is based.

However, the White House didn't indicate any immediate shift in policy as a result of the video, saying that President Barack Obama wants to see involvement by Iraqi and Kurdish forces, as well as regional and international powers.

Mr. Sotloff, 31 years old, was abducted near the Turkish border in Syria in August 2013, according to Sherif Mansour, a program coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists in New York. Few knew about his capture until the release on Aug. 19 of another video showing the beheading of American journalist James Foley.

That video concluded with a shot of a militant dressed in black standing beside a kneeling Mr. Sotloff and saying, "The life of this American citizen, Obama, depends on your next decision."

The latest video posted on the Islamic State website showed what appeared to be similar scenes to those in the previous video.

Mr. Sotloff is wearing an orange jumpsuit with his hands tied behind his back against the backdrop of a barren desert landscape.

He speaks briefly, delivering what appears to be a message dictated by his captors.

"Obama, your foreign policy of intervention in Iraq was supposed to be for the preservation of American lives and interests. So why is it that I am having to pay the price for your interference with my life?" he says.

Then a fighter, clad entirely in black and wearing a black face mask, draws a knife across Mr. Sotloff's neck. The video then shows his severed head resting on his corpse.

The militant who speaks has a similar British accent to the person who spoke on the video of Mr. Foley. He said this was retribution for U.S. attacks that broke Islamic State sieges on the Mosul Dam, Amirli and other parts of Iraq.

Mr. Sotloff's family in Pinecrest, Fla., was awaiting authentication of the video and grieving privately, said Barak Barfi, a research fellow at the New America Foundation who was acting as a family spokesman.

Mr. Sotloff's mother pleaded with her son's captors in a video released last week, going so far as to refer to Islamic State leader Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi by his self-appointed title of "caliph" of the Islamic world.

The Islamic State video also showed a man identified as Briton David Cawthorne Haines. He is kneeling and wearing an orange jumpsuit as the militant threatens to kill him next.

A U.S. official said there is no reason to believe the video isn't authentic.

Some U.S. government officials believe that Mr. Sotloff was likely killed immediately after Mr. Foley in August, and that militants delayed the release to heighten the impact, the official said after viewing the video.

The official said Mr. Haines, the British hostage, has also likely been killed.

Ms. Psaki, the State Department spokeswoman, said U.S. intelligence will work as quickly as possible to determine the authenticity of the video. If it is authentic, the U.S. would be "sickened by this brutal act," she said, adding: "Our hearts go out to the Sotloff family."

Rep. Mike Pompeo (R., Kan.), a member of the House intelligence committee, said: "We cannot afford to allow these terrorists to continue their march."

U.K. Prime Minister David Cameron said if verified, the killing of Mr. Sotloff is "a despicable and barbaric murder."

He didn't mention the threat to kill a British hostage.

Mr. Sotloff was a freelance journalist who worked for several publications, including Time magazine, the Christian Science Monitor, World Affairs Journal and Foreign Policy Magazine.

Friends described him as good-natured, curious and thoughtful.

He traveled throughout the Middle East, writing articles about Syria's civil war and the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.
Joel Simon, executive director for the Committee to Protect Journalists said there are about 20 journalists missing in Syria. He said he cannot say how many exactly are in the hands of Islamic State, though CPJ believes a good number of them are.

Nearly all of the imprisoned journalists are Syrian, along with a handful of Westerners.

"It's so heart-wrenching that these journalists who risk their lives to document the suffering of the Syrian people and inform the world would be killed in this manner," Mr. Simon said.

"It's staggering when you consider why they were there and what they hoped to accomplish and how their lives ended, it leaves you speechless.What ISIS is trying to do is to destroy this incredibly noble impulse that journalists have to go to the story and tell the world what's happening," Mr. Simon said.