http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/17/world/middleeast/isis-video-purports-to-prove-peter-kassig-execution.html 2014-11-16 13:44:02 ISIS Video Purports to Prove Execution of American Aid Worker The video footage released Sunday, which the Islamic State said showed it had executed Peter Kassig, is significantly different from those of four other hostage executions by the violent jihadist group. === GAZIANTEP, Turkey — The Islamic State released a video early Sunday showing a black-clad executioner standing over the severed head of what they claim is a 26-year-old American aid worker and former Army Ranger who disappeared over a year ago at a checkpoint in northern The footage — which has not been independently verified — is significantly different from those of four other hostage executions the militants have filmed. Unlike the killing of James Foley and others, the actual death of the former Ranger Peter Kassig, is not shown. And he is not made to deliver a final message. The camera pans across the boots of the hooded killer. Between his feet, you see a decapitated head, blood smearing the cheek. “This is Peter Edward Kassig, a U.S. citizen of your country. Peter, who fought against the Muslims in Iraq while serving as a soldier under the American Army doesn’t have much to say. His previous cellmates have already spoken on his behalf. But we say to you, Obama,” says the British-accented fighter who has appeared in previous beheading videos and has been nicknamed Jihadi John by the British press. “You claim to have withdrawn from Iraq four years ago. We said to you then that you are liars.” Mr. Kassig was based in Gaziantep, this city in southern Turkey roughly one hour from the Syrian border, last year, where he ran a small aid group dedicated to helping victims of Syria’s civil war. He was abducted on Oct. 1, 2013, on his way to Deir al-Zour, Syria. Initially held separately, he was transferred late last year to a prison beneath the basement of the Children’s Hospital in Aleppo, and then to a network of jails in Raqqa, the capital of the extremist group’s self-declared caliphate. He was one of at least 23 Western hostages held by the group, and his cellmates included Mr. Foley, as well as the American freelance journalist Steven J. Sotloff, who were beheaded in late summer. The hostages — especially the Americans — were repeatedly tortured, including through waterboarding, an abuse meant to mirror the treatment of Muslim detainees in Iraq at C.I.A. “black sites,” where several members of the Islamic State are believed to have been held. They were also repeatedly interrogated by their captors, who forced them to hand over the passwords to their Internet accounts; the militants scanned their emails, their Facebook timelines and their private chats for evidence of collusion with foreign governments. A European hostage who was released after his government paid a ransom described the moment their extremist captors discovered that Mr. Kassig was an Iraq war veteran: “One day, the guards burst in, and they said: ‘Peter?’ And he said, ‘Yes, sir,’” recalled the former hostage, who requested anonymity out of concerns for his safety. “And then the guard said, ‘Are you a soldier?’” There was a pause. And then Mr. Kassig answered, “Yes, sir,” said the former prisoner. A total of 15 of Mr. Kassig’s cellmates — all but one of them European — were released earlier this year after their governments, companies or families paid ransoms. The families of the American victims were initially told by American officials that they would be prosecuted if they tried to pay a ransom. Mr. Foley’s parents and younger brother have since given television interviews expressing frustration at how the United States government handled their son’s abduction, saying that the threat of prosecution caused them to lose valuable time — at the same moment that European countries were actively negotiating a dollar amount for their citizens who were prisoners. The footage purporting to be of Mr. Kassig’s severed head comes in the last moments of a 16-minute video tracing the history of the Islamic State, from its origins in Iraq as a unit under the control of Osama bin Laden to its modern-day incarnation in the region straddling Iraq and Syria. The black-hooded killer is shown conducting a mass beheading of captured Syrian soldiers, who are led out by the scruffs of their necks. Each fighter is shown grabbing a knife from a bowl. Then the victims are forced to kneel. They are beheaded at the same moment. In the middle is the man known as Jihadi John. Just after killing his victim, he looks up. Through the slits in his black mask, the viewer can see his eyes. Defiantly, he stares directly at the camera.