Swift payback for pilot death
JORDAN executed two alQa’ida prisoners before dawn yesterday, after Islamic State militants released a video purportedly showing a captured Jordanian pilot being burnt alive in a cage.
The pilot’s terrible death sparked outrage and street demonstrations in Jordan, where participation in the anti- IS coalition has not been popular.
The video emerged after a week-long drama over a possible prisoner exchange for a woman al-Qa’ida operative, who was one of the two prisoners executed.
The Jordanian military confirmed the death of Lt Muath Al-Kaseasbeh, 26, who was captured by the extremists in December, when his F-16 crashed on a mission with the US-led air campaign against IS.
In the 20-minute video purportedly showing his killing, the pilot displayed signs of having been beaten, including a black eye.
Toward the end of the clip, he is shown in an orange jumpsuit. He stands in an outdoor cage as a masked militant ignites a line of fuel leading to it.
The video, which threaten- ed other Jordanian pilots by name, was released on militant websites and bore the logo of IS’s al-Furqan media service.
Jordan made a swift and lethal response.
Government spokesman Mohammed al-Momani identified the prisoners executed by hanging as would-be suicide bomber Sajida al-Rishawi and terror plotter Ziad al-Karbouly.
Jordan had offered to trade al-Rishawi for Lt Muath alKaseasbeh but froze the swap when it received no proof the pilot was alive.
Al-Rishawi was sentenced to death after her 2005 role in a triple hotel bombing in Amman that killed 60 people. Al-Karbouly was sent to death row in 2008 for plotting terror attacks on Jordanians in Iraq.
In Washington yesterday, Jordan’s King Abdullah II and US President Barack Obama vowed at a hastily arranged White House meeting not to let up in the fight against IS.
The killing of the pilot appeared aimed at pressuring the government of Jordan to leave the coalition that has launched months of airstrikes on IS positions in Syria and Iraq.
But the extremists’ brutality against a fellow Muslim could backfire and turn other Sunni Muslims against them.