Radical Islamists in Egypt Post Gruesome Video of Barbaric Executions — Why It’s Being Called a ‘First’

A militant Islamist group based in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula has posted a video appearing to showing the beheading of four Egyptians the group accused of providing information to Israel leading up to an airstrike that killed three of its fighters.

According to Reuters, the Salafist Egyptian terrorist group Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis claimed the four men had been spying for Israel’s Mossad intelligence service. The terror group has killed scores of civilians in Egypt, including Christian clerics,

In the video, four blindfolded men are seen on their knees. Behind them are nine armed jihadists wearing masks and holding black flags of jihad.

Image source: YouTube

Though the video was posted Thursday, there were reports last week that four decapitated corpses had been found in the Sinai.

Reuters described it as “the first time that any decapitations had been made public in Egypt.” Daily News Egypt also called it a "first."

In the video, a masked jihadist chants and reads the alleged confessions of the men, Reuters reported. At the end of the video, one of the militants is seen methodically slicing off the heads of the victims using what appears to be a large kitchen knife, then placing the heads on their torsos.

Despite it reportedly being the first such case of a videotaped beheading in Egypt, the execution method is a hallmark of the Islamic State terrorist group fighting to establish a caliphate in Iraq, Syria and beyond, as reflected in last week’s execution of U.S. journalist James Foley.

In mid-July, an Israeli drone that was patrolling the border with Egypt killed three members of Ansar Bayt Al-Maqdis, an Egyptian newspaper reported. According to the report, the militants were trying to fire rockets at Israel and that a relative of the group’s leader was among those killed.