Jordan has executed two al-Qaeda
prisoners before dawn today; just a few hours after the Islamic State militants
released a video that purposefully showed the captured Jordanian pilot being
burnt alive in a cage. A government spokesman has confirmed the killing of the
pilot.
After the news of pilot's death
was made public, Jordan vowed a quick and lethal response.
Government spokesman Mohammed
al-Momani confirmed the execution of the two prisoners. They are identified as
Sajida al-Rishawi and Ziad al-Karbouly. Al-Rishawi was sentenced to death for
corroborated involvement in the 2005 triple-hotel bombing in Amman; al-Karbouly
was given the capital punishment in 2008 for his involvement in terror attacks
on Jordanians in Iraq.
Earlier, Jordan offered to free
al-Rishawi -a failed suicide bomber- for the pilot's safe return, but declined
any swap after saying that there is no concrete evidence of the pilot's being
alive.
The brutal murder of the
Jordanian pilot, Lt. Muath al-Kaseasbeh, 26, enraged the Jordanian people and
drew condemnation from all quarters including the US President Barack Obama.
Al-Kaseasbeh was captured by the
militants in December when his F-16 fighter jet crashed near Raqqa, Syria, the
capital of the Islamic State's self-proclaimed caliphate.
Analysts are seeing the capture
and subsequent killing as a move of IS to put pressure on Jordan to do away
with its alliance with the US. This coalition is a key to the airstrikes targeted
at the strategic locations of IS in Syria and Iraq.
This brutal killing of the pilot
might backfire on the IS as there is a possibility of Sunni Muslims, enraged at
the gory killing of another Sunni Muslim, getting organized to fight the
terrorists.
Also Read:
No comments:
Post a Comment