Jordanian pilot ‘burned alive’ in new Isil video

Video showing death of Jordanian pilot Moaz al-Kassasbeh, held prisoner by Islamic State jihadists, released now but he may have been killed a month ago. Isil jihadists have released a video that shows the Jordanian pilot they have been holding hostage being burned alive.

Moaz al-Kasaesbeh, a pilot in the Jordanian air force, was captured by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant on December 24. His death, if confirmed, marks the failure of a proposed prisoner exchange for a woman failed suicide bomber being held in Jordan.

Known social media feeds of Isil members also posted photographs of the event. In it, Lt Kasaesbeh is standing in a cage, with a line of armed and masked jihadists looking on.

A trail of flames is then lit around him, and eventually he is burned too. Throughout, he stands erect and apparently defiant.

The Jordanian authorities, working on the assumption that the photographs were real, informed his family of his death this afternoon. 

An anti-Isil campaign group working under cover in Raqqa . . . drawing attention to rumours it reported on January 8 that Lt Kasaesbeh had been killed by being burned to death. Its tweet at the time said that Isil fighters were “talking enthusiastically” about the killing of the pilot by burning. Jordanian state television reported that Lt Kasaesbeh was killed on January 3.