IS(IL) beheads US aid worker Kassig amid widespread revulsion

US President Barack Obama Sunday condemned as “pure evil” the self styled “Islamic State” group´s beheading of American aid worker Peter Kassig after the IS(IL) released a video showing his body.

The group released a video yesterday saying it had killed Kassig, who called himself Abdul-Rahman after converting to Islam, in a warning to Washington as it prepares to send more troops to Iraq.

“Abdul-Rahman was taken from us in an act of pure evil by a terrorist group that the world rightly associates with inhumanity,” Obama said in a statement released aboard Air Force One as he returned home from an Asia tour.

The video also showed the gruesome simultaneous beheadings of at least 18 men described as Syrian military personnel, the latest in a series of mass executions and other atrocities carried out by IS in Syria and Iraq.

“Like (US journalists) Jim Foley and Steven Sotloff before him, his life and deeds stand in stark contrast to everything that ISIL represents,” Obama added.

“ISIL´s actions represent no faith, least of all the Muslim faith that Abdul-Rahman adopted as his own.”

In the undated video, a man who appears to be the same British-accented jihadist who beheaded previous Western hostages stands above a severed head.

“This is Peter Edward Kassig, a US citizen,” the black-clad masked executioner says, urging Obama to send more troops back to the region to confront IS.

“Here we are burying the first American crusader in Dabiq, eagerly waiting for the remainder of your armies to arrive,” the militant says, referring to a northern Syrian town.