The Slatest

ISIS Reportedly Beheads American Photojournalist in Iraq

A photo taken of James Foley working in Libya in September 2011.

Photo by Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images

ISIS terrorists have released a video purportedly showing the beheading of American freelance photojournalist James Wright Foley who went missing on Thanksgiving Day in 2012.

Foley, a 40-year-old New Hampshire native, was kidnapped at gunpoint from an Internet café in Syria. ISIS has threatened that Steven Sotloff—another freelance reporter who has been missing since August 2013 and has written for numerous publications such as TimeChristian Science Monitor, and Foreign Policy—will also be executed depending “on Obama’s next decision” regarding U.S. military strikes against ISIS in Iraq.

In the graphic video, Foley was forced to read a letter encouraging Americans to rise up against his “real killer”—“the U.S. government,” adding that the U.S. airstrikes against ISIS “hammered the final nail into [his] coffin.” Apparently, his executor was heard in the video speaking English with a British accent.