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IS releases mass execution video from Palmyra

The terror organization Islamic State releases video showing execution of about 25 Syrian captives in the ancient city of Palmyra.

The Islamic State terror organization has released another propaganda film from the heart of the city Palmyra. The video shows a mass execution of about 25 prisoners, all of whom fought for the Syrian Army.

 

 

The execution is carried out while the prisoners kneel in front of the ancient ruins, and is conducted in front of a crowd sitting in the adjacent amphitheater.

 

 

 

The executioners all appear to be children or teenagers and are wearing desert camouflage and brown bandanas.

 

The killings are carried out in front of a relatively sparse crowd of men and some children watching from the ancient theater's seats.

 

IS reportedly carried out more than 200 executions, including of civilians, in and around Palmyra in the period when it captured the city.

 

 

The executions in the Palmyra amphitheater were first reported on May 27 by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based monitor, less than a week after ISIS captured the city.

 

At the time, Syria's antiquities director Mamoun Abdelkarim said he feared the killings could signal the start of "the group's barbarism and savagery against the ancient monuments of Palmyra."

 

"Using the Roman theater to execute people proves that these people are against humanity," he told AFP.

 

The Greco-Roman ruins at Palmyra are listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the city's capture by ISIS prompted international concerns for the fate of its spectacular ancient treasures.

 

 

So far, ISIS is not reported to have damaged the actual ruins, although it has blown up and desecrated Muslim graves in the city and destroyed a statue outside the Palmyra Museum.

 

ISIS has regularly released videos of its mass executions, with slick production and gruesome violence that experts say is a key propaganda tool for the group.

 

ISIS has been conducted a campaign of destruction in the ancient city, destroying multiple historic sites, and quashing the city's archeological sites and artifacts. The process falls in line with the group's expansion of its caliphate, and the disregard for "un-Islamic" history.

 

 AFP contributed to this report.

 

 


פרסום ראשון: 07.04.15, 20:10
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