He was part of the "Beatles" cell, which specialized in the capture and execution of foreign hostages.

El Shafee el-Sheikh is on trial this Tuesday in the United States for hostage-taking, murder and support for a terrorist enterprise.

After the selection of jurors, scheduled for Tuesday, he will have to answer for the kidnapping and death of four American nationals: journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, as well as humanitarian workers Kayla Mueller and Peter Kassig.

The 33-year-old man, stripped of British nationality, will appear for nearly three weeks in federal court in Alexandria, near Washington.

But the hearings of this exceptional trial, which will also be that of the bloody methods of Daesh, will resonate well beyond the United States.

The beheaded hostages and their ordeal filmed

The "Beatles", four jihadists nicknamed by their prisoners because of their British accent, are suspected of having supervised the detention, between 2012 and 2015, of at least 27 hostages, originating from about fifteen countries (Spain, France, Denmark, New Zealand, Peru…).

In exchange for their release, they demanded millions of dollars to feed the coffers of Daesh.

Some of their captives, including the three Americans, but also British and Japanese, were beheaded and their ordeal filmed in propaganda videos that shocked the whole world.

These images will be shown at the trial, and former European hostages are expected to recount the abuse endured at the hands of this particularly sadistic group.

A Yazidi woman, who was detained for several months with Kayla Mueller, could also be called to the stand.

An atmosphere of "human alienation and sadism"

Simulation of drowning, electrocution, crucifixion, organization of fights between the detainees…: the four Britons were shown, according to the American authorities, to be particularly cruel towards their prisoners.

Captive of the group for six months in 2014, the Spanish photographer Ricardo Garcia Vilanova confided that "torture and murder were daily" in an atmosphere "of human alienation and sadism".

According to the indictment, El Shafee el-Sheikh was not left out: after having filmed the execution of a Syrian prisoner in front of a group of European hostages, he had launched at one of them: "You're next!

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Particularly fierce and angry "George"

Born in Sudan, he grew up in Great Britain, where he became radicalized at a very young age.

In 2012, he joined Syria to fight in the jihadist ranks, but soon joined the cell specializing in the capture of Westerners.

Former hostages, who nicknamed him "George", said he was particularly fierce and angry.

After his capture in 2018 by Kurdish forces, and before his transfer to the United States in 2020, El Shafee el-Sheikh admitted, in interviews granted to several media, to having "interacted" without "compassion" with the hostages.

But he sought to minimize his role, describing himself mainly as an intermediary in charge of recovering the e-mail addresses of the relatives of the detainees to negotiate the ransoms.

His lawyers did not say whether their client, who now sports a long, full beard, would testify before the jury.

What happened to the other "Beatles"?

The group's most prominent figure, Mohammed Emwazi, nicknamed "Jihadi John", was killed in an American bombardment of Syria in November 2015. He distinguished himself by appearing dressed all in black with a butcher's knife on the videos of Daesh propaganda.

Alexanda Kotey, known as "Ringo", was captured with El Chafee El Sheikh in January 2018 in Syria and then placed under the control of the American army in Iraq in October 2019 during the Turkish offensive in northern Syria.

The fourth, Aine Davis, is imprisoned in Turkey.

World

Syria: Capture of two jihadists who allegedly participated in the beheading of around twenty hostages

World

'Jihadi John' was linked to the failed London bombing in July 2005

  • Beatles

  • Hostage

  • Jihad

  • United States

  • Trial

  • Terrorism

  • Jihadism

  • Daesh

  • Justice

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