Too Brutal-The Death of James Wright Foley

The Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham (ISIS), which claims the mantle of Islamic caliphate, has recent released a video purporting to show the graphic beheading of American journalist James Wright Foley. His killer, a knife-wielding black masked jihadist speaks with a British accent while threatening the U.S., including threatening death to a man who is identified as American journalist Steven Sotloff.

Even while outrage courses through social media-and rightfully so- many have seemingly  forgetting that there is nothing new or unique about ISIS’ barbarism. American journalist  Daniel Pearl was beheaded by Al Qaeda #3 leader Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in 2002. KSM remains in Guantanamo Bay unpunished, despite having confessed. American businessman Nick Berg was beheaded on video tape by the head of AL Qaeda in Iraq Abu Musab Al Zarqawi in 2004.

Many are warning that ISIS’ horrifying jihad will eventually return home when the Western-raised, Western-educated Jihadists who fill its ranks return to their homelands to continue their religious war. But here too there is nothing unique. Terrorist beheading reached Western shores well before there was an ISIS.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev, one of the Boston bombers is believed responsible for slitting the throats of three Boston men, Brendan Mess, Erik Weissman and Raphael Teken, in an apartment on the tenth anniversary of 9/11. Michael Adebowale and Michael Adebolajo beheaded British military drummer Lee Rigby in 2013.

The death of James Wright Foley is another horrifying tragedy in the long war directed at the West by self-declared jihadists. Whether they go by the name ISIS, or Al Qaeda, or Hamas, the end goal to impose shariah law -by force and terror if necessary- remains unchanged.

Until we approach the conflict in those terms, defining the enemy by the words he uses for himself, and not imposing our own false narratives upon his motivations, we will never be able to come to grips with the true depth of the threat.

It’s time for respectable journalists to stop saying that ISIS is “Too brutal for Al Qaeda.” It’s a false distinction. Instead start boning up on Shariah law, and  see for yourself  what our enemies actually believe about  jihad, the treatment of prisoners, sex slavery, and beheadings.