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Islamic State posts Israeli Arab ‘spy death video’

ISLAMIC State (IS) militants have posted a video online which appears to show a young boy shooting dead an Israeli Arab prisoner.

ISLAMIC State (IS) militants have posted a video online which appears to show a young boy shooting dead an Israeli Arab prisoner.

The man, identified as Muhammad Said Ismail Musallam, was accused by IS of being a spy.

IS said Mr Musallam, 19, had posed as a foreign fighter when he joined the militants in Syria.

It said he later confessed to being a spy for Israel’s Mossad – a charge denied by Israel and by his family.

“Islamic State is doing this because it has an objective. It wants to scare the entire world,” said Said Musallam, the man’s father.

And in an interview in February he said: “My son is innocent; IS accused him of working for Mossad because he tried to run away.”

He said his son had gone missing after travelling as a tourist to Turkey in 2014 and the two had spoken by phone when Muhammad was in Raqqa, an IS stronghold in northern Syria.

A few months after he went to Syria an online magazine linked to IS carried an interview in his name in which he confessed he had been sent by Israel to infiltrate the organisation.

Its publication was a clear signal that he was in danger, the BBC’s Kevin Connolly in Jerusalem says.

A spokesman for the Israel’s security service Shin Bet told AFP news agency he had left home “on his own initiative”.

The 13-minute video purportedly showing Mr Musallam’s execution has not been independently verified. Official Israeli policy is not to comment on such cases.

The video shows a boy aged about 12 accompanied by an older, French-speaking militant who voices threats against Jews in France. The boy is then shown shooting an orange-suited figure in the head before firing more shots as the man lies on the ground.

It is the latest in a series of IS propaganda videos appearing to show the killing of hostages.

Last month IS militants in Libya released a video showing them beheading 21 Coptic Christians.

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