El Shafee Elsheikh is the highest profile IS fighter – and lone ‘Beatle’ – to stand trial in the US.
Image source, Bill Hennessy
A US federal jury in Virginia has convicted an ex-British jihadist over his involvement with a notorious Islamic State terror cell.
El Shafee Elsheikh, 33, was linked to the abduction, torture and beheading of several IS hostages in Syria, including journalists and aid workers.
On Thursday, after a three-week trial, he was found guilty of lethal hostage taking and conspiracy to commit murder.
Elsheikh was the highest profile IS fighter to stand trial in the US.
Hostages nicknamed the Sudanese-born Londoner and three other men the “Beatles” because of their British accents.
The group’s actions are said to have resulted in the deaths of four American hostages: journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, and aid workers Kayla Mueller and Peter Kassig.
They are also blamed in the deaths of British aid workers David Haines and Alan Henning, and Japanese journalists Haruna Yukawa and Kenji Goto.
Some of the victims were beheaded, with their deaths filmed and broadcast on social media. The high-profile killings triggered outrage around the world.
Image source, Handout/Boston Globe
Elsheikh was the only one of the four militants to go on trial in the US, after Alexanda Kotey pleaded guilty to his own charges last September. Mohammed Emwazi was killed in a 2015 drone strike in Syria and Aine Davis, the fourth member, is currently imprisoned in Turkey.
Four rows in the courtroom were permanently reserved for former hostages and their family members.
Over the course of the trial, several of them took the stand for the government, depicting the Beatles as a cohesive unit that reveled in brutality.
Witnesses recounted receiving random beatings, being given dog names and being forced to sing a parody of the Eagles’ pop song “Hotel California” retitled “Hotel Osama”.
Families also detailed their painstaking negotiations with the group, with Marsha Mueller telling the court how she and her husband had “begged” for their daughter Kayla’s life in emails.
Lawyers for Elsheikh, meanwhile, claimed that he was not a member of the Beatles and should not be held responsible for what the group did.
They painted him instead as “a simple Isis fighter” who went to Syria alone on behalf of “suffering Muslims”.
Jurors deliberated for less than six hours in total before delivering their verdict on Thursday afternoon.
Mike Haines, whose brother David died while being held by the group, told the BBC it marked the end of “an eight-year chapter of pain” for his family.
“This unanimous judgement is a triumph for society over ills like terrorism and helps differentiate us from the hateful, divisive ideologies that fuel these individuals,” he said.
“It must also act as a warning to anyone else seduced by the false glamour of extremism.”