Another beheading. From AP:
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia – The al-Qaida group that kidnapped American Paul M. Johnson Jr. posted a statement on a Web site Friday saying it killed him, and displayed still photographs on the Internet of his beheaded body. …
Johnson was kidnapped last weekend by militants who threatened to kill him by Friday if the kingdom did not release its al-Qaida prisoners.
UPDATE: Here is the message accompanying the beheading photos (via The Guardian):
In answer to what we promised … to kill the hostage Paul Marshall after the period is over … the infidel got his fair treatment … Let him taste something of what Muslims have long tasted from Apache helicopter fire and missiles. We, God willing, will continue our road to fight the enemies of God.
Yet people still doubt that religion plays any real or essential role in all this. Also, I wonder if the mujahedin really called Mr. Johnson “Paul Marshall.” Could they be reading Paul Marshall’s Islam At the Crossroads? (Marshall was actually Johnson’s middle name; I was just struck by the coincidence.)
UPDATE: The photos, via Drudge.
ANOTHER UPDATE: I’m sorry, but I’ve had to shut down the comments. A loathsome spammer keeps trying to post on this thread; also, although comments here are largely unmoderated, I really don’t want this thread or any other to fill up with calls to genocide and the like. I still believe that we can and must defeat jihad while remaining within the bounds of Judeo-Christian morality and American Constitutionality. And no, that doesn’t mean I’m not appalled and angered by what has been done to Mr. Johnson.