LONDON — A day after Sunni militants distributed gruesome video footage of the execution of an American aid worker, indications began to emerge on Monday that the images may have shown a Briton and a Frenchman among a group of executioners.
The suggestions by a British father whose son had traveled to Syria to join the militant Islamic State and by a senior French official seemed likely to deepen apprehension about the role of foreign-born jihadis in the conflict and the possible hazards of their return to native lands.
Thousands of young European Muslims have been reported flocking to join the insurgent Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, in its campaign to revive an Islamic caliphate in areas under its control. The battle sharpened significantly in June when the Islamists flooded from Syria into Iraq.
The militant group distributed a video on Sunday purporting to show that it had beheaded a fifth Western hostage, Peter Kassig, an American aid worker and former Army Ranger. The video featured a masked executioner with a British accent who has been nicknamed “Jihadi John†in British media accounts of the earlier executions.
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An image taken from a propaganda video released by the Islamic State militant group shows a man believed to be Maxime Hauchard, a French citizen. Credit via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
British news reports on Monday said the father of another Briton who had joined ISIS thought the footage included a man who resembled his son. The father, Ahmed Muthana, from Cardiff, Wales, said, however, that he was “not quite sure†that the image showed his son Nasser, who reportedly traveled to Syria in June along with his brother Aseel to join the militants.
“It resembles him,†Mr. Muthana said. “I was shown a picture of the video. I cannot confirm it is him, but I think it might be.â€
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At the same time, the French interior minister, Bernard Cazeneuve, said on Monday that there was a “strong possibility†that one of the unmasked militants seen in the video was a French citizen, Maxime Hauchard, who “left for Syria in August 2013 after a stay in Mauritania in 2012,†news reports said. He was said to be a 22-year-old convert to Islam, originally from Normandy in northern France.
“The video was analyzed by our intelligence services,†Mr. Cazeneuve said, adding that there was a “strong possibility that a French citizen was directly involved in these despicable crimes.â€
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Peter Kassig was one of at least 23 foreign hostages from 12 countries who were kidnapped by Syrian insurgents, sold or handed over to the Islamic State, and held underground in a prison near the Syrian city of Raqqa.
The beheadings have been depicted by militants as revenge for Western military actions in the war against Islamic State. British and French warplanes have joined the American-led bombing campaign against militant targets in Iraq.
Separately, in a case marked by extraordinary secrecy, a judge on Monday lifted some reporting restrictions in a high-profile terrorism trial, enabling British news media to report that a 26-year-old law student had been found guilty last week of one terrorism-related charge and had been sent for retrial on another.
The defendant, Erol Incedal, has denied accusations that he had been planning to attack prominent individuals such as the former British prime minister, Tony Blair, or to launch a broader attack modeled on the 2008 assault in Mumbai, India, in which more than 160 people were killed.
On Monday, journalists were permitted to report that, six days ago, after 23 hours 35 minutes of deliberations, a jury had found Mr. Incedal guilty of possessing a bomb-making document likely to be useful to a terrorist, but that it could not reach a verdict on the second charge, that he was planning an assault. The jury was discharged and a retrial was ordered for next February.
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A visual guide to the crisis in Iraq and Syria.
Mr. Incedal’s trial “was surrounded by almost-unprecedented secrecy, with the public and the press excluded from two-thirds of the hearing,†The Guardian newspaper reported.
“A small group of journalists was permitted to witness some of the secret evidence, but have been prohibited from reporting what they heard, and police have taken possession of their notebooks,†it said.
In August, Britain raised its assessment of the threat of a terrorist attack to its second-highest level — severe. The authorities have also carried out a series of arrests in recent months, apparently concerned to thwart any possible attack. Security officials have expressed concern that jihadis returning from Syria and Iraq could attack citizens on the streets. The Incedal case has not been publicly linked to events in Syria and Iraq.
In court testimony, Mr. Incedal was said to have been arrested in October 2013, after the police planted a bugging device on his car when he was stopped for a possible traffic violation two weeks earlier.
The police discovered a memory card containing the bomb-making document and another file on car bombs. The card was found in a corner of the cover of his mobile phone. Mr. Incedal said he had a “reasonable excuse†for possessing it, the Press Association news agency in Britain reported, without giving details.
A co-accused, Mounir Rarmoul-Bouhadjar, 26, pleaded guilty before the trial to having an identical document, the news agency said.
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