The masked, knife-wielding man seen in a series of ISIS videos on the beheadings of Western hostages in recent months has been identified as Mohammed Emwazi, a Kuwaiti-born British citizen who grew up in london, The Washington Post reported on Thursday.
Emwazi, a computer programming graduate in his mid-20s and belonging to a well-to-do family, went by the description of “Jehadi John” in the wake of the widely-circulated videos that showed the masked man, holding his captives at knife-point and speaking with a British accent.
“I have no doubt that Mohammed is Jehadi John,” The Post quoted one of Emwazi’s close friends as saying in an interview, adding, “He was like a brother to me….I am sure it is him.” Mohammed is believed to have travelled to Syria around 2012, joining the Islamic State subsequently.
Hours later, ABC News said a former senior US intelligence official who was involved in the hunt for the man confirmed the name to it.
In london, the BBC also reported that Emwazi is the masked militant in the ISIS videos, adding British security services had been in the know of his identity but chose not disclose the name for operational reasons.
Emwazi first appeared in a video last August on the killing of American journalist James Foley. He was later seen in the videos of the beheadings of another US journalist Steven Sotloff, British aid worker David Haines, British taxi driver Alan Henning, and American aid worker Abdul-Rahman Kassig, also known as Peter. Early reports from london said Scotland Yard refused to confirm the identification, and that the Prime Minister’s office had no comment.
“We have previously asked media outlets not to speculate about the details of our investigation on the basis that life is at risk. We are not going to confirm the identity of anyone at this stage or give an update on the progress of this live counterterrorism investigation,” said Richard Walton from london’s Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command.
Emwazi, according to The Post, appeared to have left little trail on social media or elsewhere online. Those who knew him said he was polite and had a penchant for wearing stylish clothes while adhering to the tenets of his Islamic faith.
Friends, speaking on the condition of anonymity, were quoted as saying that Emwazi perhaps started to radicalise after a planned safari in Tanzania with two friends in 2009 following his graduation from the University of Westminster.
For reasons that were not clear, the trio were detained overnight in Dar es Salaam and were eventually deported.
Emwazi, according to The Post report, had claimed at that time that representatives from Britain’s MI5 security service had tried to recruit him. He later tried to move to Kuwait but was detained by counter terrorism officials in Britain in 2010.