On Friday, IS claimed the Jordanian bombings in Syria killed 26-year-old Kayla Jean Mueller, an aid worker from Arizona, who was captured by the militants in 2013 while working with Syrian refugees near the country’s northern city of Aleppo.
Kayla Jean Mueller killed by Jordan air strikes claims ISIS http://t.co/SkJPA3A0h5 #tcot #tlot #tgdn pic.twitter.com/HmJjnwIrxG
— ┌П┐(•_•) (@exposeliberals) February 7, 2015
“We do not at the present have any evidence to corroborate ISIL’s [IS’] claims,” US National Security Adviser Susan Rice said in a statement aired on NBC News on Friday.
On the same day, the Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh said in a Twitter post that the IS claim was an “old and sick trick used by terrorists and despots for decades.”
An old and sick trick used by terrorists and despots for decades: claiming that hostages human shields held captive are killed by air raids.
— Nasser S. Judeh (@NasserJudeh) February 6, 2015
According to NBC, the US Defense Department said there were no US or Jordanian combat missions on IS targets near Raqqa, but rather some 225 kilometers away, in Al-Hasakah city.
"This news leaves us concerned, yet, we are still hopeful that Kayla is alive," Mueller’s parents were quoted as saying by local media.
Meuller will be the fourth US national to die under IS hostage if her death is confirmed. Two US journalists, James Foley and Steven Sotloff, and aid worker Peter Kassig, were beheaded by the extremist group in 2014.
Jordan, which has intensified airstrikes in IS targets since the pilot’s brutal killing, vowed to destroy the extremist group in an “earth-shaking” response.
IS is currently fighting in Syria and Iraq, where it has managed to capture large swathes of territory and declared a caliphate on the territories under its control. A coalition of more than 60 countries led by the United States has been carrying out airstrikes on militants' positions in an attempt to "degrade and ultimately destroy" the radical group.
