U.S. military chief says battle with IS starting to turn: To Obama, the dog of Rome, today we are slaughtering the soldiers of Bashar and tomorrow we will be slaughtering your soldiers

Ambassadors of Gulf Arab states to return to Qatar By ABDULLAH AL-SHIHRI Nov. 16, 2014 7:46 PM EST Sheik Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani FILE - In this Saturday, Jan. 29, 2011, file photo, Qatar's crown prince, Sheik Tamim bin Hamad Al... Read RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain said Monday they will reinstate their ambassadors to Qatar after withdrawing them in an unprecedented move eight months ago. The six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council, which also includes Kuwait and Oman, had been rattled by the rift in relations that was widely seen as a result of Qatar's support for Islamist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood throughout the region. The UAE and Saudi Arabia perceive the Brotherhood as a threat to their political systems. Both have branded the 86 year-old organization as a "terrorist group". After several rounds of high-level talks and months of pressure, Qatar recently forced top Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood figures to leave and seek refuge elsewhere. Additionally, pro-Brotherhood cleric Youssef al-Qaradawi has not appeared on the pulpit in Qatar since ambassadors were withdrawn. State media and government-linked commentators across the Gulf had been calling for an end to the diplomatic spat in the face of emerging threats from the Islamic State group in Iraq and Syria. Several Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Qatar, are playing a role in the U.S.-led military coalition conducting airstrikes against the extremist group. The decision to reinstate ambassadors came after rulers of the GCC member-states met in an emergency session in Saudi Arabia late Sunday. Among those present were Saudi King Abdullah and Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani. The GCC leadership said the meeting was called to "consolidate the spirit of sincere cooperation, to confirm the mutual destiny and aspirations of the Gulf Cooperation Council, the unity of its people and close rapprochement." The statement, released after midnight Monday, heralded the "opening of a new page" in relations with the reinstatement of ambassadors. The move paves the way for the GCC's annual summit to be held in Doha, Qatar next month. A regional security agreement drawn up late last year had called on Qatar to stop supporting organizations that threaten the Gulf's stability and to stop interfering in other nations' politics. Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain said in March that withdrawing their ambassadors was a move to protect their security. The oil-rich Gulf neighbors are strong supporters of Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, who was elected this year after leading a crushing military overthrow of Islamist President Mohammed Morsi. ===================== U.S. hostage Peter Kassig is killed by Islamic State Sun, Nov 16 20:27 PM EST image 1 of 6 By Mariam Karouny BEIRUT (Reuters) - Islamic State militants have beheaded another American hostage, Peter Kassig, issuing a video claiming the killing on Sunday and warning the United States they would kill other U.S. citizens "on your streets." U.S. President Barack Obama confirmed the death of the aid worker in what he called "an act of pure evil by a terrorist group that the world rightly associates with inhumanity." The announcement of Kassig's death, the fifth such killing of a Western captive by the group, formed part of a 15-minute video posted online in which Islamic State showed the beheadings of at least 14 men it said were pilots and officers loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Kassig, 26, from Indiana, was also known as Abdul-Rahman, a name he took after converting to Islam in captivity. His family has said he was taken captive on his way to the Syrian city of Deir al-Zor on Oct. 1, 2013. “We are heartbroken to learn that our son, Abdul-Rahman Peter Kassig, has lost his life as a result of his love for the Syrian people and his desire to ease their suffering," Ed and Paula Kassig said in a statement. "Our heart also goes out to the families of the Syrians who lost their lives, along with our son." The video did not show the beheading of Kassig, who previously served in the U.S. Army, but showed a masked man standing with a decapitated head covered in blood at his feet. Speaking in English in a British accent, the man says: "This is Peter Edward Kassig, a U.S. citizen." The video appeared on a jihadist website and on Twitter feeds used by Islamic State. In a statement to reporters on Air Force One on his way home from a G20 summit in Brisbane, Australia, Obama praised Kassig's humanitarian work and offered condolences to his family. BRITISH ACCENT The man in the video spoke with the same southern British accent as the killer of previous hostages, dubbed "Jihadi John" by British media. He was believed to have been wounded in an air attack on an IS leaders' meeting in Iraq near the Syrian border earlier this month, some media reports have said. French daily Le Figaro said on its website that the French Interior Ministry was studying the possibility of the presence of a French national among the Islamic State militants involved in the beheadings shown in the video. In the video, a masked militant says: "To Obama, the dog of Rome, today we are slaughtering the soldiers of Bashar and tomorrow we will be slaughtering your soldiers," in a prediction that Washington would send more troops to the region to fight Islamic State. "And with Allah's permission ... the Islamic State will soon ... begin to slaughter your people in your streets." The format of the video was different from previous such announcements, showing other beheadings in graphic detail, and also showing most of the killers unmasked. The purported location also was disclosed as the northern Syrian town of Dabeq. An Islamic State supporter in Syria contacted by Reuters said: "The message is very clear. This is what the West understands. They think they can scare us with their planes and their bombs. No, not us. We are out to impose the religion of God and, by his will, we will." Kassig was doing humanitarian work through Special Emergency Response and Assistance, an organization he founded in 2012 to help Syrian refugees, the family has said. Obama said Kassig's life stood in stark contrast to the values represented by Islamic State, adding he was a "humanitarian who worked to save the lives of Syrians injured and dispossessed by the Syrian conflict." Islamic State's "actions represent no faith, least of all the Muslim faith which Abdul-Rahman adopted as his own," Obama added. Islamic State previously killed U.S. journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff and British aid workers David Haines and Alan Henning. The masked militant, who appeared to be the leader of a beheading squad, said Kassig was buried in Dabeq, near the Turkish border. "Here we are burying the first American crusader in Dabeq. Eagerly waiting for the remainder of your armies to arrive," he says. Western leaders and officials condemned the killing. British Prime Minister David Cameron said he was horrified by the "cold-blooded murder." The beheadings of the Syrian personnel were filmed in death squad style, with militants standing behind a kneeling man in a dark blue overall. In slow motion shots, each of the militants is shown drawing a knife from a box on the side of the road. (Additional reporting by Omar Fahmy, Lin Noueihed, Kylie MacLellan, Karey Van Hall, Geert De Clercq, Jane Wardell and Viktor Szary, Mark Hosenball, Alina Selyukh and Bill Trott; Editing by William Maclean, Janet Lawrence, Giles Elgood, Eric Walsh and Frances Kerry) ============================= U.S. military chief says battle with IS starting to turn Sat, Nov 15 16:41 PM EST image 1 of 4 By Phil Stewart BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The United States' top military officer told American troops on a surprise visit to Baghdad on Saturday that the momentum in the battle with Islamic State was "starting to turn", but predicted a drawn-out campaign lasting several years. General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was visiting Iraq for the first time since President Barack Obama responded to Islamic State advances this summer by ordering troops back into a country they left in 2011. Hours earlier, an Iraqi army colonel said security forces appeared close to retaking the country's biggest refinery at Baiji, which has been under siege for months by Islamic State militants. Obama last week authorized roughly doubling the number of American ground forces as the military expands the reach of its advisers after slowing the militants' advances with U.S. airstrikes. Dempsey told the troops the U.S. military had helped Iraqi and Kurdish forces "pull Iraq back from the precipice". ((1. An overhanging or extremely steep mass of rock, such as a crag or the face of a cliff. 2. The brink of a dangerous or disastrous situation: on the precipice of defeat.)) "And now, I think it's starting to turn. So well done," Dempsey told a group of Marines at the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. Reuters accompanied him on the trip. Islamic State has captured swathes of territory in both Iraq and Syria, where the United States is also conducting air strikes with its allies in pursuit of Obama's declared objective to "degrade and destroy" the militants. CHALLENGES REMAIN Dempsey said it had been crucial to show Islamic State was not an unstoppable, 10-foot-tall force and instead "a bunch of midgets running around with a really radical ideology". He was hardly triumphant, however. Earlier, he visited a Joint Operations Center and watched a live video feed of a location showing Islamic State's black flag waving. Thirty-six people were kidnapped by Islamic State in western Iraq on Saturday, security sources said, members of the same tribe massacred in the hundreds by the group recently. Mortar attacks on oil and gas facilities wounded two people near the northern city of Kirkuk, oil officials said. Dempsey repeatedly made the point that military force could not root out Islamic State unless Iraq's government manages to work across the Sunni-Shi'ite divide. Building trust would take time. So would the U.S. mission, he said. "How long? Several years," said Dempsey. Dempsey, who also met top Iraqi officials, told Reuters he wanted to find out whether the Iraqis believed they could win recruits for a program the United States hopes to get under way next year to re-train Iraqi units. "I want to get a sense from them on whether they believe our timeline is feasible," Dempsey said. About 1,400 U.S. troops are now in Iraq. Obama's new authorization allows for deployment of up to 3,100. After meeting senior Iraqi officials in Baghdad including Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, Dempsey traveled to Arbil, capital of the Kurdistan semi-autonomous region in the north. U.S. troops will also train Kurdish forces. (Editing by Michael Georgy, Sonya Hepinstall and Mark Trevelyan)