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Children assist executioners in latest Islamic State beheading video

The video follows reports that the Islamic State has since the beginning of the year recruited up to 400 children to join its "Cubs of the Caliphate."

By Fred Lambert

HAMA, Syria, March 29 (UPI) -- The Islamic State released a video Sunday depicting the beheading of multiple Shia men who were led to the spot of their execution by teenage boys, according to a human rights monitoring group.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports receiving a copy of the video, which was also posted to social media. The footage shows multiple armed underage males, called "Khilafah cubs" by SOHR, leading nine reportedly Shia men dressed in orange jumpsuits across a field in Hama, Syria.

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After stopping, one of the boys hands knives out to masked IS militants who then cut each prisoner's head off.

A militant in the video called the men "impure infidels" and vowed revenge for "what the regime did in the '80s in Hama," referring to former Syrian President Hafez al-Assad's brutal February 1982 crackdown against a Muslim Brotherhood uprising in the city.

The video comes less than a week after SOHR reported that between the beginning of the year and March 23, IS recruited 400 children to be a part of the "Ashbal al-Khilafah," or "Cubs of the Caliphate."

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Cities such as al-Mayadin and al-Bokamal are home to IS recruiting centers that target children in schools, mosques and at public displays of "execution, whipping, crucifying ... beheading, and stoning," SOHR reports.

Using the attraction of cars, money and weaponry, IS recruiters send underage prospects to camps that teach Sharia principles and military tactics. SOHR, which attains information from a network of sources on the ground, points out that "IS uses children to work as spies and agents to gather news and as guards on its own posts."

The monitoring group documented six under-18 IS members who were killed during fighting in Kobani against Kurdish forces in January.

Since declaring a Caliphate after spilling into Iraq from Syria last year, IS has become notorious for publicizing beheadings and other brutal executions. SOHR estimates that between February 28 to March 28, the group executed 61 people, including 36 civilians it charged with "insulting God, dealing with regime forces, recruiting people to kidnap IS members, homosexuality and spying."

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