The photo that will shock the world: jihadist Khaled Sharrouf’s son, 7, holds severed head
Sydney jihadist Khaled Sharrouf’s son — a child, 7, raised in the suburbs of Sydney — struggles with both arms to hold up the decapitated head of a slain Syrian soldier.
According to a report in The Australian newspaper, the horrifying image was posted on Twitter by a proud father with the words “That’s my boy” and is set to reverberate around the world as a savage example of the brutality of the Islamic State.
Sharrouf, a convicted terrorist who fled to Syria last year and is now an Islamic fighter, is believed to be travelling with his family.
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According to the report, Sharrouf’s son is pictured holding the severed head while wearing a pair of checked pants and a blue shirt with the insignia Polo Golf Kids.
In the photographs featuring Sharrouf and his son the heads are blackened and bloated having been dead for a week.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott said the image was evidence of the “hideous atrocities” such groups are capable of.
“We see more and more evidence of just how barbaric this particular entity is,” Mr Abbott said while in the Netherlands.
Former army chief Peter Leahy told 3AW the image was beyond belief and he called on the Islamic community leaders to address the matter urgently.
“This sort of ideology that can support a father doing this and can support this sort of activity that we’re seeing across the Middle East...let’s hear the leaders in the Islamic community condemn this type of activity because if they don’t what are they thinking,” he said.
Also speaking to 3AW, Monash University Global Terrorism Research Centre director Greg Barton said the children would probably follow in their father’s footsteps.
“Having Australian children there I think will horrify the nation but I think it reinforces the concerns that we’ve been taking over the past few weeks and authorities have been warning us about the threats back home here in Australia,” he said.
Sharrouf, a convicted terrorist, is wanted by the AFP over his crimes in Syria and Iraq. In another image he is posing in his battle-fatigues with his three children, aged four, six and seven and all armed with machineguns.
The horrific images come after revelations that kids are being coached to kill in the name of religion as Islamic State prepares a generation of fighters to rid the world of “infidels”.
Chilling footage from inside the newly founded “state” shows children as young as nine being prepared to pick up arms to continue the brutal onslaught against infidels worldwide.
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