IS executes 20 Kurds, Arabs in Manbij

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (K24) – The Islamic State  executed about twenty Kurdish and Arab civilians in Syria over the past two days in the town of Manbij, a Syrian city northwest of Aleppo.

Speaking to K24 on Monday, Mohammad Al-Manbiji, an activist living in the city reported, “ISIS militants launched a comprehensive security crackdown in[side] the town and [among] the rural areas around the town on Friday and Saturday.”

Al-Manbiji explained, “They arrested more than fifty Kurdish and Arab civilianson different charges. Most had been arrested on the charge of communicating with the [Syrian] Kurdish forces and the Syrian Free Army, and others on charges of insulting the divine self  and apostasy.”

“About twenty  detainees were executed over [the last] three days: twelve on Friday, seven on Saturday, and one on Monday,” he added.

Al Manbiji continued, “Most were executed downtown, in front of a crowd of people. They were brutally slaughtered with knives, [charged with]... dealing with the Kurdish forces.” He also explained that the Islamic State militants not only refused to hand over the bodies of the executed people to their families, but also hanged them in the towns' public square.

Over the past year, several executions have been carried out in the IS-held city of Manbij.

In February 2015, the Islamic State group sentenced four civilians to death and hanged them in the public square.

In December 2014, IS beheaded four men for blasphemy and stoned a couple to death after being accused of committing adultery.