Doug Stanglin

USA TODAY

An Algerian jihadist group linked to the Islamic State released a video Wednesday showing a French tourist who was abducted Sunday and beheaded, a U.S. terrorist watchdog group says.

French President Francois Hollande confirmed the killing of Hervé Gourdel, condemning it as a "cruel and cowardly" act.

"Our compatriot has been murdered," Hollande said before his speech to the United Nations General Assembly in New York.



After seizing Gourdel, 55, a mountaineering guide from Nice, on Sunday, the extremist group Jund al-Khilafah warned that he would be killed within 24 hours unless the French president halted French airstrikes in Iraq against the Islamic State extremist group.

France insisted it would not back down on the attacks.

France was the first U.S. ally to carry out airstrikes against the Islamic State but insisted it would target only the extremist forces in Iraq, not Syria.

SITE Intelligence Group, a U.S. organization that analyzes and monitors jihadist groups, said Jund al-Khilafah released the beheading video online Wednesday.

The video is titled in French "A message of blood for the French government." It shows Gourdel kneeling, his arms tied behind his back, in front of a half-dozen armed and masked men.

Gourdel speaks briefly, expressing love for his family, before one of the militants reads out a speech denouncing "French criminal crusaders" against Muslims in Algeria, Mali and Iraq, Agence France-Presse reported.

A militant approaches Gourdel with a knife. The actual beheading is not depicted in the video, rather it goes to black, resuming with a shot of what appears to be the victim's severed head resting on his body.

Gourdel was abducted in the northeast Kabylie region of Algeria, the BBC reported.

The Islamic State, based in regions of Syria and Iraq, has beheaded three Western hostages since August. Two of the victims, James Foley and Steve Sotloff, were U.S. journalists. The third, David Haines, was a British aid worker.

The Islamic State has threatened to behead another British aid worker, Alan Henning.

Contributing: Associated Press