ISIS killer Jihadi John 'blown to pieces' in US drone strike

Bethany Haines told ITN News “After seeing the news that ‘Jihadi John’ was killed I felt an instant sense of relief, knowing he wouldn’t appear in any more horrific videos.”

She went on: “He was only a pawn in Isis’s stupid game but knowing it’s over that he’s finally dead still hasn’t sunk in.

“As much as I wanted him dead I also wanted answers as to why he did it, why my dad, how did it make a difference?”

Mohammed Shafiq, chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, a leading Muslim organisation in the UK, said: “The killing of Mohammed Emwazi in Syria is a significant moment in the fight to get justice for David Haines, Alan Henning and all the victims of this evil man.”

In another blow to IS, Kurdish fighters, backed by US-led air strikes, took back the Iraqi town of Sinjar.

Witnesses said fighters raised a Kurdish flag and fired celebratory gunfire in the town centre after freeing it from the terrorists’ grip more than a year after it was seized.

Senior British sources said the drone strike was a US operation which followed months of joint intelligence gathering by Britain and America.

British spies, including the Cheltenham-based GCHQ listening centre, have worked closely with the US agencies to build up over the long-term a picture of the “pattern of life” of jihadists in Syria before the targeting of Emwazi.

A Number 10 spokeswoman said: “We have been working hand in glove with the Americans to defeat Isil and to hunt down those murdering hostages.

“The Prime Minister has said before that tracking down these brutal murderers was a top priority.”

Emwazi got his nickname after hostages spoke of four British captors who they dubbed The Beatles.

He first came to notoriety in a video in August 2014 which showed the beheading of US journalist James Foley.

He also appeared in videos showing the killings of Mr Henning and Mr Haines, American journalist Steven Sotloff, aid worker Abdul-Rahman Kassig and Japanese journalists Kenji Goto and Haruna Yukawa shortly before they were killed.

A British drone strike this summer killed Reyaad Khan, an Islamic State militant from Wales, as he was travelling in a car with another Briton, Ruhul Amin, 26. Both Khan appeared in propaganda videos.

The Evening Standard revealed that Emwazi was the top name on a British “kill list” of around 20 fanatical terrorists.

“We are assessing the results of tonight’s operation and will provide additional information as and where appropriate,” said Pentagon press secretary Peter Cook.

One reason for the difficulty in a 100 percent identification was, in part, because his body was said to have been ‘vaporised’ and there were few remains left.

The former London schoolboy’s movements are understood to have been under surveillance for several weeks. Victim James Foley’s mother, Diane Foley, told ABC that Emwazi’s death would be “really a small solace to us”.

“This huge effort to go after this deranged man filled with hate when they can’t make half that effort to save the hostages while these young Americans were still alive,” she said.

Shirley Sotloff, the mother of another beheaded hostage, US journalist Steven Sotloff , told NBC News: ‘If they got him great, but it doesn’t bring my son back.’

Kuwaiti-born Emwazi moved to London with his family when he was six and was raised in North Kensington.