British jihadi 'Osama bin Bieber' executed by IS for 'spying'

A British teenager who joined the Islamic State group in Syria was reportedly executed by the jihadists for being a suspected spy, it was revealed this weekend.

If true, it would make Mohammed Ismail - who was nicknamed 'Osama bin Bieber' due to his baby-faced appearance - the first Briton to be killed by the group for espionage.

According to a report by The Sunday Times, Ismail was accused by the jihadists of revealing the whereabouts of an IS fighter named on the Pentagon's "kill list".

Ismail, who left the UK in 2014 aged 18, reportedly confessed to divulging information about Nasser Muthana, a fellow Briton who had gained notoriety by appearing in IS propaganda videos.

Muthana was killed in 2016 by a US airstrike on Mosul, the IS group's former 'capital' in Iraq.

Sources cited by The Sunday Times said Ismail's execution took place in Raqqa, Syria, just a few months after Muthana's death.

The fate of foreign IS fighers has become a major issue following the recent military defeat of the jihadi group in Syria by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.

After a months-long assault by the US-backed SDF to flush out the last IS strongholds in the Euphrates Valley, militants and their families gradually gathered in the eastern Syrian town of Baghouz as the last rump of the "caliphate" shrank around them.

While some managed to escape, many of the foreigners stayed behind, either surrendering to the SDF or fighting to the death.

According to the SDF, 66,000 people left the last IS pocket since January, including 5,000 militants and 24,000 of their relatives.

The de-facto autonomous Kurdish administration in northeastern Syria has warned it does not have capacity to detain captured IS fighters and has urged countries to take back their citizens captured while fighting for the jihadists.