In the aftermath of this most tragic, devastating and spine chilling news about the murder of the courageous Alan Henning, there are no adequate words to compensate for the loss, but I am sure many will join in sending heartfelt sympathies to his wife Barbara and all their family and friends.

Alan was one of many, but they are no less important. A dreadful,dreadful situation now.

Seconded .. very brave man to go out there alone to help out.

Yes very sad news that such a good man should suffer this fate.

Has anybody actually seen any of these guys actually beheaded? The only one I managed to see had the hooded guy "John" sawing at a neck and no blood which seemed odd and then edited. All the others are edited. A lot of the reports have "alleged" prefixing "beheading" so there still seems some doubt. That's not to say the poor blighters are still alive.

I have never watched one of these and don't intend to. I think if it wasn't for people watching them there would be no point in making them.

To be perfectly honest, I have seen the end product, and would not advise looking for it. I suppose having said that, many will start to search.
There are images of each of those Westerners. There are images of many others such as Christians being massacred and beheaded and there are images of children too.
These images of the Christian massacres came up on one site that I was unprepared for. Pretty gruesome, particularly the image of a father picking up his stiff, decapitated daughter. She had what looked to be a party dress on. It does your head in, be very careful.

This has been going on for ten years! Why are people kicking off now. Remember ken bigley or usa truck driver jack hensley.
All of a sudden the uks up in arms. It happens in saudi all the time as punishment ,but thats a country we support,get oil off.
I think the hypocrisy of the uk is massive.
It happens in africa and nigeria daily but cause theres no oil to defend were not bothered.
We allow non stun halal here too ,to pander to meaningless religion yet cause its animals getting their throats slit its somehow less pain and suffering because we dont see it or care.
No ones cares or remembers the 100,000 iraq people we bombed to dust in 2003 ,we are reaping what we sow and its uk/usa that opened the door to this.....us
We take the moral high ground but we a re just as barbaric and evil. Its karma. Sorry it is.
Unfortunately as usual ,not mps,its poor alan that pays the price or say lee rigby.

Google "boko haram" killings....the west isnt bothered about this type of murder.
Or "los zetas drug gang" makes what isis do look like childs play.
All motivated by money,religion,power,drugs...
As i always say ....human race =the most savage evil destructive war mongering stupid animal on earth !!

Two headlines on BBC today make me shake my head in a mix of grief and dismay

"More than £30,000 raised for Alan Henning family"

"Manchester Dogs' Home fire donations reach £2m"

Snod

Its the same as the donkeys home getting more money than nspcc
Animals cant control their destiny ,a sometimes short violent painful life and early death.
Perhaps were a nation of misanthropics like me....?
A recent study found most people love their pets more than anything else.and love to be with them than other humans.

Yer, for some reason, it does seem that people do in general have more concerns about animals/ animal related issues than other human beings!

I heard a local Councillor say recently that by far the most common concern from constituents visiting her Surgery was complaints about dog shit in their area.

We do remember Ken Bigley and we do remember many others, we also remember the invasion of Iraq and we also remember the 2 million people in this country who marched in opposition to the Iraq invasion.
We remember the Iraqi's killed in the war, we remember the army personel killed in the war, we know of much, including ethnic cleansing in WWII.
We know there are war torn countries all over the world, we also know we cannot involve ourselves in many of them to help solve the genocide and massacres of innocent people.
You can find comparative figures if you wish to look, and we do concern oursleves with the 100,000 iraqi civilians killed, but at the moment figures state there are 100,000 Christians being massacred each year and approx. 90,000 of those in the Congo . It is Ethnic cleansing. At present there are over 40,000 Yazidi men trapped in the Iraq mountains, Yazidi women and children are sleeping in fields with no protection, and winter coming on. The Yazidis an ancient civilization who have been persecuted for centuries and have lived in Northern Iraq and other regions for over 2000 years. The middle east is being cleansed of Christians, and from what I understand it is a campaign to purify Iraq and neighbouring countries of non-islamic influences.
Svenlock, you may be right on much of your reasoned opinions but Alan Henning was giving himself without judgement.
IS are extremeists in the Shariah that are giving a choice to convert , pay taxes or be killed. If they pay taxes, they are killed anyway, if they convert they cannot revert back and then used to kill others.(probably their own)
On this occassion we 'the West' have been asked to assist and you may remember that we ,were not happy to do so. No doubt for fear of invovling ourselves in another major battle and the Iraqi Government being happy to let us.
With all that and much more, if we should care to search for the information, there are aid workers worldwide who quietly and without fuss, get on with their dedicated duties behind the scenes and just like Alan Henning, are prepared to give their assistance in any way they can, to benefit those who are suffering most, and in many cases knowing full well that they put themselves in the most vulnerable situations.

How much more heroic and selfless can your fellow human be ?

We are aware of what has happened in the past and what is happening in our world today, and support for those aid workers should not be blighted by the rights and wrongs during a desperate, humanitarian crisis.

Would anyone would like to become an aid worker, on the Syrian border? There's a team going out in November

http://barnabasfund.org/UK/Latest-emergencies/?startno=1&Limit=7&View=1col

http://www.tearfund.org/en/latest/

I repeat ,the human race is an evil for any reason they want and for any cause...
The savages who killed him dont care a toss for his reasons just how he can be used as a symbol.
The dysfunctional human race will always have an in group and an out group so they can fight.
Pick a reason.
As tolstoy said "as long as theres slaughter houses,there will always be battle fields "
So true and played out now all over the world.
I just hate the wests moral stance when the weapons used are ours and we sold them to that country.....its all about money and oil not alan.
In time hell be forgotten like ken
I will never understand why you would fight for a scumbag like cameron and get your legs blown off
The uk was worth it in the cold war. Not now