ISIL video purports to show Kurdish peshmerga beheadings

The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) on Friday published a video purporting to show the beheading of three Kurdish peshmerga fighters in northern Iraq and threatening to kill dozens more held captive.

The six-minute clip showed the peshmerga wearing orange jumpsuits being decapitated by three black-clad fighters, all of whom spoke Kurdish. The release of the video appeared timed to coincide with celebrations for the Kurdish New Year.

The footage could not be independently verified.

The peshmerga have emerged as a key partner for the U.S.-led coalition in its campaign to degrade and destroy ISIL, an armed group that controls large parts of Iraq and Syria. Coalition airstrikes have recently helped drive back ISIL in northern Iraq.

"To the Muslim Kurdish people: know that our war is not with you, rather it is with those who ventured into an alliance with the Safavids and crusaders to wage war on the Muslims," said one of the fighters, using derogatory terms to refer to Iran and the coalition respectively. Tehran has also provided assistance to the peshmerga.

Another of the fighters then directly addressed Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani, saying, "We warned you before that for every rocket you fire on those under the care of the Islamic State, you will kill one of your prisoners with your own hands."

Kurdish forces shelled parts of Mosul several days ago. Officials representing the peshmerga said the strike was retaliation for an ISIL missile that landed in a vegetable market outside the regional capital of Erbil on Monday.

ISIL has previously beheaded Western aid workers and journalists as well as domestic opponents in Syria and Iraq.

More than 1,000 peshmerga have been killed in combat with ISIL fighters since they overran a third of Iraq last summer, but several hundred Kurds have joined the other side and are fighting against their ethnic kin.

Earlier this year, a peshmerga was beheaded by a Kurdish fighter in Mosul after rockets were fired into the city by the Kurds, Reuters reported. Last month, another video was published showing captive peshmerga in cages being interviewed by a Kurdish fighter.

Kurdish authorities last week said they had evidence that ISIL fighters used chlorine as a chemical weapon against the peshmerga on at least one occasion.

Al Jazeera and Reuters