A video circulated on Arab social media on Sunday showing a child dressed as a jihadi warrior enthusiastically beheading his teddy bear with a hunting knife. In the video, a little boy appearing to be about pre-school age, entered a staged room dressed in traditional jihadist clothing brandishing a hunting knife as he approached a stage set with a white teddy bear with red polka-dot paws sitting in front of a large ISIS flag. With Islamic music playing in the background, the child brandished the knife and began to carefully behead the teddy bear. When the child stalled halfway through the beheading, a man not seen on camera calls out Takbir! which is an expression of faith in Islam. The child smiles at the camera, and appears to be encouraged by the man's words, returning to his task with renewed vigor. When the teddy bear's is successfully removed, the child lifts his knife into the air and the man off camera calls out "Allahu Akbar!" ISIS has been known to use children in its propaganda videos and affectionately refers to its child recruits as "cubs of the caliphate." The extremist Islamist organization markets these training videos on social media outlets in order to recruit young and impressionable foreign fighters who then receive military training and hard-line indoctrination.
