ISIS 'apologizes': Hey, sorry, we released that beheading video a little early

Apparently even murderous terrorist outfits recognize the importance of news embargoes, and they feel just terrible that they let the world see them slicing off Steven Sotloff's head before the agreed-upon release time.

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Hey. I used to work in media relations. You can't make mistakes like this if you want to play in the big leagues. Of course, in these times of social media and instantly viral tweets, it's so hard for cabals of brutal murderers to control the flow of information:

ISIS admitted Tuesday it released a video of a man being beheaded before it was supposed to, it has emerged. Vocativ reported that the video - which allegedly shows the killing of Steven Sotloff - was shared through a Twitter account. @Khattabyaz warned the first account there had been a mistake, and failed to stop the beheading video from being disseminated, the website reported.

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According to the news site, ISIS then wrote on Justpaste 'A clarification about the mistake was made by "Uyun al-Ummah" account, that has published the video before the official time. 'The user saw a tweet with the video and thought it was published officially. We tried to remove the video after we understood that his was published by mistake, and we are sorry to the followers of the Islamic State.' In a later Twitter message, those responsible apologized and asked fellow jihadis not to 'reproach' them.

I know. It's not funny at all. But the absurdity of the whole thing leaves me at a loss for how to even respond to this. When you're dealing with an enemy this cold, this calculating, this lacking in any sense of morality or decency . . . yeah, I don't even know what to do with it. And apparently they have no shortage of followers who think it's pretty important that the release of beheading videos be timed just so, such that delicate sensitivities not be upset. Maybe this will be the thing that gets the media clamoring for Obama to come up with a strategy. You start violating news embargoes, those people are going to be mighty unhappy. Throughout our history, America has encountered pretty brutal enemies, but it's hard to think of one so completely unconcerned about even the pretense of decency. The only thing ISIS appears to care about is letting the world see there is no limit to its brutality. The only way to respond to that is with relentless force whose only objective is to completely destroy each and every one of these beasts. But at least they are willing to apologize when they violate their own news embargo. That's big of them.

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