ISIS release sickening new video showing 30 Ethiopian Christians being shot and beheaded

ISIS militants have released a video reportedly showing about 30 Ethiopian Christians being shot and beheaded in Libya.

The video, in which militants call Christians crusaders and say they are out to kill Muslims, showed about 15 men being beheaded on a beach and another group of the same size shot in their heads in scrubland.

Both groups of men are referred to in a subtitle as "worshippers of the cross belonging to the hostile Ethiopian church".

The video shows a man dressed in black clutching a pistol stood behind some of the victims.

Speaking to he camera, he says: "Muslim blood shed under the hands of your religions is not cheap.

"To the nation of the cross: We are now back again."

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The video concludes with a warning that Christians will not be safe unless they embrace Islam or pay protection money.

Islamic State controls large parts of Iraq and Syria and wants to redraw the map of the Middle East. It is not clear how many fighters it has in oil-producer Libya.

A senior Ethiopian official said the government was gathering information about the reported killings and would respond when it had more details. He said Ethiopia had no embassy in Libya, making it more difficult to verify the incident.

Militants professing loyalty to Islamic State have claimed several high-profile attacks on foreigners in Libya this year, including an assault on the Corinthia Hotel in Tripoli and the beheading of 21 Egyptian Christians in February.

The killings of the Egyptians prompted Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to order air strikes on Islamic State targets in Libya.

Egyptian security officials estimate thousands of militants who share Islamic State’s ideology moved from the Sinai

Peninsula to Libya after the army toppled President Mohamed

Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood in 2013. Libyan officials were not immediately available for comment.