Soldiers of the Caliphate in Algeria is a splinter group from al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) that has pledged loyalty to the Islamic State (IS). In a statement released on 14 September 2013, the leader of the group Abdulmalik Suleiman Abu Gori (aka Khaled) accused AQIM of "deviating from the true path". On 24 September 2014, the group beheaded a Frenchman, Herve Gourdel (55).