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Join on Telegram Rabat – US President Joe Biden has announced that Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi, the leader of ISIS, has been “taken off the battlefield” in a raid carried out last night, February 3.
“Last night at my direction, U.S. military forces in northwest Syria successfully undertook a counterterrorism operation to protect the American people and our Allies,” a White House statement said.
“Thanks to the skill and bravery of our Armed Forces, we have taken off the battlefield Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi—the leader of ISIS,” it continued.
The raid was carried out overnight in Atmeh, a town in the rebel-controlled Idlib province of Syria near the Turkish border. It was the largest raid since the 2019 operation that took the life of former leader Abu-Bakr Al Baghdadi.
The raid on Al-Quraishi killed 13 people in total, including six children and four women, according to multiple sources on the ground.
Witnesses said the targeted buildings were surrounded by helicopters hours before the operation began.
An official from the US administration told reporters that Al-Quraishi blew himself up in the raid.
“In a final act of desperate cowardice he, and with no regard to the lives of his own family or others in the building, he chose to blow himself up,” Biden said in a press conference held after the raid.
ISIS named Al-Quraishi as its leader in 2019 after the death of its former leader, Al-Baghdadi.
Although little is known about Al-Quraishi, analysts agree that his death deals a significant blow to the Islamic State.
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