TObu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi took over as leader of the Islamic State in 2019 following the deaths in quick succession of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and Baghdadi’s designated successor, Abu Hassan al-Muhajjir.
The US operation to try to kill him had been in the planning stages since early December, when authorities became convinced he was living in a nondescript three-story building on the outskirts of Atme, in Syria’s Idlib province, near the border with Syria. Turkey.
He and his family had been in the house for 11 months, according to the owner. Qurayshi said that he was from Aleppo and that he was carrying a Syrian ID. He moved with three children, a wife and another woman who he said was his sister.
The operation was complicated by the fact that Qurayshi was known to rarely leave his residence on the third floor of the building, instead relying on a network of couriers to interact with others. The only known exception was when he would sometimes go to the roof of the building to shower, authorities said.
Administration officials said President Biden approved the operation Tuesday morning in the Oval Office. US special forces flew in from Erbil in Iraq, arriving at approximately 3 a.m. local time (1 a.m. GMT).
A man speaking Arabic with an Iraqi accent through a loudspeaker told the occupants of the house that they had 15 minutes to surrender. People fled from the first part of the building, and a short time later, according to the US, Qurayshi detonated explosives in his home, setting off an explosion so large that bodies flew across the floor.
After the explosion, special forces stormed the building, where they opened fire on Qurayshi’s top lieutenant and his wife, who had barricaded themselves in their home on the second floor. Both died but four children were rescued.
Witnesses said US troops were on the ground for more than two hours, a long time for a special forces operation.
A total of 13 people lay dead when the Americans left. It is unclear how many were killed by direct US fire and how many died during the alleged explosion inside the house. A spatter of blood near a large pool of coagulated blood seemed to support the claim that a powerful explosion had detonated near a person.
Biden later said a raid rather than an airstrike had been ordered to minimize civilian casualties. He also claimed that the high death count was caused by the explosion inside the house, and not a US attack.
A helicopter used to transport forces to the site suffered some sort of malfunction, under circumstances that are unclear. It was destroyed by a circling American plane and remains remain near the house.
All troops returned safely to Erbil. Photos that later circulated of a dead man’s face closely resembled a photograph of Qurayshi. US forensic experts took DNA samples from his body to compare with samples they already had, and Biden later confirmed the identification.
The precise version of events was still unclear hours after the attack. As is often the case with complex attacks carried out in the dark, it may take some time before it becomes clear who was killed and by whom.
www.theguardian.com
George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism