ISIS leader al-Baghdadi killed in US commando raid in Syria
‘He died like a dog, whimpering, crying and screaming all the way’
US President Donald Trump delivered a special announcement on Sunday, informing the world of the death of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in an American special ops raid. He explained that the success could not have been achieved without the acknowledgment and help of Russia, Turkey, Syria and Iraq.
“The United States has been searching for Baghdadi for many years,” Trump began. “He died... whimpering and screaming.”
“The only ones remaining were Baghdadi in the tunnel, and he had dragged three of his young children with him that were led to certain death,” Trump continued. “He reached the end of the tunnel as our dogs chased him down. He ignited his vest, killing himself and his three children.”
“The thug that tried so hard to intimidate others spent his last moments in total fear,” he said. “Baghdadi’s demise demonstrates... our commitment to the enduring and total defeat of ISIS and other terrorist organizations. Our reach is very long.”
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu congratulated Trump for eliminating Baghdadi,
calling it an “impressive achievement.”
Netanyahu, who released a statement within moments of the completion of Trump’s press conference, said that it “reflects our shared determination – of the United States and all free states – to fight terrorist organizations and terrorist states.”
The prime minister said that while this was an “important milestone,” the campaign against terrorism is “still in front of us.”
Blue and White leader Benny Gantz also praised the hit, saying “the fight against terrorism requires a combination of responsibility, patience and determination
to act when called upon.”
He said the killing of Baghdadi “perfectly reflects that combination.”
“The fight against terrorism is not a fight against just one person – it is a long and dogged fight,” Gantz said. “However, every targeting killing sends a daunting message to the leadership of the organization and its followers – the long arm of counterterrorism knows no bounds.”
The killing was first reported on Sunday morning, when Newsweek reported that the US Joint Special Operations Command’s Delta Team conducted an operation against Baghdadi on Saturday.
Iraq said on Sunday that its National Intelligence Service found Islamic State leader Baghdadi’s location and provided it to the US.
“After constant monitoring and the formation of a specialized task force over an entire year, the Iraqi National Intelligence Service, acting on accurate information, was able to locate the den in which the head of Daesh terrorists Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and those with him were hiding in the Syrian province of Idlib,” the Iraqi military said in a statement.
Iran was informed by sources in Syria that Baghdadi had been killed, two Iranian officials told Reuters on Sunday.
“Iran was informed about Baghdadi’s death by Syrian officials, who got it from the field,” one of the officials said. The second Iranian official confirmed it.
The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights confirmed that nine people died in the US strike on Baghdadi’s Idlib compound.
“Our sources from inside Syria have confirmed to the Iraqi intelligence team tasked with pursuing Baghdadi that he has been killed alongside his personal bodyguard in Idlib, after his hiding place was discovered when he tried to get his family out of Idlib towards the Turkish border,” said one of the sources.
Iraqi state TV claimed on Sunday that Iraqi intelligence had assisted in pointing out the precise location of Baghdadi.
For days, US officials had feared that Islamic State would seek to capitalize on the upheaval in Syria. But they also saw a potential opportunity, in which Islamic State leaders might break from more secretive routines to communicate with operatives, potentially creating a chance for the United States and its allies to detect them.
During the press conference, Trump clarified that no US personnel were killed in the operation, though one dog was injured entering the tunnel. He stated that the final number of people killed on Baghdadi’s end of the operation will be announced in the next 24 hours.
He described watching the operation, which he saw along with Secretary of Defense Mark Esper, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Mark Milley, National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien, and several other military and intelligence officials, as something “like a movie.”
“Today’s events are another reminder that we will continue to pursue the remaining ISIS terrorists,” Trump stated. “That also goes for other terrorist organizations. Baghdadi and the losers who work for him, and losers they are, had no idea what they were getting into. In some cases, they were very frightened puppies; in other cases, hardcore killers. Baghdadi was vicious and violent, and he died in a vicious and violent way; as a coward, running and crying.”
“Russia was great,” he said, explaining that the personnel as part of the operation had to fly over Russian territory. “I also want to thank the Syrian Kurds for certain support they were able to give us.”
Yisrael Beytenu leader and former defense minister Avigdor Liberman wrote on his Twitter account following the announcement: “Baghdadi was a symbol of the extremist Islam, which suffered a heavy moral and operational blow.”
Liberman added that the terrorist’s death proves that terrorists are not safe wherever they are, “including Gaza and Lebanon.”
Foreign Minister Israel Katz also congratulated Trump on Twitter for the operation, adding that the achievement “is extremely important in the war against one of the most murderous terrorist organizations of our time,” and that the assassination is “an important message to the free world that in a determined war, terror can be won.”
“The world is a better place with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi gone,” said former education and interior minister Gideon Sa’ar on Twitter after Trump’s press conference. “The United States has made sure he met the end that terrorists should meet. The free world must unite in the fight against terror.”
Baghdadi was long thought to be hiding somewhere along the Iraq-Syria border. He has led the group since 2010, when it was still an underground al-Qaeda offshoot in Iraq.
On September 16, Islamic State’s media network issued a 30-minute audio message purporting to come from Baghdadi, in which he said operations were taking place daily and called on supporters to free women jailed in camps in Iraq and Syria over their alleged links to his group.
In the audio message, Baghdadi also said that the United States and its proxies had been defeated in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that it had been “dragged” into Mali and Niger.
At the height of its power, Islamic State ruled over millions of people, in a self-proclaimed “caliphate” running from northern Syria through towns and villages along the Tigris and Euphrates valleys to the outskirts of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.
But the fall in 2017 of Mosul and Raqqa, its strongholds in Iraq and Syria respectively, stripped Baghdadi, an Iraqi, of the trappings of a caliph and turned him into a fugitive thought to be moving along the desert border between Iraq and Syria.
US airstrikes killed his top lieutenants, and before Islamic State published a video message of Baghdadi in April, there had been conflicting reports over whether he was alive.
Despite losing its last significant territory, Islamic State is believed to have sleeper cells around the world, and some fighters operate from the shadows in Syria’s desert and Iraq’s cities. •