Al Baghdadi — a low profile terrorist boss
He has not been seen in public since proclaiming himself ‘caliph’ 6 years ago
It is rather remarkable that [Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi] the leader of the most imageconscious terrorist group is so low-key in terms of his own publicity.” Patrick Skinner | Analyst
Discreet in his youth and invisible as the world’s most wanted man, Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi rose through the ranks quietly to become the undisputed global leader of terrorism.
The 48-year-old Iraqi-born leader of Daesh, nicknamed “The Ghost”, has not been seen in public since he proclaimed himself as so-called “caliph” in the Iraqi city of Mosul six years ago. The world’s most-wanted man has been rumoured wounded or killed a number of times in the past.
The last sign of life he gave was in November 2017 after Iraqi forces supported by the aerial might of the coalition launched their reconquest of Mosul, the country’s second city.
In an audio recording, he urged his men to defend Mosul to the bitter end and Iraqi elite forces have gained huge ground but are still battling diehard militants around the Old City.
On the run
Al Baghdadi was said to have left Mosul two years ago and has been reportedly spotted in various areas near the Syrian-Iraqi border. But his whereabouts were never confirmed.
“It is rather remarkable that the leader of the most imageconscious terrorist group is so low-key in terms of his own publicity,” said Patrick Skinner, an analyst with the Soufan Group intelligence consultancy and a former CIA case officer. That low profile — a perfect antithesis to Osama Bin Laden — is partly what Al Baghdadi, who had a $25 million (Dh92 million) bounty on his head, owed his rise as well as his survival to.
Introvert
Al Baghdadi was born Ebrahim Awad Al Badri to a modest family in Samarra, north of
Strategist
Baghdad. An introvert, he was mostly known for his skills as a footballer. Al Baghdadi moved to the capital to study Islam.
After US-led forces invaded Iraq in 2003, he founded his own insurgent outfit.
It never carried out major attacks, however, and by the time he was arrested in February 2004 and detained at the Camp Bucca facility, he was still very much a second or third-tier militant.
The US prison in southern Iraq was where he became radicalised and started showing signs of the leader he is now.
“People there realised that this shy guy was an astute strategist,” Sofia Amara, an expert on Al Baghdadi said.
He was released at the end of 2004 for lack of evidence. Iraqi security services arrested him twice subsequently, in 2007 and 2012, but let him go because they did not know who he was.
Al Qaida connection
In 2005, after his release from Bucca, he pledged allegiance to Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, the brutal leader of Al Qaida.
Al Zarqawi was killed in 2006 and Al Baghdadi took over from his successor, who was also eliminated, in 2010.
Al Baghdadi grew up in a family divided between a religious clan and another of officers loyal to Saddam Hussain’s secular Baath Party.
Years later, he incorporated the ex-Baathists his predecessors had either fought or ignored into his organisation.
It gave his leadership the military legitimacy he personally lacked and formed a solid backbone for the future of Daesh.
Uncharismatic and an average orator, Al Baghdadi was described by his ex-wife Saja Al Dulaimi as a “normal family man” who was good with children.
Al Baghdadi is thought to have had three wives, Asma Al Kubaysi, Isra Al Qaysi — from Iraq and Syria — and another, more recent, from the Gulf.