ISIS confirms leader’s death in Syria

BEIRUT — The Islamic State group confirmed for the first time on Thursday that its leader was killed in a U.S. strike in northwestern Syria last month and named his successor.

It was the first official comment from the militant group about its leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi since U.S. officials said he blew himself up along with members of his family as American forces raided his hideout in the northwestern Syrian town of Atmeh, near the border with Turkey, on Feb. 3.

Islamic State spokesman Abu Omar al-Muhajer confirmed the death of the leader on Thursday, as well as that of the group’s former spokesman, Abu Hamza al-Qurayshi, in the raid.

Al-Muhajer also said that the Islamic State has named a successor to the former leader, identifying him as Abu al-Hassan al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi and saying the late Islamic State chief has chosen him as the next caliph.

There was no immediate information about the new leader and it wasn’t known whether he is Iraqi like his two predecessors, both killed in rebel-held parts of Syria.

Last month’s U.S. strike was the second time in three years that the United States took out the top Islamic State leader.

“He has accepted the leadership,” al-Muhajer said of the new ISIS chief, without providing his real name.

In the U.S. raid, about 50 U.S. special operations forces landed in helicopters and attacked a house in a rebel-held corner of Syria, clashing for two hours with gunmen. In all, 13 people were killed, including six children and four women. Residents described continuous gunfire and explosions that jolted Atmeh near the Turkish border, an area dotted with camps for internally displaced from Syria’s civil war.

Since their defeat in 2019, the militants have struggled to mount a resurgence, staging deadly attacks in both Syria and Iraq. In January, Islamic State militants launched a complex assault on a prison in northeast Syria holding at least 3,000 ISIS detainees and setting off 10 days of clashes with U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish-led fighters.