ISIL leader criticall y wounded
• After leading a desert blitzkrieg across Syria and Iraq, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi stood before thousands of followers and proclaimed himself caliph of a new Islamic State.
But the bloodsoaked reign of a terrorist who achieved global prominence by conquering swaths of the Middle East appears to have been cut short by a U.S. airstrike.
Iraq’s government and other sources are convinced that, far from leading his men in battle, Baghdadi now lies critically wounded and subject to constant care. A U.S. air raid near the town of Al-Baaj, 145 km west of the Iraqi city of Mosul, appears to have injured Baghdadi and killed three of his companions on March 18.
The self-styled caliph is understood to have suffered spinal damage for which he requires continuous treatment. As a result, Baghdadi is thought to be incapacitated and no longer in command of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.
Instead, de facto leadership of the movement has passed to a council of senior commanders, including Baghdadi’s supposed deputy, Abu Alaa al-Afri.
If his injuries are as serious as reported, then Baghdadi is unlikely to recover and the transfer of power within ISIL will become permanent. The terrorist movement would then have lost a brutally skilful commander with a US$10million bounty on his head.
Baghdadi fought tooth and nail for a decade after being released from U.S. custody in Camp Bucca in southern Iraq in 2004. Only the fittest could have survived the onslaught mounted by U.S. forces over the years, particularly during the surge in 2007-08 when an extra 30,000 American soldiers were hurled against al-Qaida’s network in Iraq.
Baghdadi, 44, emerged from that particular furnace to become al-Qaida’s leader in Iraq in 2010. Aided by Syria’s descent into civil war, he managed to transform a marginal organization, reduced by the U.S. offensive to a few hundred fighters, into an independent force capable of seizing thousands of square kilometres of territory and ruling millions of people.
Baghdadi, who broke away from al-Qaida and founded ISIL, ruthlessly exploited the opportunity presented by Syria’s agony. Back in 2013, he captured oilfields in the deserts of eastern Syria, using these assets to fill a war-chest and make ISIL perhaps the richest terrorist movement in history.
At the same time, he steadily infiltrated the Sunni Arab areas of northern and central Iraq. In Mosul, the biggest urban centre in northern Iraq with a population of 1.5 million, Baghdadi’s men were running protection rackets and even levying taxes for months before the city fell into their hands during last summer’s offensive. ISIL’s empire is now the home for many foreign fighters, including the likes of Mohamed Emwazi, the Londoner also known as “Jihadi John” who has executed a number of British and American hostages.
Ever wary of spies, Baghdadi made his one and only public appearance in July last year, standing before worshippers in the Noori Mosque in Mosul and declaring himself to be “Caliph Ibrahim,” the leader of what he called the new Islamic State.
For all Baghdadi’s achievements, however, ISIL should still survive his loss, according to Professor Toby Dodge, the director of the Middle East Centre at the London School of Economics.
“The organization’s coherence does not rely on him,” said Dodge. “Baghdadi is one of collective leadership and behind him stand a series of figures who undoubtedly have a lifetime of experience in intelligence and violence.”
ISIL’s leaders include hardened veterans of the Iraqi army and intelligence service from Saddam Hussein’s era.