The head of the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria has been killed in Iraq in an operation by members of the Iraqi national intelligence service along with US-led coalition forces, the Iraqi prime minister announced on Friday.
“The Iraqis continue their impressive victories over the forces of darkness and terrorism,” Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani said in a statement posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Abdallah Maki Mosleh al-Rifai, or “Abu Khadija,” was “deputy caliph” of the militant group and as “one of the most dangerous terrorists in Iraq and the world,” the statement said.
Photo: AFP
On his Truth Social platform on Friday night, US President Donald Trump said: “Today the fugitive leader of ISIS in Iraq was killed. He was relentlessly hunted down by our intrepid warfighters” in coordination with the Iraqi government and the Kurdish regional government.
“PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH!” Trump posted.
A security official said the operation was carried out by an airstrike in Iraq’s Anbar province.
A second official said the operation took place on Thursday night but that al-Rifai’s death was confirmed on Friday.
They spoke on condition of anonymity, because they were not authorized to comment publicly.
The announcement came on the same day as the first visit by Syria’s top diplomat to Iraq, during which the two countries pledged to work together to combat IS.
Iraqi Minister of Foreign Affairs Fouad Hussein at a news conference said that “there are common challenges facing Syrian and Iraqi society, and especially the terrorists of IS.”
The officials had spoken “in detail about the movements of ISIS, whether on the Syrian-Iraqi border, inside Syria or inside Iraq” during the visit, he said.
Hussein referred to an operations room formed by Syria, Iraq, Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon at a recent meeting in Amman to confront IS, and said it would soon begin work.
The relationship between Iraq and Syria is somewhat fraught after the fall of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Al-Sudani came to power with the support of a coalition of Iran-backed factions, and Tehran was a major backer of al-Assad. Syrian interim president Ahmad al-Sharaa was previously known as Abu Mohammed al-Golani and fought as an al-Qaeda militant in Iraq after the US invasion of 2003, and later fought against al-Assad’s government in Syria.
However Syrian interim minister of foreign affairs Asaad Hassan al-Shibani focused on the historic ties between the two countries.
“Throughout history, Baghdad and Damascus have been the capitals of the Arab and Islamic world, sharing knowledge, culture and economy,” he said.
Strengthening the partnership between the two countries “will not only benefit our peoples, but will also contribute to the stability of the region, making us less dependent on external powers and better able to determine our own destiny,” he said.
ANGER: A video shared online showed residents in a neighborhood confronting the national security minister, attempting to drag her toward floodwaters Argentina’s port city of Bahia Blanca has been “destroyed” after being pummeled by a year’s worth of rain in a matter of hours, killing 13 and driving hundreds from their homes, authorities said on Saturday. Two young girls — reportedly aged four and one — were missing after possibly being swept away by floodwaters in the wake of Friday’s storm. The deluge left hospital rooms underwater, turned neighborhoods into islands and cut electricity to swaths of the city. Argentine Minister of National Security Patricia Bullrich said Bahia Blanca was “destroyed.” The death toll rose to 13 on Saturday, up from 10 on Friday, authorities
RARE EVENT: While some cultures have a negative view of eclipses, others see them as a chance to show how people can work together, a scientist said Stargazers across a swathe of the world marveled at a dramatic red “Blood Moon” during a rare total lunar eclipse in the early hours of yesterday morning. The celestial spectacle was visible in the Americas and Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as well as in the westernmost parts of Europe and Africa. The phenomenon happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up, causing our planet to cast a giant shadow across its satellite. But as the Earth’s shadow crept across the moon, it did not entirely blot out its white glow — instead the moon glowed a reddish color. This is because the
DEBT BREAK: Friedrich Merz has vowed to do ‘whatever it takes’ to free up more money for defense and infrastructure at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty Germany’s likely next leader Friedrich Merz was set yesterday to defend his unprecedented plans to massively ramp up defense and infrastructure spending in the Bundestag as lawmakers begin debating the proposals. Merz unveiled the plans last week, vowing his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — in talks to form a coalition after last month’s elections — would quickly push them through before the end of the current legislature. Fraying Europe-US ties under US President Donald Trump have fueled calls for Germany, long dependent on the US security umbrella, to quickly
Local officials from Russia’s ruling party have caused controversy by presenting mothers of soldiers killed in Ukraine with gifts of meat grinders, an appliance widely used to describe Russia’s brutal tactics on the front line. The United Russia party in the northern Murmansk region posted photographs on social media showing officials smiling as they visited bereaved mothers with gifts of flowers and boxed meat grinders for International Women’s Day on Saturday, which is widely celebrated in Russia. The post included a message thanking the “dear moms” for their “strength of spirit and the love you put into bringing up your sons.” It
RSS