WASHINGTON, July 12, 2022 (AFP) – The Pentagon confirmed to AFP that the leader of the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group in Syria was killed in a drone strike by US forces on Tuesday.
Mahir al-Agal was shot while riding a motorcycle near Cindires. Lieutenant Colonel Dave Eastburn, spokesman for the Department of Defense Central Command, said one of his best aides was seriously injured.
US President Joe Biden celebrated the success of the operation, which he said had “eliminated a key terrorist” and “significantly weakened ISIS’s ability to plan, finance and direct its operations in that region.”
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a leading source in the region, confirmed that Agal, classified by this organization as IS’s governor of the Levant, was killed in a drone strike.
The Syrian Civil Defense Forces said that one person was killed and another injured in the attack on a motorcycle outside the city of Aleppo, but did not reveal the identities of the victims. However, he pointed out that both men were linked to the pro-Ankara Syrian armed group Ahrar al-Sharkiya, which is on the US sanctions list, and were charged with population abuses and assassination committed during Turkey’s offensive in northern Syria in 2019. Kurdish women’s rights advocate Hevrin Halef.
– ‘Shadow’ ISIS in Syria –
According to observers, Ahrar al-Sharkiya recruited former IS leaders to fight Kurdish forces in areas controlled by Turkey and its allies in Syria.
In 2014, ISIS surged in Iraq and Syria and conquered many regions. Despite this, his self-proclaimed “caliphate” was soon overthrown by consecutive offensives in these two countries in 2017 and 2019, respectively. Since then, the organization has been destabilized several times by the killing or capture of its leaders in Syria.
Colonel Joe Buccino, spokesman for the US Army Central Command, said that ISIS, which had been defeated militarily in its former strongholds, “remains a threat to the United States and its allies in the region.”
Damien Ferré, founder of Jihad Analytics, which analyzes jihad at a global and cyber level, told AFP that the leader’s death “should not really affect” the jihadist group. “Every time an IS leader is killed, someone else is immediately put in his place,” he said.
However, Ferré said, “ISIS in Syria is a shadow of what it once was.” He is still capable of carrying out attacks against Syrian forces and operations here and there against Kurdish forces, but it has nothing to do with the period of the caliphate anymore,” he said.
The organization has also expanded its influence in other parts of the world, such as the Sahel, Nigeria, Yemen and Afghanistan, where it regularly takes responsibility for attacks.
pmh/cyj/llu/gm/ms/lb
source: Noticias
[author_name]
