Islamic State says leader killed by al-Qaeda-linked militants in Syria

The Islamic State group announced on Thursday the death of its little-known leader, Abu al-Hussein al-Husseini al-Qurayshi, who had been heading the extremist organisation since November.

It did not say when he was killed.

Al-Qurayshi is the fourth Isis leader to be killed since the group was founded by Iraqi militant Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and declared a caliphate in large parts of Syria and Iraq in June 2014 before its defeat years later.

Abu Hafs al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi was announced as the group’s fifth leader.

Isis spokesman Abu Huthaifa al-Ansari said in an audio message that al-Qurayshi “was martyred” in rebel-held northwestern Syria.

He added that al-Qurayshi was killed by members of Syria’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham when they tried to detain him in the province of Idlib.

“He fought them until he succumbed to his wounds,” al-Ansari said of al-Qurayshi, adding that the al-Qaeda-linked group detained some Isis members who were with the late leader, including Abu Omar al-Muhajir, another spokesman, and that they are still being held.

In April, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkish intelligence agents had killed al-Qurayshi in northern Syria – a statement that Isis denied.

Isis founder al-Baghdadi was killed in a raid by Americans troops in northwestern Syria in October 2019.

The group’s leader after that, Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi, was also killed in a US raid in February 2022, in northwestern Syria.

His successor was killed in southern Syria later that year.

Source: scmp