Islamic State leader ratted on 68 top jihadis when he was arrested in 2008
ISIS feared leader ‘The Professor’ ratted out 68 top jihadis before becoming the terror organisation’s chief.
Amir Mohammed Abdul Rahman al-Mawli al-Salbi offered up the names of al-Qaeda fighters when he was arrested in Iraq in 2008, according to declassified US intelligence files.
Salbi grassed on men responsible for plotting assassinations, kidnappings and bombings – and even gave spies the name of al-Qaeda’s second-in-command in Iraq, who was killed by American forces eight months later.
The rat’s intel has now been exposed after three interrogation reports were released by the Combating Terrorism Centre, a research body at the United States Military Academy in West Point, New York.
The reports, seen by The Daily Telegraph, stated: “Detainee identified a number of photographs of ‘HVI’ [high value individuals] from the Mosul area.”
It’s understood Salbi provided not only names but physical descriptions, mobile phone numbers and accounts of what they did for al-Qaeda.
He parted with the information after he was interrogated at Camp Bucca in southern Iraq.
After giving up the names, he was released in 2009.
Salbi signed a waiver which said he provided his statement “of my own free will without pressure of coercion”.
Experts say the news will cause shock waves for the death cult.
Craig Whiteside, associate professor of national security affairs at the US Naval War College, said that Salbi “doesn’t seem to have much in the way of probity” – strong moral principles – because “he was ratting out so many of his colleagues”.
And Haroro Ingram, a senior research fellow at George Washington University’s programme on extremism, told the Telegraph that the revelations would “really shake trust” in Salbi.
43-year-old Salbi, a former officer in Saddam Hussein’s army, became the leader of Isis last October.
He was appointed days after the death of former chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who killed himself and his children during a raid by US commandos.
Salbi, a founding member of Isis, is believed to have met Baghdadi while the sick pair were imprisoned at Camp Bucca in 2004.
Earlier this year Mike Pompeo, the secretary of state, offered a $5million reward for information leading to Salbi’s capture and said he was “previously active in al-Qaeda in Iraq and was known for torturing Yazidi religious minorities”.
An estimated 5,000 Yazidis were killed and hundreds of women and girls captured, enslaved and raped by militants in the Sinjar region of northern Iraq.
Salbi is said to have led the persecutions and later produced Islamic edicts that attempted to justify the massacre.
His whereabouts are unknown but it has been suggested that he followed Baghdadi to Idlib, northern Syria, the last rebel-held province in that country.
The moment Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi blew himself up during a raid by US commandos.
Source: The Sun
