US Special Forces Attack: ISIS Leader Quraishi Commits Suicide, Four Women And Six Children Killed

Illustration of ISIS. (Wikimedia Commons/VOA)

JAKARTA - The ISIS leader was killed after he blew himself up and members of his family in a US military offensive in Syria, President Joe Biden said, dealing a blow to the group as it is reorganizing as a guerrilla force after losing large swathes of territory.

Abu Ibrahim al-Hashemi al-Quraishi, has led ISIS since the death of its founder Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2019, who was also killed when he detonated explosives in an attack by the US Government.

As US troops approached Quraishi in northwestern Syria at night, he set off an explosion that also killed members of his own family, including children, according to President Biden and US officials.

The explosion was so large that it threw bodies out of the three-story building where Quraishi is and into the surrounding streets of the city of Atmeh, US officials said, blaming ISIS for all the civilian casualties.

"Thanks to the courage of our troops, this terrible terrorist leader is no more," President Biden said in a statement at the White House.

Neither President Biden nor officials briefing reporters gave a death toll, but Syrian rescue workers said at least 13 people had died, including four women and six children.

United States President Joe Biden. (Wikimedia Commons/The White House)

Quraishi's death is another setback for ISIS, nearly three years after its declared caliphate was dismantled and its fighters defeated by US and Iraqi forces.

Since then, ISIS has carried out insurgent attacks in Iraq and Syria. The most recent was last month, when his gunmen stormed a prison in northeastern Syria housing ISIS suspects.

Quraishi, a 45-year-old Iraqi, has remained largely in the shadows since succeeding Baghdadi who led the group when it launched a lightning expansion in 2014 that shocked the world. He controlled large swathes of Syria and Iraq, imposed strict Islamic rule on millions and inspired attacks in the West.

President Biden and US officials have described the Qurayshi as the "driving force" behind the 2014 genocide against the Yazidi minority in northern Iraq, calling him overseeing the Islamic State's offshoot network from Africa to Afghanistan.

"Last night's operation brought a major terrorist leader off the battlefield, sending a powerful message to terrorists around the world: We will come after you and find you," President Biden said.

Quraishi's assassination helped restore some of President Biden's government's foreign policy credentials, after it was widely criticized for the chaotic US troop withdrawal from Afghanistan last year.

Residents in Atmeh, near the Syrian-Turkish border, said helicopters landed and heavy gunfire and explosions were heard during the attack which began around midnight.

US special forces used loudspeakers to warn women and children to leave the area, they said.

Illustration of US special forces. (Wikimedia Commons/US Air Force)

The Pentagon said 10 people were evacuated from the attack area, including children. General Frank McKenzie, head of US Central Command, told the Washington-based Middle East Institute they were all "mobile and safe" and left on the scene when US troops left the region.

US military procedures to guard against civilian casualties are under scrutiny after a drone strike went wrong in Afghanistan that the Pentagon initially hailed as a success.

A video taken by a resident and seen by Reuters showed the apparently lifeless bodies of two children and a man in the rubble of buildings at the site.

Other footage showed rescue workers loading what appeared to be a small body wrapped in a white plastic sheet into an ambulance. Another body bag is in the back of the vehicle.

Using head torches, workers searched for remains through chunks of concrete, children's toys and women's clothing in the rubble. A kitchen was blackened and burned, windows hung from their frames and plastic utensils were half melted. Reuters was unable to independently verify the images.

A Syrian man who witnessed the attack said he left his house after midnight and saw planes flying in the sky.

"Ten minutes later we heard screams. 'Give up, the house is under siege,'" he said. "There was gunfire from planes and machine guns."

ISIS illustration. (Wikimedia Commons/thierry ehrmann)

Another witness said he saw several bodies at the scene. "There was blood everywhere," he told Reuters. He said one US helicopter appeared to have suffered a mechanical failure, forcing it to detonate.

As you know, local leaders, security officials and residents in northern Iraq say ISIS has re-emerged as a deadly threat, helped by the lack of central control in many areas.

"The killing of Quraishi is a big problem and a big blow to ISIS, because ISIS has never heard from this new leader," said Syrian analyst Hassan Hassan.

"I think ISIS will continue to be weak and under pressure for as long as America is in Iraq and Syria and engaged because the U.S. functions as a foot in the spring: once you step in, it kind of bounces back," he said.

Quraishi is holed up in areas of Syria that are home to several militant groups, including an al-Qaeda-affiliated faction whose leaders include foreign fighters.

US forces have for years used drones to target jihadists in the area. Thursday's operation appears to be the largest by US forces in the northwest since the attack that killed al-Baghdadi, said Charles Lister, a senior fellow at the Washington-based Middle East Institute.