Operation Kayla Mueller
White House national security adviser Robert O'Brien said on NBC's "Meet the Press" on 27 October 2019 that the operation against ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was named after humanitarian aid worker Kayla Mueller, who was captured and enslaved by ISIS in 2013. Kayla Mueller, a 26-year-old female, was kidnapped and repeatedly raped for almost 18 months by the leader of ISIL, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. American aid worker Kayla Mueller defied her ISIS captors by refusing to convert to Islam and even turned down an opportunity to escape to help save Yazidi sex slaves. The Islamic State said that a Jordanian airstrike on 06 February 2015 had killed American hostage Kayla Mueller in a building in Syria. The White House ultimately confirmed Mueller’s death, as well as an airstrike on the building cited by the militant group, but said U.S. officials could not validate, and would not investigate, precisely how or where she had died.
On February 10, 2015 President Obama said "Kayla dedicated her life to helping others in need at home and around the world. In Prescott, Arizona, she volunteered at a women’s shelter and worked at an HIV/AIDS clinic. She worked with humanitarian organizations in India, Israel, and the Palestinian territories, compelled by her desire to serve others. Eventually, her path took her to Turkey, where she helped provide comfort and support to Syrian refugees forced to flee their homes during the war. Kayla’s compassion and dedication to assisting those in need shows us that even amongst unconscionable evil, the essential decency of humanity can live on.... No matter how long it takes, the United States will find and bring to justice the terrorists who are responsible for Kayla’s captivity and death."
The US military killed a “high-valued target” in Syria believed to be ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, Newsweek and Fox News reported on 27 October 2019 citing a top US Army official. Citing sources familiar with the operation, Newsweek reported that members of the Joint Special Operations Command received “actionable intelligence,” which led them to carry out a special operations raid targeting the ISIS leader in Syria's northwestern Idlib province. A senior Pentagon official told Newsweek that the compound where al-Baghdadi was located in the Barisha village in Syria's Idlib was taken out with an airstrike. Turkey, a NATO ally backing local insurgents, was not notified prior to the operation, the official added.
The person likely to be first in line to replace the slain Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, had also been "terminated". The United States confirmed the killing of Abu al-Hassan al-Muhajir, ISIL spokesman and a high-ranking figure within the group. Much of ISIL's leadership has already been wiped out from Iraq and Syria. Many analysts have suggested that this is going to be a very different kind of succession that al-Baghdadi has probably envisioned.
The general outline of the mission was a helicopter assault by special operations forces that were pre-staged in Syria, launched against an isolated compound in northwest Syria where Baghdadi was suspected to be hiding. Following the assault, which was designed to capture or kill, the team returned to its staging base. The plan was significantly more complex than that, and designed to avoid detection by ISIS and others prior to and during execution, to avoid civilian causalities, and, with enough air cover, including armed helicopters, multiple unmanned strike aircraft, and fourth- and fifth-generation fighters, to support and defend the assaulting forces. The plan accounted for the assumption that forces would find multiple children at the objective.
Five ISIS members inside the compound presented a threat to the force. They did not respond to commands in Arabic to surrender, and they continued to threaten the force. They were then engaged by the raid force and killed. There were four women and one man. After this engagement, and once established inside the compound, U.S. forces discovered Baghdadi hiding in a tunnel. When capture at the hands of U.S. forces was imminent, Baghdadi detonated a bomb that he wore, killing himself and two young children that were with him. After the forces were safely off the objective, U.S. forces employed precision standoff munitions to destroy the compound and its contents.
General Frank McKenzie, head of US Central Command, said on 30 October 2019 that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's remains were buried at sea within 24 hours of his death inside an underground tunnel where he fled as special operations soldiers closed in on him. "US forces discovered Baghdadi hiding in a tunnel when capture at the hands of US forces was imminent," McKenzie said, as the US released the first photos and videos from Saturday's raid. "Baghdadi detonated a bomb he wore killing himself and two young children that were with him. The number two is a change, we originally thought there were three children with him." The two children appeared to be under the age of 12, he added.
At 7:15pm Eastern Daylight Time on October 26, the Special Operations force commander on the ground reported that Baghdadi had been killed. The Defense Intelligence Agency conducted the analysis, and compared DNA from the remains taken from the compound with an on-file sample taken when Baghdadi was at Camp Bucca prison in Iraq in 2004. The analysis showed a direct match between the samples and produced a level of certainty that the remains belonged to Baghdadi, of one in 104 septillion, which is certainly beyond a shadow of a doubt.
The state Iraqi News Agency cited security sources as saying that eight US helicopters targeted al-Baghdadi's hideout early Sunday 27 October 2019. CNN cited a US defense official as saying that al-Baghdadi detonated a suicide vest during the raid. They also reported that the final confirmation as to whether al-Baghdadi was actually targeted is pending while DNA and biometric testing is conducted. Two of al-Baghdadi’s wives were also killed during the US raid after detonating their own explosive vests, Newsweek reported citing Pentagon sources.
President Donald Trump reportedly approved the operation nearly a week before it took place. Iran was informed by sources in Syria that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed. “Iran was informed about Baghdadi’s death by Syrian officials who got it from the field,” one of the officials told Reuters. The second Iranian official confirmed it.
Iraq was informed by sources in Syria that the ISIS leader was killed, citing two Iraqi security sources. “Our sources from inside Syria have confirmed to the Iraqi intelligence team tasked with pursuing Baghdadi that he has been killed alongside his personal bodyguard in Idlib after his hiding place was discovered when he tried to get his family out of Idlib towards the Turkish border,” one of the sources told Reuters.
On Saturday, Trump had tweeted without further explanation, “Something very big has just happened!” White House spokesman Hogan Gidley had said late on Saturday that Trump plans to make a “major statement” at the White House at 9 a.m. EST (1300 GMT) on Sunday. At that time, Trump said "Last night was a great night for the United States and for the World. A brutal killer, one who has caused so much hardship and death, was violently eliminated – he will never again harm another innocent man, woman or child. He died like a dog. He died like a coward. The world is now a much safer place. God bless the United States of America!"
Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) Commander Mazloum Abdi tweeted, “Successful, historical operation due to a joint intelligence work with the United States” in apparent reference to reports of ISIS leader al-Baghdadi's death. Mazloum also stated that they have carried out intelligence work on the ground for five months prior to killing al-Baghdadi. "There has been intelligence work on the ground for five months, and a thorough pursuit until terrorist Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was eliminated through this joint operation. We thank everyone who contributed to this great work," Mazloum tweeted.
With a $25 million US bounty on his head, al-Baghdadi is the world’s most wanted man, responsible for steering his chillingly violent organization into mass slaughter of opponents and directing and inspiring terror attacks across continents and in the heart of Europe. ISIS was defeated in Iraq in 2017, while in Syria, it lost its last territory in March, marking the end of the terrorists’ self-declared caliphate. Despite these battlefield defeats, ISIS sleeper cells continued to launch attacks in both Iraq and Syria.
In April 2019, a propaganda video released by the extremist group’s al-Furqan media network showed a bearded man purporting to be al-Baghdadi sitting cross-legged on the floor, and giving an 18-minute address. This would have been the first appearance of al-Baghdadi since 2014, when he spoke at the Great Mosque in Mosul. In the video, al-Baghdadi referred in the past tense to the months-long fight for Baghouz at the time, ISIS’s final bastion in eastern Syria.
Jessica Stern, Boston University Professor and coauthor of ISIS: The State of Terror, said the killing of al-Baghdadi is significant, but even if his organisation is severely weakened the conditions remain ripe for another ISIL. "We know that some of the risk factors for terrorism include lots of young men who are unemployed or underemployed, sectarian tensions, sectarian conflict, sectarian war."
Hassan Hassan of the Center for Global Policy and coauthor of ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror says groups like ISIL will continue to attract members as long as authoritarian governments continue to hold power in the region. "If you're fighting someone like the regime of [Syrian President] Bashar al-Assad then jihadism provides a way for recruitment," he said. Hassan believes that the threat from ISIL remains despite al-Baghdadi's death. "Most certainly they will try to wage a campaign of revenge," he said. He added that in 2006 and 2010 the organisation was also in a critical time, yet it survived.
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