IS chief Baghdadi killed in US raid: Trump
President Donald Trump on Sunday said that elusive Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed, dying ‘like a dog,’ in a daring, night-time raid by US special forces deep in northwest Syria.
Trump told the nation in a televised address from the White House that US forces killed a ‘large number’ of Islamic State militants during the raid which culminated in cornering Baghdadi in a tunnel, where he set off a suicide vest.
‘He ignited his vest, killing himself,’ Trump said.
‘He died after running into a dead end tunnel, whimpering and crying and screaming all the way,’ Trump said, adding that three of Baghdadi’s children also died in the blast.
Trump said that the raid — which required flying more than an hour by helicopter in both directions from an undisclosed base — had been accomplished by help from Russia, Syria, Turkey and Iraq.
Special forces ‘executed a dangerous and daring night-time raid in northwestern Syria and accomplished their mission in grand style.’
At its height, Islamic State controlled swaths of Iraq and Syria in a self-declared state known as a caliphate, characterised by the brutal imposition of a puritanical version of Islam.
In addition to oppressing the people it governed, Islamic State planned or inspired terrorism attacks across Europe, while using expertise in social media to lure large numbers of foreign volunteers.
It took years of war, in which Islamic State became notorious for mass executions and sickening hostage murders, before the caliphate’s final slice of territory in Syria was seized this March.
The death of Baghdadi comes as a big boost for Trump, whose abrupt decision to withdraw a small but effective deployment of US forces from Syria caused fears that it would give Islamic State remnants and sleeper cells a chance to regroup.
Trump took a storm of criticism, including from his own usually loyal Republican Party.
In keeping with his liking for showmanship, Trump had teased the news late Saturday with an enigmatic tweet saying merely that ‘Something very big has just happened!’
News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net
