ISIS names Al-Baghdadi’s older brother as new leader
The announcement came weeks after the death last month of Abu Ibrahim al-Quraishi, the man who in turn succeeded Baghdadi in 2019 and became the group’s second so-called caliph.
FollowIslamic State (ISIS) named its new leader as Abu al-Hassan al-Hashemi al-Quraishi in a recorded audio message distributed online this week. The new leader of ISIS is the brother of its slain former caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and served as the former leader’s confidant, Islamic law adviser and messenger.
The announcement came weeks after the death last month of Abu Ibrahim al-Quraishi, the man who in turn succeeded Baghdadi in 2019 and became the group’s second so-called caliph. Both Baghdadi and Quraishi died by blowing themselves and family members up during US raids on their hideouts in northern Syria.
But on Friday, Reuters reported that western and Iraqi security sources believed his real name was Juma Awad al-Badri, the elder brother of Baghdadi.
The Islamic State group is moving to solidify support for its new leader, sharing photos on social media showing fighters uniting behind his rule.
One set of photos obtained by JihadoScope, a company that monitors online activity by Islamist extremists, and shared with VOA on Friday, shows a small group of fighters in Kirkuk, Iraq, giving bay’ah, or pledging allegiance, to the new IS emir.
A second set of photos shows a larger group of fighters purportedly from the group’s West Africa affiliate raising their weapons to the sky as they surround the black IS flag, also pledging allegiance to the new leader.
Two years ago, Iraqi intelligence officials revealed that Badri was his brother's most trusted messenger, who had travelled from northern Syria to Istanbul, Turkey, to deliver and retrieve information about the group's operations.
“We were watching somebody who was acting as a messenger to Al-Baghdadi and he was travelling frequently to Turkey and back,” a senior Iraqi intelligence official told The National.
