The terrorist group Islamic State (IS) announced on Wednesday the death of its leader, Abu al Hasan al Qurashi, who was appointed by the organization last March, and designated Abu al Hussein al Hussein al Qurashi as the new caliph, according to a audio broadcast by the audiovisual production company Al Furqan, related to the jihadists.
"I regret to announce to the Muslims and the soldiers of the Islamic Caliphate the death of the prince of the believers, Abu al Hasan al Hashemi al Qurashi, during a battle where he was fighting the enemies of Allah," the IS spokesman said in the audio. Abu Omar al-Muhager.
He also announced that, after a meeting of the organization's leadership, it was agreed to "appoint Abu al Hussein al Husseini al Qurashi as caliph of the Muslims", in reference to the nickname of the new leader, whose real name is unknown and his role in IS up to now.
The spokesman did not provide details of how or where the organization's leader, who had remained in the shadows after being appointed last March, died after his predecessor died in early February in a US operation in northwestern Syria. .
The latest information about the deceased leader was offered last June by the Turkish information portal Odatv, which assured that the caliph had been arrested in Istanbul a month earlier in an international operation prepared in secret, although this point was not officially confirmed.
The previous one, Abu Ibrahim al Hashimi al Qurashi, was killed on February 3 in a US special forces operation at a house in the Syrian province of Idlib, a stronghold of the Syrian opposition in the northwest of the country.
Al Qurashi had been proclaimed caliph by the Islamic State in 2019, after the death of his predecessor, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, in another US operation, but during his time at the head of a weakened organization and stripped of the vast territories it had come to conquests in Syria and Iraq his face was not known and his voice was not heard.
Since the death of Al Baghdadi, the leaders of the Islamic State have been nicknamed Al Qurashi, in reference to the tribe of Quraish (or Quraishites, in Spanish), to which the Prophet Muhammad belonged, and that the last two leaders have used to give legitimacy.
