The No. 2 figure in ISIS, Haji Mutazz, was killed in an August. 18 drone strike near Mosul, Iraq, a spokesman for the U.S. National Security Council announced Friday.
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“Al-Hayali’s death will adversely impact ISIL’s operations given that his influence spanned ISIL’s finance, media, operations, and logistics”, Price said, using the U.S. government’s acronym for ISIS (ISIL). He was in charge of moving large amounts of weapons, explosives, vehicles and militants between Iraq and Syria.
The deputy leader of the Islamic State terror group has been killed in an air strike in Iraq.
The death of Fadhil Ahmad al-Hayali is a significant blow to the terrorist network, also called ISIS or ISIL, but the group is known to have a fairly well-organized bureaucracy and it will likely quickly replace him.
Alberto Fernandez, vice president at the Middle East Media Research Institute, said he is confident that, this time, al-Hayali is actually dead.
However, Reuters quotes Seth Jones, a former Pentagon official who now works for the RAND Corporation, as saying: “My experience in looking at the Islamic State suggests they have demonstrated an ability to move people up into positions” when high-ranking operatives are killed. Mutazz was instrumental in a number of military operations, including the ISIS offensive in Mosul in June 2014.
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ISIS is also known as ISIL or the Islamic State.
