Senior ISIS Leader Killed by US-Led Joint Forces Strike in Iraq

ISIS deputy caliph Abu Khadija was killed in an airstrike conducted by Iraqi national intelligence and U.S.-led coalition forces in Iraq’s Anbar Province.

U.S. Air Force F-16 fighter jets fly in formation during U.S.–Philippines joint air force exercises dubbed Cope Thunder at Clark Air Base in Mabalacat, Pampanga Province, Philippines, on May 9, 2023. Ezra Acayan/Getty Images

A key leader of the ISIS terror group has been killed in a joint operation in Iraq.

Abdallah Maki Mosleh al-Rifai, also known as Abu Khadija, was deputy caliph for ISIS and “one of the most dangerous terrorists in Iraq and the world,” according to a statement by Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani.

“The Iraqis continue their remarkable victories over the forces of darkness and terrorism,” al-Sudani wrote on social media platform X.

Al-Rifai was killed in an airstrike in Anbar Province in western Iraq on March 15, conducted jointly by Iraqi national intelligence and U.S.-led coalition forces.

President Donald Trump heralded the strike on his social media platform, Truth Social, as an example of his “peace through strength” foreign policy platform.

“Today the fugitive leader of ISIS in Iraq was killed,” Trump wrote on March 14. “He was relentlessly hunted down by our intrepid warfighters ... in coordination with the Iraqi Government and the Kurdish Regional Government.”

The strike is the third major blow to ISIS in recent months, following U.S.-led strikes against senior ISIS leaders and attack planners in Somalia in February and Syria in December 2024.

ISIS, which controlled vast swaths of Iraq and Syria in 2015 and 2016, shifted to an insurgency strategy after losing much of its territory there and quickly expanded in both size and influence throughout much of northern and central Africa.

The group remains an influential player among the many terror networks that have proliferated throughout the Middle East and Africa in the absence of stable governments.

Civil leadership in Iraq is concerned about a possible resurgence of the group in the Middle East because of uncertainties about Syria’s new government and the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the region.

The United States and Iraq announced an agreement last year to wind down the military mission in Iraq of a U.S.-led coalition to fight ISIS, with U.S. forces scheduled to begin departing Iraq by September following more than two decades of operations in the country.

At the time the agreement was made, Iraqi leadership expressed confidence that it could root out the remaining ISIS cells without U.S. assistance.

Since then, however, the rapid fall of the Assad regime in neighboring Syria and uncertainties over Syria’s future have led to renewed concerns about the possible spread of extremist groups in the region.

Although Syria’s new leadership, led by terrorist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, has pursued ISIS cells since taking power, there are widespread concerns that a breakdown in the overall security of Syria could allow the group to stage a resurgence.

Further, the news of al-Rifai’s killing on March 14 coincided with a visit to Iraq by Syria’s new top diplomat to Iraq, who pledged to work with Iraq and the United States to continue combating ISIS.

Syrian interim Foreign Minister Asaad Hassan al-Shibani focused on the historic ties between the two countries, noting their respective roles throughout history in shaping Arab and Islamic culture and economy.

Strengthening the partnership between the two countries, he said, would “contribute to the stability of the region,” making it less dependent on external powers and better able to determine its own future.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Fouad Hussein likewise said at a news conference that ISIS was one of the “common challenges facing Syrian and Iraqi society” and that the two nations would continue to work together to monitor and stamp out ISIS movements along the border.

Hussein added that a new operations room formed by Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Turkey would seek to confront ISIS, thereby transferring responsibility for the matter from a coalition led by the United States to one led by regional powers.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.