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Biden’s “ISIS Leader Assassination” Theater Hides The Real Threat Protected By The US Government

US President Joe Biden triumphantly announced that the US military had assassinated the new leader of Daesh, Abu Ibrahim al-Hashemi al-Qurayshi, with many civilians dying in the process. But what does this actually show about the Biden administration’s foreign policy and the military’s modus operandi.

On Thursday, US special forces entered the town of Atmah, in the West of Syria’s militant held Idlib on a mission to assassination the leader of Daesh. US reports and local eyewitnesses say that the US forces were transported to the site on helicopters, without naming the exact number of forces used to conduct the raid, which the US says was planned for months. Joe Biden claimed in a press conference that precautions were taken to prevent civilian deaths. Ultimately, it was announced by the White Helmets that 13 were killed, including 6 children and al-Hashemi himself.

In 2019, the US Trump administration claimed to have killed the most well-known Daesh leader, known as Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in Idlib province. What’s interesting is that al-Baghdadi was killed in the very same area of Idlib as it is being claimed al-Hashemi was killed, indicating that the area is a hotbed for Daesh leaders. Although it has been accepted that al-Baghdadi was killed in the 2019 raid ordered by Trump — which was used to bolster the then President’s PR — the waters were muddied by at least 5 previous claims of al-Baghdadi’s assassination and that nobody had seen him for years. Similarly, this assassination involved the Daesh leader, al-Hashemi, detonating a massive suicide vest. He also happened to be hiding on the third floor of the building he was staying in — just like it was reported Baghdadi was.

There are now a few things to point out from the raid. The first being the so-called success of the mission by the US Government. According to the US president and complicit US media, the raid was designed to protect civilians and was rehearsed in mock designs of the very same building that the Daesh leader had stayed in for months. So, given that one of the US helicopters malfunctioned (although this could have been unavoidable) this was the first failure in the US raid, according to the accounts given up until this moment. The second failure is that the months of practice leading up to the raid itself apparently did not prepare for the event of suicide bombing, despite the fact that al-Baghdadi used a suicide vest. This previous fact would have clearly provided reason enough for them to factor this into the scenario. Either that, or the “protection of civilians” was quickly thrown out of the window — if it ever existed to begin with.

According to Reuters, who spoke to an eyewitness, US loud-speakers stated the following:

“Men, women, and children raise your hands. You are in safety of the American coalition that is surrounding the area. You will die if you don’t get out”.

This is perhaps the most stupid thing to announce when a terrorist leader is surrounded by civilians. If you genuinely wanted to protect those civilians, why make such an announcement, making your presence and intentions crystal clear to those who could potentially harm these civilians?

Then we have the significance of this assassination; how important was the Abu Ibrahim al-Hashemi al-Qurayshi? Well, according to the US media and government today, he was a very “hands on” guy of great importance. Reuters quoted an unnamed US official as saying “He was on our target list from the earliest days of the campaign. He was Baghdadi’s right-hand man, and … was personally responsible for some of the most vicious ISIS atrocities”. Yet, in November of 2019 when al-Qurayshi was named Daesh leader, US state department officials quite literally said that he was a “nobody“. This nobody is now being presented as if he was of the upmost importance. Interestingly enough, however, the US did not admit at the time that they clearly didn’t see him as a nobody in the past, as he was held under US detention in Iraq — just like his predecessor al-Baghdadi. The US even said at the time that they knew “almost nothing” about the new Daesh leader, which is very interesting considering they literally held him in one of their prisons.

So was this assassination so significant? Not really. This was more of a PR stunt. The Idlib pocket in Syria is under the joint control of Turkey — a NATO ally — al-Nussra, (now Hayat Tahrir al-Sham) and an alphabet soup of other al-Qaeda affiliated terrorist organisations. This is also a pocket of Syria with a heavy CIA influence. The US even admits that it was in bed with the radical al-Qaeda affiliates that now run Idlib. The United States specifically allows the area to remain under the repressive control of terrorist organisations. Late last year, and into early this year, the remaining Daesh members, which are located primarily in central Syria and Idlib, began a renewed campaign of deadly attacks, primarily on the Syrian army, Iran-backed militias, and civilian sites. For years the group was all but inactive, shy of a few attacks, as the majority of its fighters resided in cave dwellings, prisons or in hiding elsewhere. There was some debate last year inside Syria as to how Daesh regained its strength, some indicating that bribes had been offered to Syrian soldiers to facilitate the flow of weapons to Daesh, with others alleging that the United States had been behind a covert operation to refuel a small insurgency.

On January 20, a truck bombing attack blew a hole in the wall of a prison operating in al-Hasakah (north eastern Syria), which led to the reported escape of Daesh militants that then clashed with US forces and their Kurdish allies for 10-days. The US launched a bombing campaign, which reportedly killed around 250 of the militants. It is possible that Daesh was attempting some sort of a small comeback, but this still would not present the biggest threat currently posed to Syria.

What’s important to take out of this is the ridiculous cheerleading of US media, which uncritically celebrates such events and ushers in false nationalistic feelings of accomplishment. The US has never been under the direct threat of Daesh occupation, as Syria was. The United States Government has consistently made “mistakes” which facilitated the rise of Daesh. Whilst nobody has any problem with a terrorist leader being taken out, it is not the major event that it is being promoted as. The biggest terrorist group in Syria is now Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, which maintains a de-facto alliance with NATO power Turkey in Idlib. The US is doing nothing to purge the group and stop its terrorist attacks on Syrian territory. If they were attacking and killing the leadership of this group, it would be significant, but the Daesh leader assassination — which was documented by the well establish Hayat Tahrir al-Sham affiliated White Helmets for dramatical purposes — means little. The only possible positive indication that this could be giving, is that the US may be looking to pack up its bags and leave Syria, using this as its final accomplishment to justify its departure, yet this is unlikely whilst tensions are high with Iran.

Robert Inlakesh
Robert Inlakesh
Robert Inlakesh is a documentary filmmaker, journalist, writer, Middle-East analyst & news correspondent for The Last American Vagabond.
https://twitter.com/falasteen47

2 Replies to “Biden’s “ISIS Leader Assassination” Theater Hides The Real Threat Protected By The US Government

  1. This is not news, but opinion based editorial. Interesting that the White Helmets are cited as reliable sources of information.

    1. Incorrect, in every single way. “Reliable source of information”? You see, that is what “opinion-based editorial” actualy looks like. And why you assumed anyone was taking their claims at face value, instead of using their very involvement to bolster the skepticism that is on clear display and rife throughout the article, is beyond me. Glad I could help.

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