US and Nigerian forces killed a leader of the Islamic State group In Nigeria on a mission on Friday, US President donald trump saying.
Trump announced the joint operation in Africa’s most populous country in a late-night social media post. He said Abu Bakr al-Mainuki was the Islamic State group’s second-in-command globally and “thought he might be hiding in Africa, but he didn’t know we had sources keeping us informed about what he was doing.”
Al-Mainuki was seen as the key figure in IS’s organization and finances, and had been planning attacks against the United States and its interests, according to an official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to share confidential information.
Nigerian President Bola Tinubu confirmed the operation, saying that Al-Mainuki was killed along with “several of his lieutenants, during an attack on his compound in the Lake Chad basin.”
The joint operation is the last by both countries since their new security partnership that began last year after Trump claimed Christians were being attacked in Nigeria security crisis and threatened American military intervention. Residents and security analysts have said Nigeria’s security crisis affects both Christians, predominant in the south, and Muslims, who are the majority in the north.
According to the spokesman for the Nigerian military task force that carried out Friday’s operation, the mission was a “highly complex precision air-ground operation” and was carried out during three hours of darkness early Saturday morning with no casualties or loss of assets.
“Its elimination represents the most important counterterrorism result” in the region since the operation began in 2015, Sani Uba, a spokesman for the task force, said in a statement.
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United Nations experts in their latest report said IS had stepped up its efforts in West Africa, citing more than 500 attacks between January and October last year.
Questions about Al-Mainuki’s exact status in IS
Born in Nigeria’s Borno province in 1982, al-Mainuki took command of the West African branch of IS after his predecessor, Mamman Nur, was killed in 2018, according to the Counter Extremism Project, which tracks militant groups.
Al-Mainuki was based in the Sahel area, the monitoring group said, adding that he is believed to have fought in Libya when IS was active in the North African nation more than a decade ago. It was sanctioned by the United States in 2023.
Trump, in his social media announcement, said Al-Mainuki was “second in command globally,” hiding in Africa, a claim some analysts say is misplaced. The Nigerian military, in a statement, also said that intelligence shows that earlier this year, Al-Mainuki may have been “elevated to the position of Head of the General Directorate of States, placing him as the second-highest-ranking leader within the global hierarchy of ISIS.”
US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth also said that Al-Mainuki was the senior Emir of ISIS’s General Directorate of Provinces – “ISIS’s number two globally – responsible for overseeing attack planning, directing hostage taking, and managing financial operations.”
There is no way to independently verify his position within IS. Analysts say Al-Mainuki was deputy to Abu Musab al-Barnawi, the leader of the Islamic State in the West Africa Province who was reported to have died in 2021. He is considered one of the central proponents of the formation of ISWAP, following its split from Boko Haram in 2016.
“If confirmed, Al-Mainuki’s killing is huge because it is the first time a security agency has killed someone so high in the ISWAP rankings,” said Malik Samuel, a senior researcher at Good Governance Africa who specializes in insurgent groups in Nigeria.
“The potential to cause chaos within the group also exists because the operation must have been carried out in the heart of the fortified ISWAP base, which is very difficult to access.”
Triumph In December he ordered US forces to launch attacks against the Islamic State group in Nigeria, although he later gave few details about the impact.
The United States and Nigeria intensify joint operations
The Nigerian military said the operation was a result of the newly formed U.S.-Nigeria partnership and intelligence-sharing efforts. Samalia Uba, a military spokesperson, said in a statement that the operation also “disrupted a violent terrorist network that endangered Nigeria and the wider West African region.”
Nigeria has been battling multiple armed groups, including at least two IS affiliates, as it faces a multifaceted security crisis. IS affiliates in Africa have become some of the most active militant groups on the continent following the collapse of the so-called IS caliphate in Syria and Iraq in 2017.
He In February, the United States sent troops to the West African nation. to help advise their military, and in March, The United States also deployed drones there. after Trump’s accusations about Christians being the goal in Nigeria.
Friday night’s operation was the latest example of a series of covert missions abroad that Trump has announced this year, beginning with the surprising nighttime raid in January to capture and depose Venezuela’s then-leader, Nicolás Maduro, and whisk him to the United States, followed nearly two months later by the launch of strikes that started the war with Iran.
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