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Does Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi Still Matter?
The ISIS leader, long assumed dead, has resurfaced. But is he still in control of the terror group?
ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi appeared on a pulpit in a Mosul, Iraq, mosque in June 2014 to announce his new caliphate. The event was broadcast around the world, and marked a turning point for a terror group that President Barack Obama had initially dismissed as the “JV.” Then, Baghdadi seemed to disappear.
In the time since that last appearance, Baghdadi and ISIS have seen their once sizable caliphate reduced to rubble thanks to the efforts of a coalition of more than 20 nations. The organization once laid claim to a mini-empire dominating millions of people; just a few weeks ago, it lost control of its last remaining Syrian village near the Iraqi border. Tens of thousands of ISIS fighters have been killed, and still more have been captured. All the while Baghdadi remained out of sight; save for a few audio recordings that were hard to date, he became something of a ghost. His absence sparked a cottage industry of speculation based on anonymous government officials, mostly in Iraq and Syria, who claimed he’d been killed or badly wounded.
But that narrative was turned on its head Tuesday, when Baghdadi appeared in an 18-minute Islamic State video release…
