The leader of the Islamic State organization, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the most wanted man in the world, considered responsible for multiple atrocities and atrocities in Iraq and Syria and bloody attacks in several countries, has died at 48. years, in northwestern Syria, on the night of Saturday 26 to Sunday 27 October.

Killed in a tunnel by the US special forces, according to the account delivered by Donald Trump Sunday, his last minutes were like a past life hidden in the shadows, even when, self-proclaimed "caliph", he presided over for seven million people in Syria and Iraq.

Antithesis of former al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden, who regularly broadcast videos of him, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi appeared only in two videos: the first, in June 2014 in his only known public appearance, in the famous mosque al-Nuri of Mosul, where he had called the Muslims of the whole world to give him allegiance after having been designated at the head of the caliphate proclaimed by his group on the territories conquered in Iraq and in Syria; the second, last April 29, in which he called his supporters, from an unknown place, to continue the fight.

Between these two images, the man with the beard pepper and salt tinged with red henna, married twice and father of five children, was content with sound recordings distilled dropper. The last one was in September 2018. He urged Islamic State fighters to "save" jihadists held in prisons and their families living in IDP camps, including in Syria and Iraq.

Imprisoned by Americans in 2004

This extreme discretion earned him the nickname "invisible jihadist", "invisible caliph" or "ghost" and helped build a myth around his person. Because we finally know little about Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Born in 1971 in Samarra, Iraq, holy city for Shiites and mostly populated by Sunnis, his real name is Ibrahim Awad al-Badri.

This football fan dreamed of being a lawyer, but his lack of academic achievement did not allow him to study law. He also considered joining the army, but his bad eyes prevented him from doing so. He eventually studied Islamic Science at the Islamic University of Baghdad, where he later taught theology for several years.

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After having created, at the time of the American invasion of 2003, a jihadist group without big radiation, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was arrested in February 2004 and imprisoned in Bucca, in the extreme south of Iraq. This huge prison, where the Saddam Hussein regime's fallen dignitaries and the Sunni jihadist nebula rub shoulders, will be nicknamed "the university of jihad".

Released from Bucca for lack of evidence after 10 months, he lends allegiance to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, under the tutelage of al-Qaeda, then becomes the man of confidence of his successor, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi. He will take over at his death in 2010 under the name of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in reference to the first successor caliph of the Prophet Muhammad, Abu Bakr.

Decisive alliance with the former officers of Saddam Hussein

His master stroke lies in the integration into his ranks of ex-Ba'athist officers, former soldiers of Saddam Hussein's army, who will help him turn the guerrilla group into a formidable armed organization. Taking advantage of the civil war in Syria, its fighters settled there in 2013, before a fulgurating offensive in June 2014 in Iraq where they seize a third of the territory of which Mosul, second city of the country, rich in oil fields. The group, renamed at first Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) then Islamic State, supplants Al Qaeda. Its military successes and carefully crafted propaganda have attracted thousands of supporters around the world.

In the space of a few months, the jihadist organization is known for its violence and cruelty, especially in Syria. In the areas his fighters control, as in the Raqqa province, in the north-east where the organization has established its stronghold, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi and his men reestablish the pact of Omar - a law inherited from the earliest times of Islam imposing strict rules on Christians - and apply Sharia law. Thus, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi marks the spirits by performing near Aleppo a 15-year-old who had, according to him, insulted the prophet. The man punishes thieves by cutting off their arms. And his fighters, especially in Syria, carry out crucifixions.

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"Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi had a real social project where everyone had a role to play, including women and children, whether they were little boys who were led into battle and forced to commit abominable acts. for some by being turned into executioners, or girls who were sold and raped from the age of 7 or 8 ", explains to France 24, in October 2018, the journalist Sofia Amara, author of the book" Baghdadi, caliph of terror "(Stock ed.).

"Everything has been done so that the organization survives its leader"

Although he was the first jihadist leader to establish a proto-state, his self-proclaimed "caliphate" has now fizzled out. The Islamic State's last slump fell in Baghouz, Syria, in March, and tens of thousands of its jihadists are now in Kurdish prisons in Syria or the Iraqi state.

"But everything has been done to ensure that the organization survives its leader," says Sofia Amara [Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi] was not chosen for his charisma, his jihadist resume or his feats of arms, but for its ability to validate the decisions of the military leaders who participated in the creation of Islamic State. "

For months, the man, whose death had been mentioned several times, led more than dislocated troops, even if in the propaganda videos, his organization continued to claim, more or less opportunely, attacks worldwide.

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Conscious of the weakening of his organization, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi also took care to inscribe the fight of his group in a long time, a way to make forget the current difficulties. "Very often, the propaganda of Daesh [Arabic name of the Islamic State group] refers to the battles that the prophet [Muhammad] lost but did not prevent him from triumphing later.When we are in a millenarian conception, as is the case with Daesh, we consider that the story is never finished ", analyzes on France 24, in September 2017, Pierre Conesa, former senior official at the Ministry of Defense and specialist in jihadism.

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi also anticipated his fall by appointing Abdullah Qardash, an Iraqi with whom he had been detained in Bucca prison, in August 2019 as successor to the head of the Islamic State group.

With AFP and Reuters