Ibrahim Awad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri (Arabic: إبراهيم عواد إبراهيم علي البدري, romanized: ʾIbrāhīm ʿAwād ʾIbrāhīm Alī al-Badri; 28 July 1971 – 27 October 2019), commonly known by his nom de guerre Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (Arabic: أبو بكر البغدادي, romanized: ʾAbū Bakr al-Baghdādī), was an Iraqi militant and leader of the Islamic State (IS) who served as its first caliph from 2014 until his death in 2019.

[7] Upon the dissolution of the MSC in October 2006, Baghdadi became a leading member of the newly established Islamic State of Iraq organization, and rose through the group's ranks until he was appointed its emir, the highest leader, in 2010.

[6][7] In March 2013, the group renamed itself as the "Islamic State of Iraq and Levant" (ISIL), announcing its intention to expand into Syria and forcibly assimilate the Al-Nusra Front, leading to a conflict with Al-Qaeda's general command.

[13][14] On 27 October 2019, Baghdadi killed himself and two children by detonating a suicide vest during the Barisha raid, conducted by the United States following approval from President Donald Trump, in Syria's northwestern Idlib Province.

[2][42][43][44][39] According to a short semi-authorized biography written by Abid Humam al-Athari, his grandfather, Ibrahim Ali al-Badri, apparently lived until the age of 94 and witnessed the US occupation of Iraq.

For more than a decade, until 2004, he lived in a room attached to a small local mosque in Tobchi, a poor neighbourhood on the western fringes of Baghdad, inhabited by both Shia and Sunni Muslims.

"He's managed this secret persona extremely well, and it's enhanced his group's prestige", said Patrick Johnston of the RAND Corporation, adding, "Young people are really attracted to that.

[26] Some believe that al-Baghdadi became an Islamic revolutionary during the rule of Saddam Hussein, but other reports suggest he was radicalized by joining the Muslim Brotherhood as a youth,[52] followed by his later internment with Al Qaeda commanders at the US Camp Bucca.

[68] As leader of ISI, al-Baghdadi was responsible for masterminding large-scale operations such as the 28 August 2011 suicide bombing at the Umm al-Qura Mosque in Baghdad, which killed prominent Sunni lawmaker Khalid al-Fahdawi.

[69] On 22 December 2011, a series of coordinated car bombings and IED (improvised explosive device) attacks struck over a dozen neighborhoods across Baghdad, killing at least 63 people and wounding 180.

[77] In an interview with Al Jazeera on 7 December 2012, Iraq's Acting Interior Minister said that the arrested man was not al-Baghdadi, but rather a sectional commander in charge of an area stretching from the northern outskirts of Baghdad to Taji.

[82] In January 2014, ISIL expelled Jabhat al-Nusra from the Syrian city of Raqqa, and in the same month clashes between the two in Syria's Deir ez-Zor Governorate killed hundreds of fighters and displaced tens of thousands of civilians.

[94] In an audio-taped message, al-Baghdadi announced that IS would march on "Rome" — generally interpreted to mean the West — in its quest to establish an Islamic State from the Middle East across Europe.

[100][101] On 20 January 2015, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that al-Baghdadi had been wounded in an airstrike in Al-Qa'im, an Iraqi border town held by IS at that time, and as a result withdrew to Syria.

[109][110] Due to the relatively stationary nature of IS control, the elevation of religious clergy age=244}} and the group's scripture-themed legal system, some analysts declared al-Baghdadi a theocrat and IS a theocracy.

[112] A video, made during the first Friday prayer service of Ramadan, shows al-Baghdadi speaking on a pulpit in the Arabic language to a congregation at the Great Mosque of al-Nuri in Mosul, northern Iraq on 4 July 2014.

[120][121] A 46-minute audio recording was released on 28 September 2017 through the IS-owned media organization Al Furqan in which al-Baghdadi accuses the United States of wilting in the face of Russia and lacking "the will to fight".

[122][123] Al-Baghdadi refers to recent events including North Korean threats against Japan and the United States and the recapture of Mosul by US backed Iraqi forces over two months earlier, likely to dispel rumours of his death.

[125] On 29 April 2019, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was shown in an 18-minute long video released by an Islamic State media group, his first public appearance in almost five years.

[126][127] On 16 September 2019 al-Baghdadi released an audio message calling for his followers to free detained IS members and their families held in camps in Iraq and Syria.

"[10] Authorities within the United States had also accused al-Baghdadi of kidnapping, enslaving, and repeatedly raping an American, Kayla Mueller, who IS later alleged was killed in a Jordanian airstrike but is believed to have been executed by IS.

Colonel John Dorrian, of the Combined Joint Task Force, stated he was aware of al-Baghdadi having chosen to sleep in a suicide vest, in the event he should find himself facing capture.

[132] In 2018, Iraqi intelligence officials and a number of experts believed that al-Baghdadi was hiding in IS's then-de facto capital of Hajin, in IS's Middle Euphrates Valley Pocket in Syria.

Even though no direct evidence has yet been found that al-Baghdadi himself was present in the city, experts noted that the remaining IS leadership was concentrated in Hajin, and that IS was persistently launching a strenuous defense.

[134] On 1 February 2019, the chief of the Intelligence Office of Iraq's Interior Ministry, Abu Ali Al-Basri, stated that al-Baghdadi never stayed in one place at a time as he continued to sneak back-and-forth across the Iraq-Syria border.

[136] According to an Associated Press interview with a Yazidi slave of his, Baghdadi had tried to escape to Idlib in late 2017 along with a wife and his security guards, but returned midway due to fear of an attempt on his life.

[174][175][176] US President Donald Trump and his officials stated that while being hunted by American military canines and after being cornered in a tunnel, al-Baghdadi died by self-detonating a suicide vest, killing three young children, reportedly his own, as well.

[206] On 29 October 2019, Trump stated on social media that al-Baghdadi's "number one replacement" had been killed by American forces, adding: "Most likely would have taken the top spot - Now he is also Dead!

[211] The Iraqi Interior Ministry said that al-Baghdadi had two wives, Asma Fawzi Mohammed al-Dulaimi (sometimes referred to as "Al-Qubaysi" or "al-Kubaysi"[212]) and Israa Rajab Mahal Al-Qaisi.

[224] Sujidah al-Dulaimi was arrested in Syria in late 2013 or early 2014, and was released from a Syrian jail in March 2014 as part of a prisoner swap involving 150 women, in exchange for 13 nuns taken captive by al-Qaeda-linked militants.