Another Isis chief is dead – but there is still no long-term US plan

An unbalanced approach to combating Isis – one that focuses on bombastic raids to take out high-profile leaders in a vacuum – is not going to work, writes Bel Trew

Al-Qurashi was holed up with his family in a house along the Turkish border (AFP via Getty Images)

In many ways, the US raid which killed Isis’s chief on Thursday was like experiencing déjà vu. Like his predecessor in 2019, Isis caliph Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi was killed in Idlib province, an opposition-held pocket of northwest Syria.

Al-Qurashi too was holed up with his family in a house along the Turkish border. In fact, it was just 15 kilometres up the road from the last hiding spot of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Like al-Baghdadi, he too blew himself up to evade capture.

The news came out in jagged disclosures before President Joe Biden also declared victory, albeit in a less bombastic manner than his predecessor Donald Trump who infamously claimed Baghdadi “died like a dog… whimpering, screaming and crying”.