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senior Islamic State leader who coordinated suicide bombings and recruited funds
and fighters for the jihadists has been killed in a coalition air strike in
Syria, the Pentagon said Thursday.
Tariq
bin Tahar al-Awni al-Harzi was killed in the northern city of Shaddadi on June
16, Pentagon spokesman Navy Captain Jeff Davis said in a statement.
His
brother Ali, an IS recruiter and person of interest in the 2012 Benghazi attack,
was killed by an air strike in Iraq a day earlier.
Washington
had put a $3-million bounty on the head of Harzi, a 33-year-old Tunisian, and
described him in the past as the IS group’s “emir of suicide bombers.”
As
of late 2013, Harzi was a key figure in suicide and car bombings in Iraq, the US
says.
The
Pentagon said his killing was a significant blow to the Islamic State group.
“His
death will impact ISIL’s ability to integrate foreign terrorist fighters into
the Syrian and Iraqi fight as well as to move people and equipment across the
border between Syria and Iraq,” Davis said, using an alternative acronym for the
group.
The
Pentagon said Harzi was also “responsible for moving people and material into
Syria and Iraq” and also raised funds to recruit fighters and facilitate
travel.
In
addition, he supported the Islamic State group by procuring and shipping weapons
from Libya to Syria, where the militants have taken large swathes of
territory.
He
also worked to help raise funds from Gulf-based donors for the Islamic State
group, the United States says, including about $2 million from a Qatar-based
facilitator.
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