image source, AQAP
The United States has offered a reward of five million dollars for anyone who provides information about Batarfi
Al-Qaeda’s branch in Yemen announced the death of its leader, Khaled Batarfi, but did not clarify the circumstances of his death.
A video clip published by Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula showed the body of Khaled Batarfi wrapped in a shroud and the organization’s flag.
The statement read by a senior official did not indicate how he died, but used wording that did not suggest that he was killed like his predecessor.
Batarfi, a Saudi citizen in his 40s, became the leader of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in 2020.
The United States classified him as a “global terrorist” in 2018 and placed a reward of $5 million for anyone who provides information about him.
In the video posted on social media on Sunday, Abu Khubaib al-Sudani, an Al-Qaeda official in the Arabian Peninsula, read a statement that did not provide any details about the causes of Batarfi’s death.
Al-Sudani also announced that the Shura Council of AQAP had chosen Saad bin Atef Al-Awlaki as the new head of the group.
United Nations experts said in a report last July that Batarfi and Al-Awlaki lead “two conflicting wings of the group,” while Al-Awlaki enjoys the support of some tribes.
Batarfi traveled to Afghanistan in 1999 and fought in the ranks of the Taliban during the US-led invasion.
He joined Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula in 2010, and led militants to take control of the Yemeni governorate of Abyan, according to American sources.
During the era of Batarfi, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula was influenced by Al-Qaeda leader Saif Al-Adel, who is now believed to be leading the organization after the killing of Ayman Al-Zawahiri in a US drone strike in Afghanistan in 2022.
Washington considers the Al-Qaeda branch in the Arabian Peninsula the most dangerous branch of the organization, since its attempt in 2009 to blow up a plane over the United States.
The branch claimed responsibility for the bloody attack on the French satirical weekly newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris in 2015, but its foreign operations have diminished in recent years.
A recent United Nations report on Al-Qaeda stated: “Despite the organization’s decline in the Arabian Peninsula, it remains the most effective terrorist organization in Yemen.”
Experts said that it is difficult to measure the exact number of Al-Qaeda fighters in the Arabian Peninsula because it was rooted within local tribes, but their number is estimated to be in the thousands.
They added that it is believed that most of the senior leaders are located in the Wadi Ubaida region in the Ma’rib Governorate in the center of the country, while others are believed to be in the Hadhramaut Governorate in the east and Shabwa and Abyan in the south.
It is worth noting that Al-Awlaki, Batarfi’s successor, a Yemeni also known as Saad Muhammad Atef, is a member of the organization’s Shura Council and on the list of the American “Rewards for Justice Program.”
The United States offered a reward of up to six million dollars to anyone who provides information about him.
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