The organization said in its announcement on Sunday night that Saad bin Atef Al-Awlaki would succeed him Batarfi.
Al-Qaeda published a video clip, showing Batarfi wrapped in a shroud carrying the Al-Qaeda flag in black and white.
The organization did not announce any details about the cause of his death.
Here is some known information about Batarfi:
- It is believed that the leader, born in Saudi Arabia, died in his early forties.
- Batarfi traveled to Afghanistan in 1999, fighting alongside the Taliban during the US-led invasion.
- Joined Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula In 2010, he led gunmen to control the Yemeni governorate of Abyan, according to American sources.
- Batarfi took over as leader of the branch in February 2020, succeeding Qasim al-Rimi, who was killed in a US drone strike, an operation ordered by former US President Donald Trump.
- Al-Rimi claimed responsibility for an attack targeting a US naval air base in Pensacola, Florida, in 2019, in which 3 American sailors were killed.
- During Batarfi’s era, AQAP 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 United States had announced a reward of $5 million for anyone who brings Batarfi’s head.
- 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 group in Yemen, with the intention of launching attacks in the region and beyond.”
- Estimates submitted to the United Nations put the total number of AQAP militants at between 3,000 and 4,000 active and passive fighters.