The U.S. military targeted the global leader of ISIS in an airstrike in Somalia late last month but cannot confirm whether he was killed, three U.S. officials say.
The U.S. government has publicly identified Abdulqadir Mumin as the head of the ISIS affiliate in Somalia, but two U.S. officials say that last year he quietly became the worldwide leader of the terror group.
ISIS still has thousands of fighters worldwide, primarily in northern Iraq and northeastern Syria, according to U.S. intelligence agencies.
The official said ISIS militants in Somalia operate more effectively in certain ways than other terror networks that are active in the country, including evading the FBI and Interpol and sharing their tactics, techniques and procedures with one another, like financing.
The U.S. says Mumin is responsible for deadly attacks throughout Somalia over the past decade, including the 2019 assassination of a judicial official in his home and the 2016 capture and monthslong occupation of a city in the Puntland region.
The previous two global chiefs of ISIS, including its best-known leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, had killed themselves when they were cornered during U.S. military raids.
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