Speculation rife on successor after Baghdadi’s death

Ali Rajab

The October 27 death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has opened the door wide for speculation on who will succeed him. Baghdadi blew himself up before being targeted by an American raid in the northern Syrian province of Idlib.

One of three senior ISIS commanders is expected to succeed Baghdadi. The three commanders are Abdullah Qerdash, Jalaleddine al-Tunsi and Mohamed al-Shamali al-Jezrawi.

Abdullah Qerdash

In August this year, Baghdadi nominated Qerdash, an Iraqi national, to succeed him, according to the ISIS-affiliated Amaq news agency. Iraqi security expert Fadel Abu Regheif revealed that Werdash was imprisoned at Buka Jail in Basra. He previously served as the legislator of al-Qaeda organization in Iraq, Abu Regheif said.

Qerdash is a graduate of the College of Imam al-Adham in Mosul. He was a close associate of senior ISIS commander Abu al-Alaa al-Afri, who served as Baghdadi’s deputy and the second-in-command in his organization. Al-Afri was killed in 2016. His father was an eloquent preacher.

Qerdash is a descendant of the Tribe of Quraish, a prerequisite of the ISIS leadership as stipulated by Baghdadi himself. The Consultative Council of ISIS restricts leadership of the organization to the descendants of this tribe.

The descendants of the same tribe inside the ISIS leadership include Hejji Abdelnasser al-Iraqi who was included in a terrorism list by the US Department of State in 2018. Hejji heads the ISIS cabinet, the entity that runs the affairs of the terrorist organization. He commanded ISIS in Raqqa.

The other descendants of Quraish tribe inside ISIS is Ismail al-Ethawi who known as Abu Zaid al-Iraqi. Ismail assumed the position of Baghdad deputy. He headed a special panel to formulate the school curricula across the ISIS caliph. He was arrested by Iraqi intelligence in May 2018.

Jalaleddine al-Tunsi

Islamist affairs specialist Hesham al-Hashmi wrote on Twitter on October 27 that ISIS will be led in the coming days by either Jalaleddine al-Tunsi or Mohamed al-Shamali al-Jezrawi.

Al-Tunsi is a major candidate for the command of the terrorist organization, especially if its consultative councils waives the Quraish tribe requirement.

Al-Tunsi was born in 1982 in coastal Tunisian province of Sousse. He migrated to France in the 1990s and obtained the French citizenship before returning to Tunisia after the 2011 attacks. He then travelled to Syria to join ISIS.

He is one of the most important senior commanders of ISIS. He was a close associate of Baghdadi. He appeared in a video showing ISIS terrorists removing the demarcations on the border between Iraq and Syria in 2014. In 2016, he reportedly assumed the command of the ISIS branch in Libya.

Mohamed al-Shamali al-Jezrawi

He was responsible for administrative affairs and migrants inside ISIS. Jezrawi joined al-Qaeda in Iraqi in 2005. He then joined ISIS.

Jezrawi was born in Iraq in 1979. He is a Saudi national. The US pledged to give $5 million to anyone who would give it information about the whereabouts of Jezrawi.