Major Update:
CIA got initial tip-off from one of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's wives and a courier: The Central Intelligence Agency worked closely with Iraqi and Kurdish intelligence officials in Iraq and Syria to identify more precisely Baghdadi's whereabouts and to put spies in place to monitor his periodic movements, the report said.
The CIA got the tip-off about the possible location of the elusive ISIS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi some months ago when one of his wives and a courier were arrested and interrogated, according to the New York Times.
Armed with that initial tip, the Central Intelligence Agency worked closely with Iraqi and Kurdish intelligence officials in Iraq and Syria to identify more precisely Baghdadi's whereabouts and to put spies in place to monitor his periodic movements, the report said.
We know how Trump obsessively rants and rails about his enemies in what demonizes as the “deep state.”
In his despicable self-aggrandizing press conference yesterday (see my story) he diminished the crucial help the Kurds and their CIA handlers gave to the United States by mentioning them last as he thanked everyone else.
He said “I want to thank the nations of Russia, Turkey, Syria, and Iraq and I also want to thank the Syrian Kurds for certain support they were able to give us." Then to add injury to injury he said:
“We had our own intel we got very little help... when we waste our time with our intelligence we hurt our country." This was a slam at the CIA and then he added yet another slam about the CIA: "I've dealt with some people who aren't very intelligent having to do with intel."
This is how the Kurds responded:
Now we learn this:
In their long hunt for Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, Iraqi intelligence teams secured a break in February 2018 after one of the Islamic State leader's top aides gave them information on how he escaped capture for so many years, said two Iraqi security officials.
Baghdadi would sometimes hold strategy talks with his commanders in moving minibuses packed with vegetables in order to avoid detection, Ismael al-Ethawi told officials after he was arrested by Turkish authorities and handed to the Iraqis.
"Ethawi gave valuable information which helped the Iraqi multi-security agencies team complete the missing pieces of the puzzle of Baghdadi's movements and places he used to hide," one of the Iraqi security officials said.
"Ethawi gave us details on five men, including him, whom were meeting Baghdadi inside Syria and the different locations they used," he told Reuters.
Excerpts:
Baghdadi would sometimes hold strategy talks with his commanders in moving minibuses packed with vegetables in order to avoid detection, Ismael al-Ethawi told officials after he was arrested by Turkish authorities and handed to the Iraqis.
“Ethawi gave valuable information which helped the Iraqi multi-security agencies team complete the missing pieces of the puzzle of Baghdadi’s movements and places he used to hide,” one of the Iraqi security officials said.
“Ethawi gave us details on five men, including him, whom were meeting Baghdadi inside Syria and the different locations they used,” he told Reuters.
Turning militants such as Ethawi was critical to the agents trying to track Baghdadi.
Ethawi, who holds a PHD in Islamic Sciences, was considered by Iraqi intelligence officials to be one of the leader’s top five aides. He joined al Qaeda in 2006 and was arrested by U.S. forces in 2008 and jailed for four years, according to the Iraqi security officials.
Baghdadi later tasked Ethawi with key roles such as delivering religious instructions and the selection of Islamic State commanders. After the group largely collapsed in 2017, Ethawi fled to Syria with his Syrian wife.
The hunt for Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was a joint operation between U.S., Turkish and Iraqi intelligence agents. No doubt there were CIA agents working closely with Turkish informants and assets. I can only imagine how they feel that these Kurds may have already been killed by the Turks as a result of Trump’s decision to green-light their invasion.
.
I wonder how they react when Trump lambasts the entire CIA.
.
Somewhere, possibly in hiding anywhere but in the United States for obvious and reprehensible reasons, we have the ultimate spy, who was once a member of the deepest of deep states within ISIS who may have to live out the rest of his life in for for his life and the lives of his family.
.
If anyone deserves a medal (added: if as an act of conscience he helped the CIA) from the United States if he helped capture Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi it would seem from the current reports that it is may be this man. If worth of such an honor he couldn’t appear on TV, and I am not sure he would even accept it from Trump.