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ISIS leader al-Mawla was prison informant for U.S. military, interrogation docs show

Al-Mawla gave information to U.S. military in 2008, Combating Terrorism Center at West Point documents show.

Published: April 8, 2021 8:16am

Updated: April 8, 2021 9:38am

The leader of the jihadist group Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, Amir Muhammad Sa’id Abdal-Rahman al-Mawla, was  previously a prisoner informant for the U.S. military, according to recently interrogation records.

The records were recently released by the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, a Pentagon-funded academic institution at the U.S. Military Academy. 

Al-Mawla, or Iraqi detainee M060108-01, is characterized in interrogation records as chatty and cooperative with the American military in Iraq in 2008, according to the documents.

"He did a number of things to save his own neck, and he had a long record of being hostile – including during interrogation – toward foreigners in ISIS," Christopher Maier, an assistant secretary of defense, told the The Washington Post.

Al-Mawla was announced as ISIS's leader in 2019, a week after former leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi was killed.

Over several days of interrogation, al-Mawla purportedly provided details such as precise details and directions to the militant group's secret media headquarters, including the color of the front door.

He also provided information on the compound for the group's second in command,Moroccan-born Swede Abu Qaswarah.

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