The Pentagon on Tuesday called into question a report that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was wounded in an airstrike and replaced by his deputy, former physics teacher Abu Alaa Afri.
"We have no reason to believe it was Baghdadi," Army Col. Steven Warren, a Pentagon spokesman,
told The Daily Beast, in speaking of the alleged injury.
The Guardian U.K. previously reported on Tuesday that "a source in Iraq with connections to the terror group revealed that Baghdadi suffered serious injuries during an attack by the US-led coalition in March."
That attack took place "on 18 March in the al-Baaj a district of Nineveh, close to the Syrian border," it wrote further.
Defense officials in the U.S. confirmed that the reported airstrikes had occurred, but said they were not aimed at high-value targets like Baghdadi.
The Guardian's original report quoted Hisham al-Hashimi, an Iraqi official who advises Baghdad on ISIS. He claimed that Baghdadi was injured in the strike. On Wednesday,
Newsweek reported that Baghdadi was replaced by Abu Alaa Afri after speaking with Hashimi, but did not mention the Pentagon's comments of denial about the injuries from the previous day.
Brig. Gen. Saad Maan, a spokesman for the Iraqi interior ministry, agreed with Hashimi's claim that Baghdadi was injured, but did not speak to his possible replacement.
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