WATCH: Iraq releases video of airstrike said to have killed deputy ISIS commander

Iraq's Defense Ministry said on Wednesday the deputy commander of the Islamic State group had been killed in an air strike in the north of the country.

By JPOST.COM STAFF, REUTERS
Iraq releases video of airstrike said to have killed deputy ISIS commander
Iraqi authorities on Thursday released footage of what they say is an airstrike on a compound that resulted in the death of the deputy commander of Islamic State.
Iraq's Defense Ministry said on Wednesday the deputy commander of the Islamic State group had been killed in an air strike in the north of the country, but the US military denied coalition air forces had conducted such an attack.
The ministry said Abu Alaa al-Afar was kill in a coalition attack on a mosque where he was meeting with other militants. However, the US Central Command strongly denied that a coalition airstrike had hit the mosque.
It said it had no information to corroborate claims that the militant leader had been killed.
More than 60 countries led by the United States launched a campaign last summer to "degrade and destroy" the ultra-radical Sunni Islamist group, which seized large areas of Iraq and Syria. The coalition has been conducting air strikes against Islamic State in both countries.
"Based on accurate intelligence, an airstrike by the coalition forces targeted the second in command of IS, Abu Alaa al-Badri," the Iraqi defence ministry said in a statement on its website.
Afar, whose real name is Abdul Rahman Mustafa Mohammed, is an ethnic Turkmen from the town of Tel Afar in northwestern Iraq, and is thought to be second in command of Islamic State under self-proclaimed caliph Abu Bark al-Baghdadi.
Baghdadi was recently reported to have been incapacitated by an air strike in the same region of Iraq, and Afar was tipped to assume leadership of the organization. The Pentagon has denied those reports as well, saying Baghdad remains capable of directing operations and was not wounded in any raid.