Abu azrael killing isis terrorist

Abu Azrael himself appears to be a member of the Kata'ib Imam Ali militia. Phillip Smyth, an expert on Shia militias at the University of Maryland and a blogger at Hizballah Cavalcade, external, says the group was formed last summer and immediately started promoting their star soldier using a sophisticated strategy.

"I've been watching Shia militias on Facebook and social media for years and this fits the model of an organised campaign," he says. "He had his own Facebook profiles and pages, the earliest in late 2014 … they had built up the character quite well, and initial photo releases were shown of him doing heroic or interesting things." The Kata'ib militia has also posted much darker social media content, Smyth says, including severed heads of what they claim are IS fighters.

Most of Abu Azrael's Facebook fans are Iraqis, but Iranians have also taken an intense interest in him, sharing photos and suggesting that his tough appearance belies a kind nature and a good sense of humour. Pictures and a video being shared online show a smiling and waving Abu Azrael riding a bike, supposedly through battle zones. And a popular video shows him taunting IS militants with a "captured" walkie-talkie. One of his followers has even created a cartoon of Abu Azrael pounding a man "into flour" - a punishment he promises to inflict on his battlefield opponents.

Alex recently finished an internship at the Lowy Institute. He is undertaking a master of Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut.

It has become commonplace in the Western media to see experts and politicians lament our inability to counter ISIS propaganda. As ISIS has demonstrated, media can now be created and disseminated effectively with very few resources. Less well recognised is the fact that a number of groups in Syria and Iraq have used the same social media tools against ISIS.

One campaign run by the Popular Mobilisation Forces (an umbrella organisation composed of mainly Shia militias) in Iraq has been particularly effective in breaking the narrative of disaster and defeat that shrouded the opposition to ISIS throughout much of 2014. The clash here is no longer viewed as between beleaguered state forces backed by coalition airstrikes, but between two ideologically motivated sides seeking to crush each other through a force of will as much as arms.

This propaganda effort is well encapsulated in the carefully managed social media campaign of Shia commander Ayyub Faleh al Rubaie, known as Abu Azrael — Arabic for 'Father of the Angel of Death.' Abu Azrael is also known by a number of other nicknames such as 'The Iraqi Rambo' and 'Daesh Killer', and over the last eighteen months has shot from relative obscurity to celebrity status in the fight against ISIS in Iraq.

His catchphrase, Ila Taheen ('I will grind you [ISIS] to dust') has gone viral, registering millions of views and reposts worldwide, and has even been made into a song. Reputedly a former professor and martial arts champion with experience training in Lebanon with Hezbollah and fighting against American troops in the Iraqi insurgency of the early 2000s, Abu Azrael has become a hero for many Shia Iraqis. [fold]

Abu Azrael's image is carefully constructed. It is designed to portray calm

Commander in the Islamic Movement of Iraq

Ayoub Falih Hasan Al-Rubayie (Arabic: أيوب فالح حسن الربيعي; born 1978), known by his nom de guerreAbu Azrael, is an Iraqi commander in the Kataib al-Imam Ali, an Iraqi Shi'a militia group of the Popular Mobilization Forces that fought ISIS (ISIL) figthers in Iraq. He has become a public icon among Shia's Iraqis, gaining a large following on social media.

Abu Azrael was a member of Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army, which fought against the U.S.-led Coalition forces during the Iraqi insurgency.

Personal life

Abu Azrael is a Shi'a Muslim who is a former university lecturer and a one-time Taekwondo champion. According to an Iranian source, reports from March 2015 claimed that Azrael is a father of five, and lives an ordinary life when not on the battlefield.

Following incidents where he was filmed desecrating the corpses of ISIS militants, Azrael stated that he had been told by a senior imam in Najaf that he should pray for penance and never do such a thing again.

In October 2019, he was severely beaten unconscious by protesting Iraqis in Baghdad's Tahrir Square.

In 2020, he was infected with COVID-19 and suffered lung damage.

Public image

Abu Azrael fought against ISIS, although he has also fought against other militant groups. By the spring of 2015, he had made front-page appearances on international news websites in England, France and the United States.

He has received a medal of honor from the Representative of the Supreme Religious Authority Sayyid Ahmad al-Safi.

In 2016, he was spotted on the battlefield in the Battle of Mosul against ISIL.

During the 2023 Israel–Hamas war, Abu Azrael claimed to have been near the Israel–Lebanon border, waiting for "any opportunity" to enter Israel.

See also

Refe

Newsweek (13 June 2017)
Ayyub Faleh Hassan al-Rubaie’s reputation for ruthless revenge attacks against members of the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) has earned him international attention and the nickname “Archangel of Death.” He goes after his victims with an ax and sword. Once, he set an ISIS fighter’s corpse on fire. When he was accused of mutilating the body, he assured his loyal supporters he had confessed his sins to his imam under instructions to “never do such a thing again.”

Now the Iraqi militiaman widely known in Iraq as Abu Azrael (meaning “Father of Azrael,” the Islamic and Jewish “angel of death”) is looking across the border into Syria. After recently dislodging ISIS from several northwestern Iraqi villages in the region, the celebrity warrior told Newsweek he wants to continue defending his homeland from the Sunni militant group by any means necessary.
The effort is significant beyond the global attention focused on Abu Azrael’s superhero persona. The border operation could help create an extensive route of support from Damascus to Baghdad against ISIS’s self-proclaimed caliphate, which has significantly diminished throughout Iraq and Syria in recent years.

“We have not entered into Syrian territory, but we are still on the Syrian-Iraqi border and we’re closing in on Daesh, inflicting bitter losses,” Abu Azrael said via Twitter, using the Arabic-language acronym for ISIS. “We will defend the oppressed people of all sects, protect the country from criminals, help the displaced and return them to their areas.”
Abu Azrael, center, part of the majority-Shiite Muslim Kata’ib al-Imam Ali, is one of over 100,000 fighters under the umbrella of the Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces invol