A top spokesman for the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was killed in Syria, according to a terrorism expert.
Rita Katz, director of Site Intelligence Group, tweeted that Abu Muhammad al-Adnani was killed in Aleppo, citing ISIS’s media service.
{mosads}”Adnani’s death is a major blow for #ISIS—especially after the death of high-ranking military leader Omar Shishani,” she added.
The news service, Amaq, said al-Adnani died while inspecting military operations near the city, according to CNN.
Al-Adnani was last heard in an audio message in May urging Muslims to carry out attacks in the West, the BBC reported.
The U.S. Defense Department, which usually announces whether it has targeted a senior ISIS leader, has not confirmed al-Adnani’s death.
A senior defense official confirmed only that there was a strike in Syria earlier Tuesday morning targeting an ISIS “senior leader.”
“With regards to the reports about the death of ISIL leader Al-Adnani, I can confirm on background that earlier this morning (EDT) — PM same day in Syria — coalition forces conducted an airstrike in al Bab, Syria, targeting an ISIL senior leader,” the official said.
“We are still assessing the results of the operation at this time,” the official said.
Al Bab is a Syrian city in the Aleppo governorate.
Al-Adnani, 37, was also ISIS’s director of external operations, and was best known for issuing an edict in September 2014 for followers to kill Westerners.
“If you can kill a disbelieving American or European — especially the spiteful and filthy French — or an Australian, or a Canadian, or any other disbeliever from the disbelievers waging war, including the citizens of the countries that entered into a coalition against the Islamic State, then rely upon Allah, and kill him in any manner or way however it may be,” he said in a message, the BBC reported.
“Smash his head with a rock, or slaughter him with a knife, or run him over with your car, or throw him down from a high place, or choke him, or poison him,” he said.
Updated at 4:15 p.m.