Haji Bakr

Samir al-Khlifawi, better known by the nom de guerre Haji Bakr, was a former Iraqi military officer and senior commander of the rebel group Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). He served as the head of the group’s military council and was leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s top deputy in Syria. He was killed in Syria by Syrian rebels in January 2014

Prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq and overthrow of Saddam Hussein, al-Khlifawi had been an Iraqi Army Colonel who had worked on weapons development. Iraqi intelligence say that he joined al-Qaida in Iraq and took part in the Iraqi insurgency. Arrested by American Forces, al-Khlifawi was held in detention in Camp Bucca, alongside many of the men who would form the senior leadership of ISIL, including Abu Muslim al-Turkmani, Abu Abdulrahman al-Bilawi and future leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Following his release he became a senior leader in the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), and led the groups’s military council following the killing of top commanders Abu Omar al-Baghdadi and Abu Ayyub al-Masri by US Forces in 2010. al-Khlifawi played an influential role in Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi becoming the next ISI leader, and reportedly organized an internal purge, including scores of assassinations, in order to solidify al-Baghdadi's control of the group.

Haji Bakr was killed in early January 2014 in the northern Syrian town of Tal Rifaat by members of the Syrian Martyrs' Brigade during the conflict between ISIL and Syrian rebel groups.