Mazen al- Nahiri: Baathist Officer Turned Islamic State Commander

Mazen al- Nahiri: Baathist Officer Turned Islamic State Commander

With the rise of Islamic State’s (IS) self-proclaimed caliphate in Syria and Iraq, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who made his first public appearance in July 2014, deviated from the norms of secrecy normally attached to any jihadist leadership (YouTube, July 5, 2014). With more militants from around the globe drawn to the group, and intermittent rumors about al-Baghdadi’s fate, some circles have begun to question the group’s origins and full nature of al-Baghdadi’s role as the man behind IS (thaqfny.com, May 10, 2016). New roles for behind-the-scenes militants like Mazen al-Nahiri are being carved out within the ranks of the jihadist insurgency, showing that the public face of the self-proclaimed caliphate is only one facet of the terrorist group, with the names of many senior members of IS’ militant command structure yet to be revealed.

Background

Mazen al-Nahiri (a.k.a. Abu Safaa al-Rifai), born in the 1970s in Iraq, was a colonel in the Iraqi Army during Saddam Hussein’s rule. Then, before the fall of Baghdad in 2003, he became a founding member of the group that would become IS and that group’s head of intelligence and security (orientreports.com, July 15, 2016). Al-Nahiri is barely a religious cleric and not a Sunni. A secular former Baathist, he has nonetheless been a powerful factor in the rise of IS and, reportedly, is the successor of Samir Abd Muhammad al-Khlifawi (a.k.a. Haji Bakr), a senior IS leader who was killed in Syria in January 2014 (alhayat.com, April 21, 2015). [1][2]

During the territorial expansion of IS, there was growing unease among the group’s leadership about a possible revolt from the inside and penetration of the group by spies who might be trafficking information to other rival armed groups, or to Iraqi government militants. In response to these fears, al-Nahiri established the security and intelligence office of IS (alaanfm, August 25, 2016, alarab.co.uk, November 20, 2015).

Al-Nahiri drew upon his army experience to structure an intelligence system similar to those used in totalitarian regimes. Al-Nahiri established several cells and detachments in Anbar province and other Iraqi provinces, especially in the western and northern areas of Iraq, whose job was to gather intelligence and on-the-ground information. The responsibility of al-Nahiri and the intelligence office is to protect the group’s leaders (beirutme.com, July 5, 2016).

Another responsibility of al-Nahiri through the security and intelligence office involves carrying out security vetting of those who want to join IS. He founded the first IS department under the name of “security and intelligence.” The members of this unit grew from an initial 20 members to 200 members, developing into a core unit in the group’s leadership (alghadalsoury.com, August 6, 2016). Mazen al-Nahiri adopted an intelligence mechanism based on involving Iraqi tribal leaders in the group by blackmailing them with audio and visual recordings that confirm their allegiance to IS. They coerce tribes to ally with the group and provide support to its territorial expansion, threatening otherwise to leak these tapes to Iraqi intelligence. Through development of this system of coercion, al-Nahiri helped secure IS’ regional ties with the tribes in Iraq (roayahnews.com, July 5, 2016).

Operational Commander

Al-Nahiri is believed to play a key role in helping to lead IS operations, including the unsuccessful assassination of Abu Mohammad al-Julani, the leader of Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, formerly known as the al-Nusra Front (arb.majalla.com, August 30, 2016). Al-Nahiri played a pivotal role in IS’ initial command structure, liaising with Abu Muhammad al-Adnani to persuade former Iraqi army officers who served under Saddam Hussein before 2003 to join the group, especially those who had moved to Syria. These officers include General Ibrahim al Jinabi, Fadel Al ethawai (a former officer in the Iraqi army), Asi Mahmoud al-Ubaidi, Nabil al-Muaini and Mahmoud al-Jinabi (alarabiya.net, December 12, 2015; Reuters, December 11,2015).  Al-Nahiri is believed to be one of the few founding IS militant alive after the death of Hajij Bakir, and his successor Abu Ali al-Beblawi who was killed in July 2014 in Mosul. Following the deaths of Abu Muslim al-Turkumani and Abdul Rahman al Kadoli, who represent the secondary leadership figures of the group, al-Nahiri climbed his way up the IS command hierarchy  (all4syria.info, August 26, 2016).

Al-Nahiri’s connection with the group goes back to the “zero-tolerance” policy, which was devised by Hajji Bakir in response to the rising fears that the Iraqi militants would impede IS’ territorial expansion. Hajj Bakr founded a “zero-tolerance committee” led by Mazen al-Nahiri, whose duty is to communicate with the Iraqi armed militants to persuade them to pledge bayah (an oath of allegiance) to al-Baghdadi, or an oath of alliance with the group (roayahnews.com, July 5, 2016).

Some reports indicate that al-Nahiri – along with Haji Bakr, Abu Ali al-Anbari and Ibrahim Awad al-Badri – was one of the founders of IS. According to the same reports, the involvement of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in the group was a decision made by these leading militants, who found in al-Baghdadi a new religious Islamist facet for the group, a public face who could put forward their ideas in order to rally support in Anbar province. Following the death of Hamid Dawud Mohamed Khalil al-Zawi (a.k.a. Abu Umar al-Baghdadi) – known as Abu Hamza al-Baghdadi, he was the leader of the militant groups Mujahedeen Shura Council – on April 18, 2010, Haji Bakr contacted three militants, including Mazen al-Nahiri, to join the group, changing its name to IS (islamist-movements.com, April 5, 2015).

Current Role

Al-Nahiri is currently a prominent leader in the IS High Commission, which supervises the group’s six departments, 14 diwans, and 35 wilayah (provinces). The High Commission is believed by some to have more power in the commanding structure of the group than Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (arb.majalla.com, August 30, 2016).

Conclusion

Operating behind the scenes, Mazen al-Nahiri has largely maintained his anonymity, acting as an obscure, yet rapidly evolving, intelligent commander. He has elevated the group from one only wielding Islamic extreme rhetoric, to a group adept at intelligence gathering and infiltration, helping to establish the insurgency.

Al-Nahiri is a testimony to the fact that IS has complex roots that stretch beyond those of an exclusively ideological Islamic group. Further, his rise highlights the role former Ba’athist intelligent army officers – departing from secularist Ba’athism – have played in the rise of Islamic State. Al-Nahiri, and the former officers he has helped recruit, seized the opportunity to insert themselves into Islamic State’s growing power structure, capitalizing on volatile conditions in the region. While many questions remain regarding who occupies the top positions in Islamic State and what roles they play, al-Nahiri is an important example of the many interests driving militants to join Islamic State, interests that will undoubtedly influence their individual decision making as the group comes under increasing pressure in the months to come.

NOTES

[1] Baathists are the followers of Ba’athism which is a secular Arab nationalist ideology that promotes the development and creation of a unified Arab state through the leadership of one-party states and opposes political pluralism. Iraq and Syria are the two Ba’athist states which forbade criticism of their ideology through authoritarian government (islamweb.net , May 24, 2003).

[2] Hajji Bakr was Samir Abd Muhammad al-Khlifawi, a former Ba’athist colonel in the Iraqi Intelligence Service during Sadam Hussein’s time who turned into ISIS’s godfather and a senior leader of the militant group, heading its Military Council and leading its operations in Syria. Hajji was killed in early January 2014 in Tell Rifaat during clashes between ISIS and the Syrian rebels (alhayat.com, April 21, 2015).