A high-stakes joint counterterrorism operation conducted by Nigerian and U.S. military forces has resulted in the death of one of the Islamic State (IS) group’s most senior global commanders, Abu-Bilal al-Minuki, Nigerian President Bola Tinubu has officially confirmed.
In an official statement announcing the success of the mission, Tinubu emphasized that the operation marked a major milestone in the two nations’ deepening counterextremism partnership. “Our determined Nigerian Armed Forces, working closely with the Armed Forces of the United States, conducted a daring joint operation that dealt a heavy blow to the ranks of the Islamic State,” the president said.
The operation was first disclosed by U.S. President Donald Trump, who identified al-Minuki as the second-highest-ranking leader in the global ISIS network. Washington had officially designated al-Minuki as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist back in 2023, recognizing his outsize role in orchestrating violence across the African continent and beyond. Taking to his platform Truth Social, Trump praised the mission as flawlessly executed, calling the eliminated commander “the most active terrorist in the world.”
According to details released by Nigerian authorities, the precision strike that killed al-Minuki targeted his compound in the volatile Lake Chad Basin, where he was hiding alongside several of his top lieutenants. All of the senior IS figures in the compound were killed in the operation.
Nigeria’s military confirmed that the successful mission was directly enabled by a recently established strategic counterterrorism partnership and expanded intelligence-sharing framework between Abuja and Washington. Military officials outlined al-Minuki’s rapid rise through the IS ranks: he was most recently promoted to the position of Head of the General Directorate of States, placing him among the core leadership of the global extremist organization.
Prior to his promotion to the global IS hierarchy, al-Minuki oversaw all IS-affiliated operations across the Sahel region and West Africa. Under his leadership, the group carried out dozens of deadly attacks targeting civilian populations, vulnerable minority communities, and local security infrastructure.
Nigerian military investigators have also linked al-Minuki to one of the most high-profile extremist kidnaps in the country’s recent history: the 2018 abduction of more than 100 schoolgirls from a boarding school in Dapchi, northeastern Nigeria, which was carried out by Boko Haram, the extremist faction that al-Minuki once served as a senior commander before pledging allegiance to IS in 2015. Earlier in his militant career, military spokesperson Samali Uba confirmed al-Minuki facilitated the movement of extremist fighters to Libya to support IS operations across North Africa.
Trump framed al-Minuki’s death as a devastating blow to both IS’s African networks and its global operational infrastructure, noting that the strike has disrupted key terrorist funding channels and fractured the group’s command structure. The U.S. president extended his gratitude to Nigeria’s government for its close collaboration, adding that al-Minuki “will no longer terrorize the people of Africa or help plan operations to target Americans.”
The successful operation comes as part of a growing trend of deepened military cooperation between Nigeria and the United States, as Nigeria escalates its years-long campaign to root out extremist violence across the country’s northern and northeastern regions. Just weeks prior to this strike, in April, IS claimed responsibility for a mass shooting at a football pitch in northeastern Nigeria’s Adamawa State that left at least 29 people dead. Late last year, during the Christmas holiday period, the two countries carried out another joint airstrike targeting IS-affiliated groups in Sokoto State, demonstrating the consistent momentum of their counterterrorism partnership.