Al-Qaeda confirms death of Yemen leader Qaeed al-Dhahab

The Yemen-based al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) confirmed on Saturday in an Internet posting, the death of senior AQAP member Qaeed al-Dhahab in a U.S. drone strike late last month.

The U.S.-based SITE Intelligence Group said that AQAP said in a communiqué issued on jihadist forums on Friday that Dhahab was killed in the U.S. “war on Islamic sharia” (law), Agence France-Presse news agency reported.

The death of the AQAP leader was the latest in a series of attacks targeting the extremist group, considered by Washington to be the its most dangerous branch.

A tribal source told AFP that the August 30 early morning strike on a vehicle in Manasseh village in the southern province of Bayda killed Dhahab and two other men.

Witnesses have also confirmed the death of Dhahab, an AQAP military chief who had previously fought with the group in Iraq.

The tribal source said he was killed just hours after being married on Thursday, reported AFP.

He was the brother of Tarek al-Dhahab, an AQAP leader who in January 2012 with other militants briefly overran the town of Radah in Bayda province before being killed by Yemeni troops.

Qaeed al-Dhahab was seen as a high-profile AQAP leader and was also the brother-in-law of Yemeni-born American radical Islamic cleric Anwar al-Awlaqi, a key AQAP figure who was killed in a drone strike in Yemen in September 2011.

(With AFP)