Daesh* leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was reportedly attacked in a village near Hajin by some of the terrorist organisation's foreign fighters in an apparent coup attempt, The Guardian reported, citing anonymous intelligence sources. Baghdadi reportedly survived the alleged coup attempt, with his bodyguards taking him into hiding in the nearby desert.
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Soon after the attack, which allegedly took place on 10 January, Daesh* placed a bounty on the head of one of its veteran militants — Abu Muath al-Jazairi. While the bounty doesn't explicitly reveal the reason why the veteran foreign terrorist fighter has fallen in disfavour, intelligence officials, cited by The Guardian, suggest that he led the unsuccessful coup attempt aimed against the leader.
"They got wind of it just in time. There was a clash and two people were killed. This was the foreign fighter element, some of his most trusted people", the intelligence source reportedly said.
Over the course of the last two years, Daesh* has lost most of its territory in Syria and Iraq, resorting to hunkering in hideouts located in the remaining territories under its control. In December 2017, Iraq officially declared the end of the war against Daesh*, and one year later US President Donald Trump announced that American troops had managed to defeat the terrorist organisation, noting that its remnants could be cleared out by regional forces.
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At the same time, Turkey and Damascus are still planning to conduct operations against the remaining terrorist forces in Syria.
*Daesh (also known as ISIS/ISIL/IS) is a terrorist organisation banned in Russia
