ISIS Confirms Death of 'Jihadi John' in U.S. Airstrike
'Jihadi John' was killed in a U.S. airstrike as he exited a building in Raqqa.
— -- ISIS says that its infamous executioner, known as "Jihadi John," died in a U.S. airstrike targeting a car he was riding in Syria last year.
"The car he was in was targeted in a strike by an unmanned drone in the city of ar-Raqqah, destroying the car and killing him instantly," an article on page 23 of the magazine said.
U.S. officials said that they believed Mohammed Emwazi, a British national, was killed in a "flawless" airstrike in November.
"He walked out of a building and got in the car. We struck it right after with zero collateral damage," a counter-terrorism official told ABC News on Nov. 12. "The vehicle was on fire. It was a 100 percent flawless, direct hit."
"Jihadi John" essentially "evaporated" in the explosion, the official said.
Following the news of Emwazi's potential death, British Prime Minister David Cameron said that the airstrike was an "act of self-defense" and "the right thing to do," calling the executioner a "barbaric murderer."
A British drone had taken part of the strike, but it was an American drone that fired the fatal missiles, a U.S. Defense official said in November.
Emwazi's infamy began in August 2014 when ISIS released a video purporting to show American journalist and hostage James Foley being beheaded, allegedly by Emwazi, who appeared in all black. He was publicly identified as "Jihadi John" in February 2015 and had since stopped appearing in ISIS videos.
Emwazi was born in Kuwait and became a naturalized citizen of the United Kingdom. He was believed to be 27 years old when he entered Syria from the U.K. in 2012. Prior to the trip, he had been linked to a number of alleged jihadists in London who purportedly supported a terror group in Somalia, according to court documents.
