Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was injured after an airstrike carried out by Iraq's Air Force struck his convoy last week while he was heading to Karabala to attend a meeting with ISIS commanders, according to CNN.
The Baghdad Information Center—a joint intelligence sharing project founded and run by Russia, Iran, Iraq and Syria—has confirmed the reports.
The ISIS leader was reportedly seen being "carried away in a vehicle'' after the aerial attack on the convoy in western Anbar province, a location not far from the Syrian border.
Iraq's military bombed the site of the meeting, which also killed nine of the group's leaders and injured some of them, CNN reported.
"The fate of murderer Al-Baghdadi is unknown and he was carried away by a vehicle. His health condition is still unclear,'' Reuters said, quoting an Iraqi military official.
The Pentagon has yet to confirm the report.
The Baghdad interior ministry, meanwhile, hailed the Iraqi air force operation. In statement, the ministry said the air force carried out "a heroic operation'' by striking Al-Baghdadi's convoy while he was on his way to attend a meeting with senior ISIS leaders in Karabala, CNN reported.
This latest report about Baghdadi having been injured in an airstrike is not the first. In November last year, Iraqi officials said the ISIS leader was wounded in an airstrike. Again in March, Iraq's Interior Ministry said the Iraqi air force wounded Al-Baghdadi in another airstrike in the Iraqi town of Al-Qaem.
In May, he was said to have been seriously wounded in yet another airstrike by the anti-ISIS coalition, which left him incapacitated, according to Reuters. A few days after, an audiotape of Al-Baghdadi was released where he urged Muslims to join his self-proclaimed caliphate in Iraq and Syria, without mentioning about the reported airstrike that allegedly wounded him.
ISIS has seized large swatches of territory in Iraq and Syria, and has forged alliances with other militant groups in the Middle East. Last June, the group proclaimed itself to be a worldwide caliphate with Al-Baghdadi referred to as caliph by his followers, said CNN. Caliph is the title of a Muslim state's civil and religious leader considered to be a representative of Allah on earth.
