Amid reports Saturday of U.S. military helicopters over Syria's northwestern Idlib province, a senior Pentagon official familiar with the operation and Army official briefed on the matter told Newsweek that Baghdadi was the target of the top-secret operation in the last bastion of the country's Islamist-dominated opposition, a faction that has clashed with ISIS in recent years. A U.S. Army source briefed on the results of the operation told Newsweek that Baghdadi was killed in the raid. And the Defense Department told the White House they have "high confidence" that the high-value target killed was Baghdadi but further verification is pending.
Members of a team from the Joint Special Operations Command carried out Saturday's high-level operation after receiving actionable intelligence, according to sources familiar with the operation. The location raided by special operations troops had been under surveillance for some time.
On Saturday night, after the operation had concluded, President Trump tweeted: "Something very big has just happened!"
Baghdadi was "dead pending verification," the Pentagon source told Newsweek.