SECRETIVE jihadist Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, whose militants are behind a wave of killings in Syria and Iraq, uses video message to urge all Muslims to join his group and murder anyone against him.
Reuters
Al-Baghdadi calls on Muslims to obey him and kill opponents.TERROR warlord Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi took the spotlight for the first time yesterday in a video praising the slaughter of innocent people.
The ISIS leader - whose jihadist militants are behind a wave of killings in Syria and Iraq - delivered a sermon to fanatics in a mosque in the captured Iraqi city of Mosul.
Surrounded by henchmen and rows of Kalashnikovs, Baghdadi called upon all Muslims to obey him, rise up and kill those who are against him.
He said: 'Allah likes us to kill his enemies, and make jihad in his sake.'
It is the first time that the notoriously secretive ISIS leader, now seen as more powerful and feared than al-Qaeda's chiefs, has been shown publicly.
The video, which Baghdad sources last night confirmed as genuine, was thought to have been released to rebuff reports by Iraqi media he had been hurt or killed in an airstrike.
The broadcast was immediately condemned by his enemies in the Muslim community.
Baghdadi and his group - now called the Islamic State - are becoming more brazen as they attempt to rampage through Iraq and the Middle East, funded by plundering £256million and gold from Mosul Central Bank.
Baghdadi - who spent four years in a US-run terror prison in Iraq - is filmed below the black flag of the Islamic State.
Text appears on the video calling him 'Caliph Ibrahim, emir of the faithful in the Islamic State'.
He urged Muslims to join their cause and said under his direction, the Islamic world would be returned to 'dignity, might, rights and leadership'.
Claiming victory and praising the 'jihadists' who slaughtered Iraqi soldiers and civilians, he said: 'God has granted your brothers, the mujahideen, victory and a conquest after years of patience and holy struggle, and enabled them to achieve their objective.... so they declared the caliphate and placed the caliph in charge.
'This is a duty on Muslims that has been lost for centuries.'
He proclaimed himself leader of the so-called caliphate but said he did not seek out the position and described it as a 'burden'.
The 21-minute video spread rapidly across jihadist websites after it was posted online.
Experts believe the success of the Islamic State has proved attractive to foreign jihadists.
The Government have said as many as 500 Brits could have gone to Syria and Iraq to join their ranks and fear many will return to the UK trained in terror.
Prominent Sunni religious leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi dismissed Baghdadi's caliphate claim.
Egypt-born Qaradawi said: 'The declaration issued by the Islamic State is void under sharia law.'
THE trial of Abu Hamza, the radical cleric extradited from the UK to the US in 2012, is due to start at a federal court in New York today.
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