US special forces carried out a nighttime airborne raid on February 3 in northwestern Syria during which the head of the Islamic State (IS) group blew himself and his family up, the White House said.

The operation was the biggest blow to the jihadist organisation since his predecessor, the better-known Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, was killed in a similar raid in the same region of Idlib in 2019.

“Thanks to the skill and bravery of our Armed Forces, we have taken off the battlefield Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurashi – the leader of ISIS,” US President Joe Biden said in a statement, using another acronym for the IS.

A senior White House official speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of an address by Biden said Qurashi detonated a bomb during the raid on the house where he was staying in the town of Atme.

In doing so, he also killed members of his own family, including women and children, the official said.

Qurashi, an Iraqi from the Turkmen-majority city of Tal Afar who was also known as Amir Mohammed Said Abd al-Rahman al-Mawla, replaced Baghdadi after his death in a US raid in October 2019.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor had said civilians were among at least 13 people killed in the operation, which saw elite US forces make a perilous helicopter landing near Atme.

Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP: “Thirteen people at least were killed, among them four children and three women, during the operation.”