Jonathan Ernst/Reuters
The leader of ISIS’s Afghanistan branch was killed in a special-forces raid last month, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said Sunday. The leader, Abdul Hasib, was thought to be the mastermind behind several large-scale attacks, including the recent massacre at a military hospital in Kabul that left at least 50 people dead. Ghani said in a statement that Hasib was killed in an operation in Nangarhar province on April 27, and the government had waited to announce his death until it could be confirmed. The U.S. military said it was also involved in the raid that killed Hasib as well as 35 other militants. Hasib’s death would be the second time in less than a year that U.S. forces helped to eliminate the Islamic State terror group’s leader in Afghanistan. Hasib’s predecessor was killed in a U.S. airstrike last July.