Nearly two years after Pakistan’s army said it killed fugitive terrorist leader and ex-Broward resident Adnan El Shukrijumah, the FBI still hasn’t verified his death. But news reports this month say al Qaeda recently claimed that Shukrijumah’s widow was one of three women released by Pakistan in exchange for the son of the country’s former army chief.
The other women reportedly handed over to al Qaeda in the exchange were the adult daughters of Ayman al Zawahiri, who took over as leader after Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. forces in May 2011.
The Long War Journal, a project of the nonprofit, nonpartisan Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, first reported the story Sept. 2. Al Qaeda’s unverified claims about the exchange were made in late August in Al Masra, a magazine published by an organization linked to al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.
The U.S. State Department had offered a $5 million reward for information leading to the capture of Shukrijumah, chief of al Qaeda’s North American operations, before the 39-year-old former Miramar resident was reported slain during a helicopter gunship assault on a hideout in a mountainous region of northwest Pakistan on Dec. 6, 2014. Shukrijumah’s widow and four children were reportedly taken into custody following a gun battle.
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