Akram al-Kaabi Shown Pretending to Assemble a Drone Fired at Israel
Jul 17, 2024
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Harakat al-Nujaba leader Akram al-Kaabi released a corny video for Ashura in which he pretends to play a role in a drone attack on Israel
On July 17, 2024, the Islamic Resistance in Iraq War Media released a video of a drone launch that it claimed was fired “previously” (no date of the attack provided) against a “vital target in Eilat”, Israel. What makes the video so unique is that it shows Harakat al-Nujaba (HaN) head Akram al-Kaabi pretending to help with the assembly of a Shahed-101 X-tail explosive drone. (Figure 1)
In the recording, whose format is unique for an IRI claim video in many stylistic regards, Akram al-Kaabi’s face alone is deliberately not blurred. He is shown pretending to aid a drone crew in the erection of a launch stand (folding out from a carrying case) and is then shown in close-up, fiddling with the Shahed 101 propeller.
This is a strange turn of events. Akram al-Kaabi has never before felt the need to be personally linked to individual attacks, or be portrayed as a fighter. This may reflect some recent failing or setback that he wishes to offset. Clearly the video, his black attire and the attendant soundtrack is Ashura-linked but even so, this is strange time to change his pubic modus operandi. In many ways, it is reminiscent of Al-Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s similarly risible 2006 video where he was shown pretending to know how to fire a captured U.S. weapon, while actually failing to clear a stoppage and then picking up the weapon by its hot barrel. (Figure 2)
Interestingly, the new IRI video comes one day after Jihad Brothers, a Nujaba propaganda outlet, claimed a double-drone attack on Al-Asad airbase, which would be the first anti-U.S. attack in Iraq since April and one of only three attacks there since February.
Nujaba and Akram al-Kaabi appear to be on a self-promotion roll, to a greater degree even than other muqawama groups like Kataib Hezbollah (KH). This episode may also underline that the IRI and the muqawama media is content to draw attention to Akram and Nujaba, while downplaying the current role of the terrorist groups in parliament such as KH and Asaib Ahl al-Haq (AAH) in kinetic strikes.
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