Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri

Biography

Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri was born in 1942 in Ad-Dawr near Tikrit, the son of a farmer, and had only a primary education; his early trade of selling ice earned him the nickname 'the Iceman'. Drawn into Ba'athist politics as a teenager, he befriended Saddam Hussein in 1963, worked in the party's intelligence apparatus and took part in the 17 July Revolution of 1968.

After the Ba'ath seized power he became interior minister and worked to sideline rival parties, especially the communists. From 1979 he was vice chairman of the Revolutionary Command Council and Saddam's closest deputy, involved in the wars with Iran and Kuwait and in crushing the 1991 uprisings; he survived an assassination attempt in Karbala in 1998.

He was the most senior Ba'athist to escape capture after the 2003 invasion and appeared as the king of clubs in the US deck of most-wanted Iraqis. He led insurgent groups such as the Naqshbandi Army against the occupation and the new Iraqi government, and after Saddam's execution became leader of the banned Ba'ath Party in January 2007.

Reports of his death circulated several times, including a 2015 claim by a Shia militia, but he kept releasing videos. The Ba'ath Party announced that he died on 25 October 2020.