"'The organization is ticking along quite nicely, even in this period now,' Hans-Jakob Schindler, senior director of the New York and Berlin-based Counter Extremism Project (CEP), told VOA.

'Yes, you killed the leader. That's a big blow,' said Schindler, who spent three years overseeing the United Nations team that tracked IS, as well as rival terror group al-Qaida and also Afghanistan’s Taliban. 'But the organization itself is not strategically weak … a network-based organization can always replace a leader.'"