Reports of his death had been frequent – and exaggerated, writes Martin Chulov. But not this time.

Even as US forces were flying to Iraq the remains of the Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who was killed in Syria in the early hours of Saturday, a debate about his legacy was stirring.

For more than five years, Baghdadi, who was known by birth as Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri, was the most wanted man on the planet – a figure who had turned an already potent post-invasion insurgency in Iraq into a formidable terrorist juggernaut that changed the course of history.

In the time he led the Isis terror group, Baghdadi succeeded in shredding the authority of Iraq and Syria and testing the borders of the entire Middle East – all the while eluding the world’s most powerful intelligence agencies and militaries.