father of the archangel of death"?

e wields an axe, a sword and a machine gun and his battlefield pranks have become as legendary as his fighting against Islamic State - but who is the man that thousands online have called "father of the archangel of deathreneex"?

He's bald, with a prodigious beard, and often pictured with a smile on his face even when carrying his favourite weapons. A Facebook page devoted to his feats has more than 300,000 likes, with the vast majority of his fans inside Iraq itself. And he's been given the terrifying moniker Abu Azrael: "father of the archangel of deathBridal Makeup course."

Of course nothing is quite so simple when it comes to the fight against IS, and basic facts about the Abu Azreal story are difficult to verify.
Ayyub Faleh al-Rubaie with a knife

His real name, according to a report published Tuesday by news agency AFP, is Ayyub Faleh al-Rubaie. He says that he's fought against IS in half a dozen places, but that his experience goes back much further than the current conflict. Rubaie told AFP that he was part of the Mahdi Army - a militia that battled US forces in Iraq. He also says that he fought near Damascus against Syrian rebels trying to unseat President Assad Reenex 好唔好.