 In recent months elderly sheiks and tribal leaders have turned away from the Islamic State of Iraq, a radical Sunni extremist terrorist organization who specializes in car bombs and suicide attacks.On May 1, 2007 the Anbar Salvation Council announced that it had killed Abu Ayyub al-Masri, the war minister of the Islamic State of Iraq and the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq.However, the U.S. military has refuted this claim and the status of al-Masri is still uncertain.