The early chapters of this series focus on a man we refer to as Abu Hus-Safa al-Khanadi,

who claimed to be a member of ISIS and said he had committed multiple murders while in

the Islamic State.

In several episodes of this series, we documented his story, as well as our efforts to verify

aspects of it.

In September of 2020, two and a half years after this podcast was released, the Canadian

police arrested Hus-Safa, whose real name is Shairo's Choundry, and charged him with

perpetrating a hoax.

That charge led the times to conduct its own investigation, which found a history of

misrepresentations by Choundry, and no corroboration that he committed the atrocities he described

in the Caliphate podcast.

As a result, the times has concluded that the episodes of Caliphate that presented Choundry's

claims did not meet our standards for accuracy.

In this feed, we've published a conversation with the executive editor of the Times, Dean

Bakeh, where he discusses the original reporting in Caliphate, and what the times has found

in its re-examination of the story.

On July 4, 2014, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State, arrives in Western

Mosque in a convoy of cars in great secrecy.

I remember residents telling me that all of the streets were roped off suddenly, they didn't

know why.

He walks into the historic al-Murray mosque, a famous mosque in Western Mosque.

The mosque is full because it's Friday, and the congregation is waiting for the Friday

...