Osama bin Laden

Militant leader (1957–2011)

"ObL" and "Bin Laden" redirect here. For other uses, see OBL (disambiguation) and Bin Laden (disambiguation).

Not to be confused with Osama Vinladen.

Osama bin Laden

أسامة بن لادن

Bin Laden, c. 1997–1998

1st General Emir of al-Qaeda
In office
11 August 1988 – 2 May 2011
Preceded by| Position established
Succeeded by| Ayman al-Zawahiri
Personal details
Born|

Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden

(1957-03-10)10 March 1957
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Died| 2 May 2011(2011-05-02) (aged 54)
Abbottabad, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan
Manner of death| Gunshot wounds to the chest and head
Resting place| Arabian Sea
Citizenship|

* Saudi Arabia (until 1994)
* Stateless (from 1994)

Spouses|

Najwa Ghanem

(m. 1974; sep. 2001)​

Khadijah Sharif

(m. 1983; div. 1990)​

Khairiah Sabar

(m. 1985)​

Siham Sabar

(m. 1987)​

Amal Ahmed al-Sadah

(m. 2000)​

Children| Around 20 to 26 (including Abdallah, Saad, Omar and Hamza)
Parents|

* Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden (father)
* Hamida al-Attas (mother)

Education| King Abdulaziz University (BBA)
Religion| Sunni Islam[1][2][3][4]
Jurisprudence| Hanbali
Military service
Allegiance|

* Maktab al-Khidamat (1984–1988)
* Al-Qaeda (1988–2011)

Years of service| 1984–2011
Rank| General Emir of al-Qaeda
Battles/wars|

* Soviet–Afghan War
* Battle of Jaji  (WIA)
* Afghan Civil War
* Battle of Jalalabad
* War in Afghanistan
* Fall of Kabul (2001)
* Battle of Tora Bora
* Insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
* Operation Neptune Spear †

Osama bin Laden[a] (10 March 1957 – 2 May 2011) was a militant leader who was the founder and first general emir of al-Qaeda. Ideologically a pan-Islamist, Bin Laden participated in the Afghan mujahideen against the Soviet Union, and supported the Bosnian mujahideen during the Yugoslav Wars. Opposed to American foreign policy in the Middle East, Bin Laden declared war on the United States in 1996 and advocated attacks targeting U.S. assets in various countries, and supervised the execution of the September 11 attacks inside the U.S. in 2001.

|  |

This article is part of
a series about

Osama bin Laden

|

* * *

Personal

* Personal life
* Political views
* Militant career
* Bodyguards
* Compound in Abbottabad
* House in Khartoum
* Wadi al-Aqiq
* Family

* * *

1st General Emir of al-Qaeda

* Fatwas
* September 11 attacks
* Motives
* Planning
* Responsibility
* "Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US"
* Allegations of CIA assistance
* Alleged Pakistani support

* * *

Works

* Videos and audio recordings
* 2004 video
* 19 January 2006 tape
* 6 September 2007 video
* 11 September 2007 video
* 20 September 2007 tape
* Interviews
* Letter to the American People
* Messages to the World

* * *

Killing and legacy

* Manhunt
* CIA fake vaccination campaign in Pakistan
* Killing
* reactions
* conspiracy theories
* In popular culture

* v
* t
* e

Born in Riyadh to the aristocratic bin Laden family, he studied at Saudi and foreign universities until 1979, when he joined the mujahideen fighting against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. In 1984, he co-founded Maktab al-Khidamat, which recruited foreign mujahideen into the war. As the Soviet war in Afghanistan came to an end, Bin Laden founded al-Qaeda in 1988 to carry out worldwide jihad. In the Gulf War, Bin Laden's offer of support to Saudi Arabia against Iraq was rejected by the Saudi royal family, which instead sought American aid.

Bin Laden's views on pan-Islamism and anti-Americanism resulted in his expulsion from Saudi Arabia in 1991. He shifted his headquarters to Sudan until 1996, when he established a new base in Afghanistan, where he was supported by the Taliban. Bin Laden declared two fatāwā in August 1996 and February 1998, declaring holy war against the U.S. After al-Qaeda's bombings of U.S. embassies in East Africa, which killed hundreds of civilians, he was indicted by a U.S. district court and listed on the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorists and Most Wanted Fugitives lists. In October 1999, the United Nations designated al-Qaeda as a terrorist organization.

Bin Laden organized the September 11 attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people, mostly civilians. This resulted in the U.S. invading Afghanistan and launching the war on terror. Bin Laden became the subject of a nearly decade-long international manhunt led by the U.S. During this period, he hid in the mountains of Afghanistan and later escaped to neighboring Pakistan. On 2 May 2011, Bin Laden was killed by U.S. special operations forces at his compound in Abbottabad. His corpse was buried in the Arabian Sea and he was succeeded by his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri on 16 June 2011. During his lifetime, Bin Laden became a symbol of terrorism and was reviled in the United States and elsewhere as a mass murderer due to his orchestration of numerous attacks and bombings.

## Name

[edit]

Further information: Romanization of Arabic

Bin Laden's name is most frequently rendered as "Osama bin Laden". The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), as well as other U.S. governmental agencies, have used either "Usama bin Laden" or the accepted transliteration "Usama bin Ladin".

Osama bin Laden's full name, Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden, means "Osama, son of Mohammed, son of Awad, son of Laden".[6] "Mohammed" refers to Bin Laden's father Mohammed bin Laden; "Awad" refers to his grandfather, Awad bin Aboud bin Laden, a Kindite Hadhrami tribesman. Aboud's father was Ali, whose father was Omar. The family includes many individuals over a number of generations.

He was named Usama, meaning "lion", after Usama ibn Zayd, one of the companions of Muhammad.[7] Osama bin Laden had assumed the kunya (teknonym) Abū ʿAbdallāh, meaning "father of Abdallah" The Arabic linguistic convention would be to refer to him as "Osama" or "Osama bin Laden", not "Bin Laden" alone, as "Bin Laden" is a patronymic, not a surname in the Western manner. According to one of his sons Omar, the family's hereditary surname is āl-Qaḥṭānī, but Bin Laden's father, Muhammad bin Ladin, never officially registered the name.[8]

## Early life and education

[edit]

Main article: Personal life of Osama bin Laden

See also: Bin Laden family

The bin Laden family, who run the Saudi Binladin Group (Saudi Arabian headquarters pictured), has connections to the Saudi royal family.

Osama bin Laden was born on 10 March 1957 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.[9][10] His father was Muhammad bin Ladin,[11][12] a billionaire construction magnate with close ties to the Saudi royal family,[13] and his mother was Mohammed bin Laden's tenth wife, Syrian Hamida al-Attas (then called Alia Ghanem).[14][15] Despite it being generally accepted that Bin Laden was born in Riyadh, his birthplace was listed as Jeddah in the initial FBI and Interpol documents.[16]

Mohammed bin Laden divorced Hamida soon after Osama bin Laden was born. Mohammed recommended Hamida to Mohammed al-Attas, an associate. Al-Attas married Hamida in the late 1950s or early 1960s.[17] The couple had four children, and Bin Laden lived in the new household with three half-brothers and one half-sister.[14] The Bin Laden family made $5 billion in the construction industry, of which Osama later inherited around $25–30 million.[18]

Bin Laden was raised as a devout Sunni Muslim.[19] From 1968 to 1976, he attended the elite Al-Thager Model School.[14][20] Bin Laden attended an English-language course in Oxford, England, during 1971.[21] He studied economics and business administration[22] at King Abdulaziz University. Some reports suggest he earned a degree in civil engineering in 1979,[23] or a degree in public administration in 1981.[24] One source described him as "hard working";[25] another said he left university during his third year without completing a college degree.[26]

At university, Bin Laden's main interest was religion, where he was involved in both "interpreting the Quran and jihad" and charitable work.[27] Other interests included writing poetry; reading, with the works of Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery and Charles de Gaulle said to be among his favorites; black stallions; and association football, in which he enjoyed playing at centre forward and followed the English club Arsenal.[28][29] During his studies in Jeddah, Bin Laden became a pupil of the influential Islamist scholar Abdullah Yusuf Azzam and avidly read his treatises. He also read the writings of several Muslim Brotherhood leaders and was highly influenced by the Islamic revolutionary ideas advocated by Sayyid Qutb.[30]

## Personal life

[edit]

Main article: Personal life of Osama bin Laden

At age 17 in 1974, Bin Laden married Najwa Ghanem at Latakia, Syria;[31] but they were later separated and she left Afghanistan on 9 September 2001, 2 days before the 9/11 attacks.[32] His other known wives were Khadijah Sharif (married 1983, divorced 1993); Khairiah Sabir (married 1985); Siham Sabir (married 1987); and Amal al-Sadah (married 2000). Some sources also list a sixth wife, name unknown, whose marriage to Bin Laden was annulled soon after the ceremony.[33] Bin Laden fathered 24 children with his wives.[34] Many of Bin Laden's children fled to Iran following the September 11 attacks, and as of 2010[update] Iranian authorities closely controlled them there.[35]

Nasser al-Bahri, who was Bin Laden's personal bodyguard from 1997 to 2001, details Bin Laden's personal life in his memoir. He describes him as a frugal man and strict father, who enjoyed taking his large family on shooting trips and picnics in the desert.[36]

Bin Laden's father Mohammed died in 1967 in an airplane crash in Saudi Arabia when his American pilot Jim Harrington[37] misjudged a landing.[38] Bin Laden's eldest half-brother, Salem bin Laden, the subsequent head of the Bin Laden family, was killed in 1988 near San Antonio, Texas, in the U.S., when he accidentally flew a plane into power lines.[39]

The FBI described Bin Laden as an adult as tall and thin, between 1.93 m (6 ft 4 in) and 1.98 m (6 ft 6 in) in height and weighing about 73 kilograms (160 lb),[40] although author Lawrence Wright, in his book on al-Qaeda, The Looming Tower, writes that a number of Bin Laden's close friends confirmed that reports of his height were greatly exaggerated, and that he was actually "just over 6 feet (1.8 m) tall".[41] After his death, he was measured to be roughly 1.93 m (6 ft 4 in).[42] Bin Laden had an olive complexion and was left-handed, usually walking with a cane. He wore a plain white keffiyeh. At one point, he stopped wearing the traditional Saudi male keffiyeh and instead wore the traditional Yemeni male keffiyeh.[43] He was described as soft-spoken and mild-mannered in demeanor.[44]

## Political views

[edit]

Part of a series on

Islamism

Fundamentals

* Islam
* History
* Culture
* Economics
* Politics
* Secularism

Ideologies

* Salafi movement
* Salafi jihadism
* International propagation
* By region
* Deobandi movement
* Deobandi jihadism
* Qutbism
* Khomeinism
* Shia Islamism
* Islamic fundamentalism
* Islamic nationalism

Concepts

* Apostasy in Islam
* Takfir
* Islamic governance
* Caliphate
* Islamic democracy
* Islamic feminism
* Islamic liberalism
* Islamic socialism
* Islamic extremism
* Islamic state
* Islamic monarchy
* Islamic republic
* Spread of Islam (of knowledge)
* Jihad
* Islamic terrorism
* Jihadism
* Pan-Islamism
* Political Islam
* aspects
* Post-Islamism
* Sharia
* Shura
* Two-nation theory
* Ummah

Influences

* Anti-communism
* Anti-imperialism
* Anti-Zionism
* Decolonization
* Islamic Golden Age
* Islamic revival

Movements

Scholastic

* Barelvi
* Dawat-e-Islami
* Deobandi
* Nurcu
* Salafism
* Madkhalism
* Ahl-i Hadith
* Sahwa movement
* Wahhabism
* International propagation
* by country/region

Political

* Salafist Front
* Salafist Call
* Movement of Society for Peace
* Hamas
* Party of Democratic Action
* Jamaat-e-Islami
* Millî Görüş
* Muslim Brotherhood
* List of Islamic political parties

Militant

* Militant Islamism based in
* MENA region
* South Asia
* Southeast Asia
* Sub-Saharan Africa

Key texts

* The Caliphate or the Grand Imamate (Rashīd Rīďha 1922)
* Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam (Iqbal 1930s)
* Principles of State and Government (Asad 1961)
* Ma'alim fi al-Tariq ("Milestones") (Qutb 1965)
* Islamic Government:
Governance of the Jurist ("Velayat-e faqih") (Khomeini 1970)

Heads of state

* Ahmed al-Sharaa
* Recep Tayyip Erdoğan
* Ruhollah Khomeini
* Mohamed Morsi
* Muammar Gaddafi
* Alija Izetbegović
* Ismail Haniyeh
* Zia ul-Haq
* Ali Khamenei
* Omar al-Bashir
* Mohammed Omar
* House of Saud
* House of Thani
* Hibatullah Akhundzada

Key ideologues

* Abu Hamza al-Masri
* Rabee al-Madkhali
* Muhammad Abduh
* Jamāl al-Dīn al-Afghānī
* Qazi Hussain Ahmad
* Muhammad Nasiruddin al-Albani
* Muhammad Asad
* Hassan al-Banna
* Rached Ghannouchi
* Safwat Hegazi
* Muhammad Iqbal
* Ali Khamenei
* Ruhollah Khomeini
* Necip Fazıl Kısakürek
* Abul A'la Maududi
* Abul Hasan Nadwi
* Taqi al-Din al-Nabhani
* Yusuf al-Qaradawi
* Sayyid Qutb
* Tariq Ramadan
* Ata Abu Rashta
* Rashid Rida
* Navvab Safavi
* Ali Shariati
* Haji Shariatullah
* Hassan Al-Turabi
* Ahmed Yassin
* Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab

Criticism

* Liberal and reform movements within Islam
* in Europe
* in North America
* Khaled Abu al-Fadl
* Farag Foda
* Abdelwahab Meddeb
* Maryam Namazie
* Maajid Nawaaz
* Sam Harris
* Olivier Roy
* Bassam Tibi
* Muhammad Sa'id al-Ashmawi
* Gilles Kepel
* Shiraz Maher
* Magnus Ranstorp

Related topics

* Islam and modernity
* Modernism
* Islam and other religions
* Islamophobia

* Islam portal
* Politics portal

* v
* t
* e

Main article: Political views of Osama bin Laden

According to former CIA analyst Michael Scheuer, who led the CIA's hunt for Bin Laden, Bin Laden was motivated by a belief that U.S. foreign policy has oppressed, killed, or otherwise harmed Muslims in the Middle East.[45] As such, the threat to U.S. national security arises not from al-Qaeda being offended by what the U.S. is but rather by what the U.S. does, or in the words of Scheuer, "They (al-Qaeda) hate us (Americans) for what we do, not who we are."[46] Nonetheless, Bin Laden criticized the U.S. for its secular form of governance, calling upon Americans to convert to Islam and reject the immoral acts of fornication, homosexuality, intoxicants, gambling, and usury, in a letter published in late 2002.[47]

Bin Laden believed that the Islamic world was in crisis and that the complete restoration of Sharia law would be the only way to set things right in the Muslim world. He opposed such alternatives as secular government,[47] as well as pan-Arabism, socialism, communism, and democracy.[48] He subscribed to the Athari (literalist) school of Islamic theology.[49]

These beliefs, in conjunction with violent jihad, have sometimes been called Qutbism after being promoted by Sayyid Qutb.[50] Bin Laden believed that Afghanistan, under the rule of Mullah Omar's Taliban, was "the only Islamic country" in the Muslim world.[51] Bin Laden consistently dwelt on the need for violent jihad to right what he believed were injustices against Muslims perpetrated by the U.S. and sometimes by other non-Muslim states.[52] In his Letter to the American People published in 2002, Bin Laden described the formation of the Israeli state as "a crime which must be erased" and demanded that the United States withdraw all of its civilians and military personnel from the Arabian Peninsula, as well as from all Muslim lands.[53][54]

His viewpoints and methods of achieving them had led to him being designated as a terrorist by scholars;[55][56] journalists from The New York Times,[57][58] the BBC,[59] and Qatari news station Al Jazeera;[60] and analysts such as Peter Bergen,[61] Michael Scheuer,[62] Marc Sageman,[63] and Bruce Hoffman.[64][65] He was indicted on terrorism charges by law enforcement agencies in Madrid, New York City, and Tripoli.[66]

Bin Laden supported the targeting of American civilians, in retaliation against U.S. troops indiscriminately attacking Muslims. He asserted that this policy could deter U.S. troops from targeting Muslim women and children. Furthermore, he argued that all Americans were complicit in the crimes of their government due to majority of them electing it to power and paying taxes that fund the U.S. military.[67] According to Noah Feldman, Bin Laden's assertion was that "since the United States is a democracy, all citizens bear responsibility for its government's actions, and civilians are therefore fair targets."[68]

Two months after the September 11, 2001 attacks, Bin Laden stated during an interview with Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir:

> "According to my information, if the enemy occupies an Islamic land and uses its people as human shields, a person has the right to attack the enemy. ... The targets of September 11 were not women and children. The main targets were the symbol of the United States: their economic and military power. Our Prophet Muhammad was against the killing of women and children. When he saw the body of a non-Muslim woman during a war, he asked what the reason for killing her was. If a child is older than thirteen and bears arms against Muslims, killing him is permissible."[69]

Bin Laden's overall strategy for achieving his goals against much larger enemies such as the Soviet Union and U.S. was to lure them into a long war of attrition in Muslim countries, attracting large numbers of jihadists who would never surrender. He believed this would lead to economic collapse of the enemy countries, by "bleeding" them dry.[70] Al-Qaeda manuals express this strategy. In a 2004 tape broadcast by Al Jazeera, Bin Laden spoke of "bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy".[71]

A number of errors and inconsistencies in Bin Laden's arguments have been alleged by authors such as Max Rodenbeck and Noah Feldman. He invoked democracy both as an example of the deceit and fraudulence of Western political system—American law being "the law of the rich and wealthy"[72]—and as the reason civilians are responsible for their government's actions and so can be lawfully punished by death.[73] He denounced democracy as a "religion of ignorance" that violates Islam by issuing man-made laws, but in a later statement compares the Western democracy of Spain favorably to the Muslim world in which the ruler is accountable. Rodenbeck states, "Evidently, [Bin Laden] has never heard theological justifications for democracy, based on the notion that the will of the people must necessarily reflect the will of an all-knowing God."[74]

Bin Laden was heavily anti-Semitic, stating that most of the negative events that occurred in the world were the direct result of Jewish actions. In a December 1998 interview with Pakistani journalist Rahimullah Yusufzai, Bin Laden stated that Operation Desert Fox was proof that Israeli Jews controlled the governments of the U.S. and the United Kingdom, directing them to kill as many Muslims as they could.[75] In a letter released in late 2002, he stated that Jews controlled the civilian media outlets, politics, and economic institutions of the United States.[47] In a May 1998 interview with ABC News, Bin Laden claimed that the Israeli state's ultimate goal was to annex the Arabian Peninsula and the Middle East into its territory and enslave its peoples, as part of what he called a "Greater Israel".[76] He stated that Jews and Muslims could never get along, that war was "inevitable" between them, and accusing the U.S. of stirring up anti-Islamic sentiment.[76] He claimed that the U.S. State Department and U.S. Department of Defense were controlled by Jews, for the sole purpose of serving the Israeli state's goals.[76] He often delivered warnings against alleged Jewish conspiracies: "These Jews are masters of usury and leaders in treachery. They will leave you nothing, either in this world or the next."[77] Shia Muslims have been listed along with heretics, the United States, and Israel as the four principal enemies of Islam at ideology classes of Bin Laden's al-Qaeda organization.[78]

Bin Laden was opposed to music on religious grounds,[79] and his attitude towards technology was mixed. He was interested in earth-moving machinery and genetic engineering of plants, while rejecting the use of chilled water.[80] He also believed climate change to be a serious threat and penned a letter urging Americans to work with U.S. President Barack Obama to make a rational decision to "save humanity from the harmful gases that threaten its destiny".[81][82]

## Militant and political career

[edit]

Main article: Militant career of Osama bin Laden

### Afghan–Soviet War

[edit]

See also: Allegations of CIA assistance to Osama bin Laden

After leaving college in 1979, Bin Laden went to Pakistan, joined Abdullah Yusuf Azzam and used money and machinery from his own construction company to help the mujahideen resistance in the Soviet—Afghan War.[83] He later told a journalist: "I felt outraged that an injustice had been committed against the people of Afghanistan."[84] From 1979 to 1992, the U.S. (as part of CIA activities in Afghanistan, specifically Operation Cyclone), Saudi Arabia, and China provided between $6–12 billion worth of financial aid and weapons to tens of thousands of mujahideen through Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).[85]

British journalist Jason Burke wrote: "[Bin Laden] did not receive any direct funding or training from the U.S. during the 1980s. Nor did his followers. The Afghan mujahideen, via Pakistan's ISI intelligence agency, received large amounts of both. Some bled to the Arabs fighting the Soviets but nothing significant."[86] Bin Laden met and built relations with Hamid Gul, who was a three-star general in the Pakistani Army and head of the ISI agency. Although the United States provided the money and weapons, the training of militant groups was entirely done by the Pakistan Armed Forces and the ISI.[87] According to Brigadier Mohammad Yousaf, the person in charge of the ISI's Afghan operations at the time, it was a strict policy of Pakistan to prevent any American involvement in the distribution of funds or weapons or in the training of the mujahideen, and the CIA officials stayed in the embassy in Islamabad, never entering Afghanistan or meeting with the Afghan resistance leaders themselves.[88] According to some CIA officers, beginning in early 1980, Bin Laden acted as a liaison between the Saudi General Intelligence Presidency (GIP) and Afghan warlords; no evidence of contact between the CIA and Bin Laden exists in the CIA archives. Steve Coll states that although Bin Laden may not have been a formal, salaried GIP agent, "it seems clear that Bin Laden did have a substantial relationship with Saudi intelligence."[89] Bin Laden's first trainer was U.S. Special Forces commando Ali Mohamed.[90]

By 1984, Bin Laden and Azzam established Maktab al-Khidamat, which funneled money, arms, and fighters from around the Arab world into Afghanistan. Through al-Khadamat, Bin Laden's inherited family fortune[91] paid for air tickets and accommodation, paid for paperwork with Pakistani authorities and provided other such services for the jihadi fighters. Bin Laden established camps inside Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in Pakistan and trained volunteers from across the Muslim world to fight against the Soviet-backed regime, the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. Between 1986 and 1987, Bin Laden set up a base in eastern Afghanistan for several dozen of his own Arab soldiers.[92] From this base, Bin Laden participated in some combat activity against the Soviets, such as the Battle of Jaji in 1987.[92] Despite its little strategic significance, the battle was lionized in the mainstream Arab press.[92] It was during this time that he became idolized by many Arabs.[93]

### Allegation of involvement in 1988 Gilgit massacre

[edit]

See also: 1988 Gilgit massacre

In May 1988, responding to rumours of a massacre of Sunnis by Shias, large numbers of Shias from in and around Gilgit, Pakistan were killed in a massacre.[94] Shia civilians were also subjected to rape.[95] The massacre is alleged by B. Raman, a founder of India's Research and Analysis Wing,[96] to have been in response to a revolt by the Shias of Gilgit during the rule of military dictator Zia-ul Haq.[97] He alleged that the Pakistan Army induced Osama bin Laden to lead an armed group of Sunni tribals, from Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier Province, into Gilgit and its surrounding areas to suppress the revolt.[98]

### Formation and structuring of al-Qaeda

[edit]

Main article: Al-Qaeda

The flag used by various al-Qaeda factions

By 1988,[99] Bin Laden had split from Maktab al-Khidamat. While Azzam acted as support for Afghan fighters, Bin Laden wanted a more military role. One of the main points leading to the split and the creation of al-Qaeda was Azzam's insistence that Arab fighters be integrated among the Afghan fighting groups instead of forming a separate fighting force.[100] Notes of a meeting of Bin Laden and others on 20 August 1988, indicate that al-Qaeda was a formal group by that time: "Basically an organized Islamic faction, its goal is to lift the word of God, to make his religion victorious." A list of requirements for membership itemized the following: listening ability, good manners, obedience, and making a pledge (bayat) to follow one's superiors.[101]

According to Wright, the group's real name was not used in public pronouncements because its existence was still a closely held secret.[102] His research suggests that al-Qaeda was formed at an 11 August 1988, meeting between several senior leaders of Egyptian Islamic Jihad (EIJ), Azzam, and Bin Laden, where it was agreed to join Bin Laden's money with the expertise of the EIJ and take up the jihadist cause elsewhere after the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan.[103] Others argue that the organization was founded earlier and already existed when the leaders met on 11 August 1988.[104][105]

Following the Soviet Union's withdrawal from Afghanistan in February 1989, Bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia as a hero of jihad.[106] Along with his Arab legion, he was thought to have brought down the mighty superpower of the Soviet Union.[107] After his return to Saudi Arabia, Bin Laden engaged in opposition movements to the Saudi monarchy while working for his family business.[106] He offered to send al-Qaeda to overthrow the Soviet-aligned Yemeni Socialist Party government in South Yemen, but was rebuffed by Prince Turki bin Faisal. He then tried to disrupt the Yemeni unification process by assassinating YSP leaders, but was halted by Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdulaziz after President Ali Abdullah Saleh complained to King Fahd.[108] He was also angered by the internecine tribal fighting among the Afghans.[93] However, he continued working with the Saudi GID and the Pakistani ISI. In March 1989, Bin Laden led 800 Arab foreign fighters during the unsuccessful Battle of Jalalabad.[109][110][111] Bin Laden led his men in person to immobilize the 7th Sarandoy Regiment but failed doing so leading to massive casualties. He funded the 1990 Afghan coup d'état attempt led by hardcore communist General Shahnawaz Tanai.[111] He also lobbied the Parliament of Pakistan to carry out an unsuccessful motion of no confidence against Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.[110]

### The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and Gulf war

[edit]

The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait under Saddam Hussein on 2 August 1990, put the Saudi kingdom and the royal family at risk. With Iraqi forces on the Saudi border, Saddam's appeal to pan-Arabism was potentially inciting internal dissent. One week after King Fahd agreed to U.S. Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney's offer of American military assistance, Bin Laden met with King Fahd and Saudi Defense Minister Sultan bin Abdulaziz, telling them not to depend on non-Muslim assistance from the U.S. and others and offering to help defend Saudi Arabia with his Arab legion. When Sultan asked how Bin Laden would defend the fighters if Saddam used Iraqi chemical and biological weapons against them, he replied, "We will fight him with faith."[112] Bin Laden's offer was rebuffed, and the Saudi monarchy invited the deployment of U.S. forces in Saudi territory.[113]

Bin Laden publicly denounced Saudi dependence on the U.S. forces, arguing that it was indignity that the kingdom was being defended by an army of American unbelievers.[114] Bin Laden tried to convince the Saudi ulama to issue a fatwa condemning the American military deployment but senior clerics refused out of fear of repression.[115] Bin Laden's continued criticism of the Saudi monarchy led them to put him under house arrest, under which he remained until he was ultimately forced to leave the country in 1991.[116] The U.S. 82nd Airborne Division landed in the north-eastern Saudi city of Dhahran and was deployed in the desert barely 400 miles from Medina.[93]

The aftermath of al-Qaeda's 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York City

Meanwhile, on 8 November 1990, the FBI raided the New Jersey home of El Sayyid Nosair, an associate of al-Qaeda operative Ali Mohamed. They discovered copious evidence of terrorist plots, including plans to blow up New York City skyscrapers. This marked the earliest discovery of al-Qaeda terrorist plans outside of Muslim countries.[117] Nosair was eventually convicted in connection to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and, years later, admitted guilt for the murder of Rabbi Meir Kahane in New York City on 5 November 1990.

### Move to Sudan

[edit]

Further information: Al-Qaeda involvement in Africa

In 1991, Bin Laden was expelled from Saudi Arabia by its government after repeatedly criticizing the Saudi alliance with the United States.[106][118] He and his followers moved first to Afghanistan and then relocated to Sudan by 1992,[106][118] in a deal brokered by Ali Mohamed.[119] Bin Laden's personal security detail consisted of bodyguards personally selected by him. Their arsenal included SA-7, Stinger missiles, AK-47s, RPGs, and PK machine guns.[120] Meanwhile, in March–April 1992, Bin Laden tried to play a pacifying role in the escalating civil war in Afghanistan, by urging warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar to join the other mujahideen leaders negotiating a coalition government instead of trying to conquer Kabul for himself.[121]

It is believed that the first bombing attack involving Bin Laden was the 29 December 1992, bombing of the Gold Mohur Hotel in Aden in which two people were killed.[106]

In the 1990s, Bin Laden's al-Qaeda assisted jihadis financially, and sometimes militarily, in Algeria, Egypt, and Afghanistan. In 1992 or 1993, Bin Laden sent an emissary, Qari el-Said, with $40,000 to Algeria to aid the Islamists and urge war rather than negotiation with the government. Their advice was heeded. The war that followed caused the deaths of 150,000 to 200,000 Algerians and ended with the Islamists surrendering to the government.[122]

In Sudan, Bin Laden established a new base for mujahideen operations in Khartoum. He bought a house on Al-Mashtal Street in the affluent Al-Riyadh quarter and a retreat at Soba on the Blue Nile.[123][124] During his time in Sudan, he heavily invested in the infrastructure, in agriculture and businesses.[125] He was the Sudan agent for the British firm Hunting Surveys,[126] and built roads using the same bulldozers he had employed to construct mountain tracks in Afghanistan. Many of his labourers were the same fighters who had been his comrades in the war against the Soviet Union. He was generous to the poor and popular with the people.[127][128] He continued to criticize King Fahd of Saudi Arabia. In response, in 1994, Fahd stripped Bin Laden of his Saudi citizenship and persuaded his family to cut off his $7 million a year stipend.[11][129][130]

By that time, Bin Laden was being linked with EIJ, which made up the core of al-Qaeda. In 1995, the EIJ attempted to assassinate the Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. The attempt failed, and Sudan expelled the EIJ. After this bombing, al-Qaeda was reported to have developed its justification for the killing of innocent people. According to a fatwa issued by Mamdouh Mahmud Salim, the killing of someone standing near the enemy is justified because any innocent bystander will find a proper reward in death, going to Jannah (paradise) if they were good Muslims and to Jahannam (hell) if they were bad or non-believers.[131] The fatwa was issued to al-Qaeda members but not the general public.

The U.S. State Department accused Sudan of being a sponsor of international terrorism and Bin Laden of operating terrorist training camps in the Sudanese desert. However, according to Sudan officials, this stance became obsolete as the Islamist political leader Hassan al-Turabi lost influence in their country. The Sudanese wanted to engage with the U.S., but American officials refused to meet with them even after they had expelled Bin Laden. It was not until 2000 that the State Department authorized U.S. intelligence officials to visit Sudan.[126]

The 9/11 Commission Report states:

> In late 1995, when Bin Laden was still in Sudan, the State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) learned that Sudanese officials were discussing with the Saudi government the possibility of expelling Bin Laden. CIA paramilitary officer Billy Waugh tracked down Bin Ladin in Sudan and prepared an operation to apprehend him, but was denied authorization.[132] US Ambassador Timothy Carney encouraged the Sudanese to pursue this course. The Saudis, however, did not want Bin Laden, giving as their reason their revocation of his citizenship. Sudan's minister of defense, Fatih Erwa, has claimed that Sudan offered to hand Bin Laden over to the United States. The Commission has found no credible evidence that this was so. Ambassador Carney had instructions only to push the Sudanese to expel Bin Laden. Ambassador Carney had no legal basis to ask for more from the Sudanese since, at the time, there was no indictment outstanding against Bin Laden in any country.[133]

In January 1996, the CIA launched a new unit of its Counterterrorism Center (CTC) called the Bin Laden Issue Station, code-named "Alec Station", to track and to carry out operations against his activities. Bin Laden Issue Station was headed by Michael Scheuer, a veteran of the Islamic Extremism Branch of the CTC.[122] U.S. intelligence monitored Bin Laden in Sudan using operatives to run by daily and to photograph activities at his compound, and using an intelligence safe house and signals intelligence to surveil him and to record his moves.[134]

### Return to Afghanistan

[edit]

The 9/11 Commission Report states:

> In February 1996, Sudanese officials began approaching officials from the United States and other governments, asking what actions of theirs might ease foreign pressure. In secret meetings with Saudi officials, Sudan offered to expel Bin Laden to Saudi Arabia and asked the Saudis to pardon him. US officials became aware of these secret discussions, certainly by March. Saudi officials apparently wanted Bin Laden expelled from Sudan. They had already revoked his citizenship, however, and would not tolerate his presence in their country. Also Bin Laden may have no longer felt safe in Sudan, where he had already escaped at least one assassination attempt that he believed to have been the work of the Egyptian or Saudi regimes, and paid for by the CIA.

Due to the increasing pressure on Sudan from Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the United States, Bin Laden was permitted to leave for a country of his choice. He chose to return to Jalalabad, Afghanistan aboard a chartered flight on 18 May 1996; there he forged a close relationship with Mullah Omar.[135][136] The expulsion from Sudan significantly weakened Bin Laden and his organization.[137] Some African intelligence sources have argued that the expulsion left Bin Laden without an option other than becoming a full-time radical, and that most of the 300 Afghan Arabs who left with him subsequently became terrorists.[126] Various sources report that he lost between $20 million[138] and $300 million[139] in Sudan; the government seized his construction equipment, and he was forced to liquidate his businesses, land, and even his horses.

#### 1996 Declaration of war and 1998 fatwa

[edit]

Main article: Fatawā of Osama bin Laden

In August 1996, Bin Laden issued a fatawā titled "Declaration of War against the Americans Occupying the Land of the Two Holy Places", which was published by Al-Quds Al-Arabi, a London-based newspaper. Saudi Arabia is sometimes called "The Land of the Two Holy Mosques" in reference to Mecca and Medina. The reference to occupation in the fatwā referred to U.S. forces based in Saudi Arabia for the purpose of controlling air space in Iraq, known as Operation Southern Watch.[140] Despite the assurance of President George H. W. Bush to King Fahd in 1990, that all U.S. forces based in Saudi Arabia would be withdrawn once the Iraqi threat had been dealt with, by 1996 the Americans were still there. Bush cited the necessity of dealing with the remnants of Saddam Hussein's regime (which Bush had chosen not to destroy). Bin Laden's view was that "the 'evils' of the Middle East arose from America's attempt to take over the region and from its support for Israel. Saudi Arabia had been turned into an American colony".[141]

Fervently attacking American support for Israel and Saudi Arabia as well as its sanctions on Iraq, Bin Laden declared in the fatwa:

> "Terrorising you, while you are carrying arms on our land, is a legitimate and morally demanded duty. It is a legitimate right well known to all humans and other creatures... [our] youths are different from your soldiers. Your problem will be how to convince your troops to fight, while our problem will be how to restrain our youths.. The youths hold you responsible for all of the killings and evictions of the Muslims and the violation of the sanctities, carried out by your Zionist brothers in Lebanon; you openly supplied them with arms and finance. More than 600,000 Iraqi children have died due to lack of food and medicine and as a result of the unjustifiable aggression (sanction) imposed on Iraq and its nation. The children of Iraq are our children. You, the USA, together with the Saudi regime are responsible for the shedding of the blood of these innocent children. Due to all of that, what ever treaty you have with our country is now null and void."[142]

Pakistani journalist Hamid Mir interviewing Bin Laden, c. 1997–1998. The AKS-74U in the background is a symbol of the mujahideen's victory over the Soviets, since these weapons were captured from Spetsnaz forces.

On 23 February 1998; Bin Laden, alongside Ayman al-Zawahiri, Ahmad Refai Taha, Shaykh Mir Hamzah and Maulana Fazlur Rahman; issued another fatwā against the U.S., calling upon Muslims to attack the country and its allies. It was entitled "Declaration of the World Islamic Front for Jihad against the Jews and the Crusaders".[143] After listing numerous acts of aggression committed by the U.S., such as the presence of American forces in the Arabian Peninsula, sanctions against Iraq, Israeli repression of Palestinians, among other things. The fatwa stated:

> "All these American crimes and sins are a clear proclamation of war against God, his Messenger, and the Muslims. Religious scholars throughout Islamic history have agreed that jihad is an individual duty when an enemy attacks Muslim countries. This was related by the Imam ibn Qudama in "The Resource," by Imam al-Kisa'i in "The Marvels," by al-Qurtubi in his exegesis, and by the Sheikh of Islam when he states in his chronicles that "As for fighting to repel an enemy, which is the strongest way to defend freedom and religion, it is agreed that this is a duty. After faith, there is no greater duty than fighting an enemy who is corrupting religion and the world.""[144][143]

At the public announcement, Bin Laden said that North Americans are "very easy targets". He told the attending journalists, "You will see the results of this in a very short time."[145] It also claimed the "individual duty for every Muslim "was to liberate Al-Aqsa in Jerusalem and the Grand Mosque in Mecca from their grip.[146][147]

### Late 1990s attacks

[edit]

In Afghanistan, Bin Laden and al-Qaeda raised money from donors from the days of the Afghan jihad, and from the Pakistani ISI to establish more training camps for mujahideen fighters.[148] Bin Laden effectively took over Ariana Afghan Airlines, which ferried Islamic militants, arms, cash, and opium through the United Arab Emirates and Pakistan, as well as provided false identifications to members of Bin Laden's terrorist network.[149] The arms smuggler Viktor Bout helped to run the airline, maintaining planes and loading cargo. Michael Scheuer, head of the CIA's Bin Laden unit, concluded that Ariana was being used as a terrorist taxi service.[150]

It has been claimed that Bin Laden funded the Luxor massacre of 17 November 1997,[151][152][153] which killed 62 civilians, and outraged the Egyptian public. In mid-1997, the Northern Alliance threatened to overrun Jalalabad, causing him to abandon his Najim Jihad compound and move his operations to Tarnak Farms in the south.[154]

The aftermath of the 1998 bombing of the U.S. embassy in Nairobi, Kenya

Another successful attack was carried out in the city of Mazar-i-Sharif in Afghanistan. Bin Laden helped cement his alliance with the Taliban by sending several hundred Afghan Arab fighters along to help the Taliban kill between five and six thousand Hazaras overrunning the city.[155]

Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri organized an al-Qaeda congress on 24 June 1998.[156] The 1998 U.S. embassy bombings were a series of attacks that occurred on 7 August 1998, in which hundreds of people were killed in simultaneous truck bomb explosions at the U.S. embassies in the major East African cities of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and Nairobi, Kenya.[157] The attacks were linked to local members of the EIJ, and brought Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri to the attention of the U.S. public for the first time. Al-Qaeda later claimed responsibility for the bombings.[157]

The two locations targeted in Operation Infinite Reach, the U.S.' 1998 bombing of al-Qaeda targets in Khartoum, Sudan, and Khost, Afghanistan

In retaliation for the embassy bombings, U.S. President Bill Clinton ordered a series of cruise missile strikes on Bin Laden-related targets in Sudan and Afghanistan on 20 August 1998.[157] In December 1998, the CIA reported to Clinton that al-Qaeda was preparing for attacks in the U.S., including the training of personnel to hijack aircraft.[158] On 7 June 1999, the FBI placed Bin Laden on its Ten Most Wanted list.[159][160][161][162][141] On October 15, 1999, the United Nations designated al-Qaeda as a terrorist organization through UN Security Council Resolution 1267. This resolution aimed to impose sanctions on individuals and entities associated with al-Qaeda, including freezing assets and imposing travel bans.[163]

In late 2000, Richard Clarke revealed that Islamic militants headed by Bin Laden had planned a triple attack on 3 January 2000, which would have included bombings in Jordan of the Radisson SAS Hotel in Amman, tourists at Mount Nebo, and a site on the Jordan River, as well as the sinking of the destroyer USS The Sullivans in Yemen, and an attack on a target within the United States. The plan was foiled by the arrest of the Jordanian terrorist cell, the sinking of the explosive-filled skiff intended to target the destroyer, and the arrest of Ahmed Ressam.[164]

### Yugoslav Wars

[edit]

See also: Bosnian mujahideen

A former U.S. State Department official in October 2001 described Bosnia and Herzegovina as a safe haven for terrorists, and asserted that militant elements of the former Sarajevo government were protecting extremists, some with ties to Bin Laden.[165]

According to Middle East intelligence reports, Bin Laden financed small convoys of recruits from the Arab world through his businesses in Sudan. Among them was Karim Said Atmani, who was identified by authorities as the document forger for a group of Algerians accused of plotting the bombings in the United States.[166] He is a former roommate of Ahmed Ressam, the man arrested at the Canada–United States border in mid-December 1999 with a car full of nitroglycerin and bomb-making materials.[167][168] He was convicted of colluding with Bin Laden by a French court.[169]

A Bosnian government search of passport and residency records, conducted at the urging of the United States, revealed other former mujahideen who were linked to the same Algerian group or to other groups of suspected terrorists, and had lived in the area 100 km (60 mi) north of Sarajevo, the capital, in the past few years. Khalil al-Deek was arrested in Jordan in late December 1999 on suspicion of involvement in a plot to blow up tourist sites. A second man with Bosnian citizenship, Hamid Aich, lived in Canada at the same time as Atmani and worked for a charity associated with Bin Laden. In its 26 June 1997 report on the bombing of the Al Khobar building in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, The New York Times noted that those arrested confessed to serving with Bosnian Muslim forces. Further, the captured men also admitted to ties with Bin Laden.[170][171][verification needed]

In 1999, the press reported that Bin Laden and his Tunisian assistant Mehrez Aodouni were granted citizenship and Bosnian passports in 1993 by the government in Sarajevo. The Bosnian government denied this information following the September 11 attacks, but it was later found that Aodouni was arrested in Turkey and that at that time he possessed the Bosnian passport. Following this revelation, a new explanation was given that Bin Laden did not personally collect his Bosnian passport and that officials at the Bosnian embassy in Vienna, which issued the passport, could not have known who he was at the time.[170][171][verification needed]

The head of Albania's State Intelligence Service (SHISH), Fatos Klosi, said that Bin Laden was running a terror network in Albania to take part in the Kosovo War under the guise of a humanitarian organization and it was reported to have been started in 1994. Claude Kader, who was a member, testified its existence during his trial.[172] By 1998, four members of EIJ were arrested in Albania and extradited to Egypt.[173] The mujahideen fighters were organized by Islamic leaders in Western Europe allied to him and al-Zawahiri.[174]

During his trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, former Serbian President Slobodan Milošević quoted from a purported FBI report that al-Qaeda had a presence in the Balkans and aided the Kosovo Liberation Army. He claimed Bin Laden had used Albania as a launchpad for violence in the region and Europe. He claimed that they had informed Richard Holbrooke that KLA was being aided by al-Qaeda but the US decided to cooperate with the KLA and thus indirectly with Osama despite the U.S. embassy bombings earlier. Milošević had argued that the U.S. aided the terrorists, which culminated in its backing of the 1999 NATO bombing of Yugoslavia during the Kosovo War.[175][176][177][178]

### Criminal charges

[edit]

On 16 March 1998, Libya issued the first official Interpol arrest warrant against Bin Laden and three other people. They were charged for killing Silvan Becker, agent of Germany's domestic intelligence service, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, in the Terrorism Department, and his wife Vera in Libya on 10 March 1994.[66][179] Bin Laden was still wanted by the Libyan government at the time of his death.[180][181] He was first indicted by a grand jury of the U.S. on 8 June 1998, on a charges of conspiracy to attack defense utilities of the U.S. and prosecutors further charged that Bin Laden was the head of the terrorist organization called al-Qaeda, and that he was a major financial backer of Islamic fighters worldwide.[182]

During the Clinton administration, capturing Bin Laden had been an objective of the U.S. government.[183] Shortly after the September 11 attacks, it was revealed that Clinton had signed a directive authorizing the CIA (specifically, their elite Special Activities Division) to apprehend Bin Laden and bring him to the U.S. to stand trial for the 1998 embassy attacks; if taking him alive was deemed impossible, then deadly force was authorized.[184] On 20 August 1998, 66 cruise missiles launched by U.S. Navy ships in the Arabian Sea struck Bin Laden's training camps near Khost in Afghanistan, missing him by a few hours.[185]

On 4 November 1998, Bin Laden was indicted by a Federal Grand Jury in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, on charges of Murder of US Nationals Outside the United States, Conspiracy to Murder US Nationals Outside the United States, and Attacks on a Federal Facility Resulting in Death[186] for his alleged role in the 1998 embassy attacks. The evidence against Bin Laden included courtroom testimony by former al-Qaeda members and satellite phone records, from a phone purchased for him by al-Qaeda procurement agent Ziyad Khaleel in the U.S.[187][188] However, the Taliban ruled not to extradite Bin Laden on the grounds that there was insufficient evidence published in the indictments and that non-Muslim courts lacked standing to try Muslims.[189]

Bin Laden became the 456th person listed on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list, when he was added on 7 June 1999, following his indictment along with others for capital crimes in the 1998 embassy attacks. Attempts at assassination and requests for the extradition of Bin Laden from the Taliban of Afghanistan were met with failure before the bombing of Afghanistan in October 2001.[190] In 1999, US President Bill Clinton convinced the United Nations to impose sanctions against Afghanistan in an attempt to force the Taliban to extradite him.[191]

In 1999, the CIA, together with Pakistani military intelligence, had prepared a team of approximately 60 Pakistani commandos to infiltrate Afghanistan to capture or kill Bin Laden, but the plan was aborted by the 1999 Pakistani coup d'état;[185] in 2000, foreign operatives working on behalf of the CIA had fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a convoy of vehicles in which Bin Laden was traveling through the mountains of Afghanistan, hitting one of the vehicles but not the one in which Bin Laden was riding.[184]

In 2000, before the September 11 attacks, Paul Bremer characterized the Clinton administration as correctly focused on Bin Laden, while Robert Oakley criticized their obsession with Osama.[164]

### September 11 attacks

[edit]

See also: September 11 attacks and Videos and audio recordings of Osama bin Laden

> God knows it did not cross our minds to attack the Towers, but after the situation became unbearable—and we witnessed the injustice and tyranny of the American-Israeli alliance against our people in Palestine and Lebanon—I thought about it. And the events that affected me directly were that of 1982 and the events that followed—when America allowed the Israelis to invade Lebanon, helped by the US Sixth Fleet. As I watched the destroyed towers in Lebanon, it occurred to me punish the unjust the same way: to destroy towers in America so it could taste some of what we are tasting and to stop killing our children and women.

> — Osama bin Laden, 2004[192]

United Airlines Flight 175 crashes into the World Trade Center's South Tower on 9/11.

U.S. president George W. Bush received an intelligence report on 6 August 2001, titled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S."[193] On 11 September 2001 (the "September 11 attacks" or "9/11"), the U.S. was attacked by al-Qaeda, who used four commercial airplanes as missiles against various targets. Two planes, American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175, were crashed into the North and South Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City. American Airlines Flight 77 was crashed into the Pentagon. United Airlines Flight 93 did not reach its intended destination, as its passengers overtook the plane, which crashed in Pennsylvania. The Twin Towers eventually collapsed. At least 2,750 people died from the attacks.[194] On the day of the attacks, the National Security Agency intercepted communications that pointed to Bin Laden's responsibility,[195] as did German intelligence agencies.[196] At 11:30 p.m., Bush wrote in his diary: "The Pearl Harbor of the 21st century took place today... We think it's Osama bin Laden."[197] The Federal Bureau of Investigation has stated that classified[198] evidence linking al-Qaeda and Bin Laden to the September 11 attacks is clear and irrefutable.[199] The UK Government reached a similar conclusion regarding al-Qaeda and Bin Laden's culpability for the September 11 attacks, although the government report noted that the evidence presented is not necessarily sufficient to prosecute the case.[200] Identified motivations of the September 11 attacks include the support of Israel by the United States, presence of the U.S. military in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and the U.S. enforcement of sanctions against Iraq.

Image from the video of Bin Laden released on 13 December 2001

Bin Laden initially denied involvement in the attacks. On 16 September 2001, he read a statement, later broadcast by Al Jazeera, denying responsibility for the attack.[201] In a videotape recovered by U.S. forces in November 2001 in Jalalabad, Bin Laden was seen discussing the attack with Khaled al-Harbi in a way that indicates foreknowledge.[202] The tape was broadcast on various news networks on 13 December 2001. The merits of this translation have been disputed. Arabist Dr. Abdel El M. Husseini stated: "This translation is very problematic. At the most important places where it is held to prove the guilt of Bin Laden, it is not identical with the Arabic."[203]

In the 2004 video, Bin Laden abandoned his denials without retracting past statements. In it, he said he had personally directed the nineteen hijackers.[204][205] In the 18-minute tape, played on Al-Jazeera, four days before the American presidential election, Bin Laden accused George W. Bush of negligence in the hijacking of the planes on September 11.[204] He said was inspired to destroy the World Trade Center after watching the destruction of towers in Lebanon by Israel during the 1982 Lebanon War.[206] Through two other tapes aired by Al Jazeera in 2006, Bin Laden announced, "I am the one in charge of the nineteen brothers. ... I was responsible for entrusting the nineteen brothers ... with the raids" (23 May 2006).[207] In the tapes, he was seen with Ramzi bin al-Shibh, as well as two of the 9/11 hijackers, Hamza al-Ghamdi and Wail al-Shehri, as they made preparations for the attacks (videotape broadcast 7 September 2006).[208]

## Manhunt and activities after the September 11 attacks

[edit]

### Bush administration

[edit]

Main article: Manhunt for Osama bin Laden

A leaflet made by the Central Intelligence Agency which was distributed in Afghanistan, showing a bounty for Bin Laden

In response to the attacks, the United States launched the war on terror to depose the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and capture al-Qaeda operatives, and several countries strengthened their anti-terrorism legislation to preclude future attacks. The CIA's Special Activities Division was given the lead in tracking down and killing or capturing Bin Laden.[209] U.S. officials named Bin Laden and the al-Qaeda organization as the prime suspects and offered a reward of $25 million for information leading to his capture or death.[210][211] On 13 July 2007, the Senate voted to double the reward to $50 million, although the amount was never changed.[212] The Airline Pilots Association and the Air Transport Association offered an additional $2 million reward.[213]

While referring to Bin Laden in a CNN film clip on 17 September 2001, then-President George W. Bush stated, "I want justice. There is an old poster out west, as I recall, that said, 'Wanted: Dead or alive'".[214] Subsequently, Bin Laden retreated further from public contact to avoid capture. Numerous speculative press reports were issued about his whereabouts or even death; some placed Bin Laden in different locations during overlapping time periods.

On 10 October 2001, Bin Laden appeared as well on the initial list of the top 22 FBI Most Wanted Terrorists, which was released to the public by the George W. Bush administration and based on the indictment for the 1998 embassy attack. Bin Laden was among a group of 13 fugitive terrorists wanted on that latter list for questioning about the 1998 attack. He remains the only fugitive ever to be listed on both FBI fugitive lists.[citation needed] Despite these multiple indictments, the Taliban refused to extradite Osama bin Laden. However, they did offer to try him before an Islamic court if evidence of Osama bin Laden's involvement in the September 11 attacks was provided. It was not until eight days after the bombing of Afghanistan began in October 2001 that the Taliban finally did offer to turn over Osama bin Laden to a third-party country for trial, in return for the U.S. ending the bombing. This offer was rejected by George W. Bush, stating that this was no longer negotiable: "there's no need to discuss innocence or guilt. We know he's guilty."[215]

Delta Force GIs disguised as Afghan civilians, while they searched for Bin Laden in November 2001

Bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri in Kabul, Afghanistan, in November 2001

Bin Laden was believed to be hiding in the White Mountains (Spin Ghar) in Afghanistan's east, near the Pakistani border.[216][217] According to The Washington Post, the US government concluded that Bin Laden was present during the Battle of Tora Bora, Afghanistan, in late 2001, and according to civilian and military officials with first-hand knowledge, failure by the U.S. to commit enough U.S. ground troops to hunt him led to his escape and was the gravest failure by the U.S. in the war against al-Qaeda. Intelligence officials assembled what they believed to be decisive evidence, from contemporary and subsequent interrogations and intercepted communications, that Bin Laden began the Battle of Tora Bora inside the cave complex along Afghanistan's mountainous eastern border.[218]

On 11 December 2005, a letter from Atiyah Abd al-Rahman to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi indicated that Bin Laden and the al-Qaeda leadership were based in the Waziristan region of Pakistan at the time. In the letter, translated by the United States military's Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, Atiyah instructs al-Zarqawi to send messengers to Waziristan so that they meet with the brothers of the leadership. Al-Rahman also indicates that Bin Laden and al-Qaeda are weak and have many of their own problems. The letter has been deemed authentic by military and counterterrorism officials, according to The Washington Post.[219][220]

The Washington Post also reported that the CIA unit composed of special operations paramilitary forces dedicated to capturing Bin Laden was shut down in late 2005.[221]

U.S. and Afghanistan forces raided the mountain caves in Tora Bora between 14 and 16 August 2007. The military was drawn to the area after receiving intelligence of a pre-Ramadan meeting held by al-Qaeda members. After killing dozens of al-Qaeda and Taliban members, they did not find either Bin Laden or al-Zawahiri.[222]

Al-Qaeda continued to release time-sensitive and professionally verified videos demonstrating Bin Laden's continued survival, including in August 2007.[223] He claimed sole responsibility for the September 11 attacks and specifically denied any prior knowledge of them by the Taliban or the Afghan people.[224]

### Obama administration

[edit]

On 7 October 2008, in the second debate of that year's U.S. presidential election, then-presidential candidate Barack Obama pledged, "We will kill Bin Laden. We will crush al-Qaeda. That has to be our biggest national security priority."[225] Upon being elected, Obama expressed his plans to renew and ramp up the U.S. search for Bin Laden.[225] Obama rejected the Bush administration's policy on Bin Laden that conflated all terror threats from al-Qaeda to Hamas to Hezbollah, replacing it with a covert, narrow focus on al-Qaeda and its direct affiliates.[226][227]

Bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan

A diagram of the compound

In 2009, a research team led by Thomas Gillespie and John A. Agnew of UCLA used satellite-aided geographical analysis to pinpoint three compounds in Parachinar as Bin Laden's likely hideouts.[228] In March 2009, the New York Daily News reported that the hunt for Bin Laden had centered in the Chitral District of Pakistan, including the Kalam Valley. Author Rohan Gunaratna stated that captured al-Qaeda leaders had confirmed that Bin Laden was hiding in Chitral.[229] Pakistan's Prime Minister Gillani rejected claims that Osama bin Laden was hiding in Pakistan.[230]

Early in December 2009, a Taliban detainee in Pakistan said he had information that Bin Laden was in Afghanistan that year; he said that in January or February 2009, he met a trusted contact who had seen Bin Laden in Afghanistan about 15 to 20 days earlier.[231] However, on 6 December 2009, U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates stated that the United States had had no reliable information on the whereabouts of Bin Laden in years.[231][232] On 9 December, General Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, said that al-Qaeda would not be defeated unless Bin Laden were captured or killed, thus indicating that the U.S. high command believed that he was still alive. Testifying to the U.S. Congress, he said that Bin Laden had become an iconic figure, whose survival emboldens al-Qaeda as a franchising organization across the world, and that Obama's deployment of 30,000 extra troops to Afghanistan meant that success would be possible. He said killing or capturing Bin Laden would not spell the end of al-Qaeda, but the movement could not be eradicated while he remained at large.[232][233]

In a 2010 letter, Bin Laden chastised followers who had reinterpreted al-tatarrus—an Islamic doctrine meant to excuse the unintended killing of non-combatants in unusual circumstances—to justify routine massacres of Muslim civilians, which had turned Muslims against the extremist movement. Of the groups affiliated with al-Qaeda, Bin Laden condemned Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan for an attack on members of a hostile tribe, declaring that the operation is not justified, as there were casualties of noncombatants. Bin Laden wrote that the tatarrus doctrine needs to be revisited based on the modern-day context and clear boundaries established. He asked a subordinate to draw up a jihadist code of conduct that would constrain military operations in order to avoid civilian casualties. In Yemen, Bin Laden urged his allies to seek a truce that would bring the country stability, or would at least show the people that they were careful in keeping Muslims safe on the basis of peace. In Somalia, he called attention to the extreme poverty caused by constant warfare, and he advised al-Shabab to pursue economic development. He instructed his followers around the world to focus on education and persuasion rather than entering into confrontations with Islamic political parties.[234]

On 2 February 2010, Afghan president Hamid Karzai arrived in Saudi Arabia for an official visit. The agenda included a discussion of a possible Saudi role in Karzai's plan to reintegrate Taliban militants. During the visit, an anonymous official of the Saudi Foreign Affairs Ministry declared that the kingdom had no intention of getting involved in peacemaking in Afghanistan unless the Taliban severed ties with extremists and expelled Osama bin Laden.[235] On 7 June 2010, the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Seyassah reported that Bin Laden was hiding out in the mountainous town of Sabzevar, in northeastern Iran.[236] On 9 June, The Australian's online edition repeated the claim.[237] This report turned out to be false.

On 18 October 2010, an unnamed NATO official suggested that Bin Laden was alive, well, and living comfortably in Pakistan, protected by elements of the country's intelligence services. A senior Pakistani official denied the allegations and said that the accusations were designed to put pressure on the Pakistani government ahead of talks aimed at strengthening ties between Pakistan and the U.S.[238]

In April 2011, various U.S. intelligence outlets traced Bin Laden to Abbottabad, Pakistan. It was previously believed that he was hiding near the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas, but he was found 160 km (100 mi) away in a three-story mansion in Abbottabad at 34°10′9.51″N 73°14′32.78″E﻿ / ﻿34.1693083°N 73.2424389°E﻿ / 34.1693083; 73.2424389,[239][240][241] 1.3 km (0.8 mi) southwest of the Pakistan Military Academy.[242][243][244][245] Imagery from Google Earth indicates that the compound was built between 2001 and 2005.[246]

## Death and aftermath

[edit]

Main article: Killing of Osama bin Laden

See also: Reactions to the killing of Osama bin Laden and Osama bin Laden death conspiracy theories

Map showing the US operation from its bases in Afghanistan to Pakistan that killed Bin Laden, and the subsequent burial of his body at sea

Osama bin Laden was shot and killed by Navy Seal operatives in Abbottabad, Pakistan, on 2 May 2011,[247][248] shortly after 1:00 AM local time (4:00 PM Eastern Time on 1 May 2011)[b][249][250] by a U.S. military special operations unit.[251][252] The operation, code-named Operation Neptune Spear, was ordered by Barack Obama in April 2011 and carried out in a CIA operation by a team of U.S. Navy SEALs from the United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group (also known as DEVGRU or informally by its former name, SEAL Team Six) of the Joint Special Operations Command,[253] with support from CIA operatives on the ground.[254][255][256]

Members of the Obama administration in the Situation Room, tracking the mission that killed Bin Laden

The FBI's website, listing Bin Laden as deceased on the Most Wanted List on 3 May 2011

The raid on Bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad was launched from Afghanistan.[257] After the raid, reports at the time stated that U.S. forces had taken Bin Laden's body to Afghanistan for positive identification, then buried it at sea, in accordance with Islamic law, within 24 hours of his death.[258] Subsequent reporting has called this account into question—citing, for example, the absence of evidence that there was an imam on board the USS Carl Vinson, where the burial was said to have taken place.[259] On 15 June 2011, U.S. federal prosecutors officially dropped all criminal charges against Bin Laden.[260]

Pakistani authorities later demolished the compound in February 2012[261] to prevent it from becoming a neo-Islamist shrine.[262] In February 2013, Pakistan announced plans to build a PKR 265 million (US$30 million) amusement park in the area, including the property of the former hideout.[263] In an interview in 2019, Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan claimed that Pakistani intelligence led the CIA to Osama bin Laden.[264]

It was widely reported by the press that Bin Laden was fatally wounded by Robert J. O'Neill; however, it has also been widely discredited by witnesses, who claim that Bin Laden was possibly already dead by the time O'Neill arrived, having been injured by an anonymous SEAL Team Six member referred to under the pseudonym "Red".[265][266] According to Navy SEAL Matt Bissonnette, Bin Laden was struck by two suppressed shots to the side of the head from around ten feet away after leaning out of his bedroom doorway to survey Bissonnette and a point man. Once the Navy SEALs entered the bedroom, his body began convulsing and Bissonnette along with another SEAL responded by firing multiple shots into his chest.[267]

On 29 March 2012, Pakistani newspaper Dawn acquired a report produced by Pakistani security officials, based on interrogation of his three surviving wives, that detailed his movements while living underground in Pakistan.[268]

### Allegations of Pakistan support and protection of Bin Laden

[edit]

Main article: Alleged Pakistani support for Osama bin Laden

Bin Laden was killed within the fortified complex of buildings that were probably built for him,[269] and had reportedly been his home for at least five years.[270][271] The compound was located less than 2 kilometres (1 mi) from Pakistan Military Academy and less than 100 kilometres (62 mi) from Pakistan's capital.[254][272] While the United States and Pakistan governments both claimed, and later maintained, that no Pakistani officials, including senior military leaders, knew Bin Laden's whereabouts or had prior knowledge of the U.S. strike,[273][274] Carlotta Gall, writing in The New York Times Magazine in 2014, reported that ISI Director General Ahmad Shuja Pasha knew of Bin Laden's presence in Abbottabad.[275] In a 2015 London Review of Books article, investigative reporter Seymour M. Hersh asserted—citing U.S. sources—that Bin Laden had been a prisoner of the ISI at the Abbottabad compound since 2006; that Pasha knew of the U.S. mission in advance, and authorized the helicopters delivering the SEALs to enter Pakistani airspace; and that the CIA learned of Bin Laden's whereabouts from a former senior Pakistani intelligence of Ahmad Shuja Pasha, who was paid an estimated $25 million for the information.[259] Both stories were denied by U.S. and Pakistani officials.

Mosharraf Zia, a leading Pakistani columnist, stated, "It seems deeply improbable that Bin Laden could have been where he was killed without the knowledge of some parts of the Pakistani state."[276] Pakistan's U.S. envoy, Ambassador Husain Haqqani, promised a "full inquiry" into how Pakistani intelligence services could have failed to find Bin Laden in a fortified compound so close to Islamabad. "Obviously Bin Laden did have a support system", he said. "The issue is, was that support system within the government and the state of Pakistan, or within the society of Pakistan?"[277]

Others argued that Bin Laden lived in the compound with a local family, and never used the internet or a mobile phone, which would have made him much easier to locate.[278] Pakistan's president Asif Ali Zardari denied that his country's security forces sheltered Bin Laden, and called any supposed support for Bin Laden by the Pakistani government baseless speculation.[279][280] Government officials said that the country's limited resources had been committed to its war against the Pakistan Taliban, and other insurgents who posed an active threat to it, rather than to finding or sheltering Bin Laden.[281] Coll states that as of 2019 there is no direct evidence showing Pakistani knowledge of Bin Laden's presence in Abbottabad. Documents captured from the Abbottabad compound generally show that Bin Laden was wary of contact with Pakistani intelligence and police, especially in light of Pakistan's role in the arrest of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.[282]

## Reception and legacy

[edit]

Further information: Aftermath of the September 11 attacks, Aftermath of the Afghanistan War (2001–2021), and Post-9/11

The FBI Most Wanted webpage for Bin Laden in late 2011

During the early 2000s, despite condemnations from U.S-allied governments in the Arab world, anti-American protestors from Pakistan to Palestinian territories used his portraits during their protests, speeches and public campaigns.[283] His popularity in the Muslim world reached its apex through the course of the Iraq War; during which opinion polls conducted in some countries gave him 50% – 60% favourable ratings.[284][283][285][286] However, at his death, Arab reaction was described as "muted", overshadowed by the beginning of the Arab Spring.[287] The Pew Research Center found in 2011 that support for Bin Laden and al-Qaeda had declined steadily across a number of Muslim countries, and was as low as 1% in Lebanon, describing him as "discredited".[288] Latin American political leaders expressed opposition to Bin Laden, with Peruvian president Alan García calling him "demonic"; however, at his death, some leftist Latin American leaders also denounced the United States for violating Pakistani sovereignty to target Bin Laden.[289] His death was celebrated in India, and the fact that he was found in Pakistan was regarded as cause for concern due to the complex Indo-Pakistani relationship.[290] During a June 2020 Pakistani parliament session, Prime Minister Imran Khan denounced Bin Laden's killing, labelling it as "an embarrassing moment" in their country's history, and also praised Bin Laden as a Shaheed (martyr).[291][292][293]

Bin Laden is a reviled figure in the Western world, where he is regarded as a terrorist and mass murderer.[294][295] His obituary in the New York Times referred to him as "the North Star" of global terrorism, seen by Americans as equivalent to "Hitler or Stalin."[295] Mark Hosenball wrote:

> In history's long list of villains, bin Laden will find a special place. He ha[d] no throne, no armies, not even any real territory, aside from the rocky wastes of Afghanistan. But he ha[d] the power to make men willingly go to their deaths for the sole purpose of indiscriminately killing Americans—men, women and children. He [was] an unusual combination in the annals of hate, at once mystical and fanatical—and deliberate and efficient.

> — Mark Hosenball, 2001[296]

## See also

[edit]

* The Golden Chain
* Islamic extremism
* Islamic fundamentalism
* Islamic terrorism
* List of assassinations by the United States
* Osama bin Laden in popular culture
* Pakistan and state-sponsored terrorism
* Allegations of CIA assistance to Osama bin Laden

## Notes

[edit]

1. ^ /oʊˈsɑːmə bɪn ˈlɑːdən/ ⓘ, oh-SAH-mah bihn LAH-dehn.[5] Full name in Arabic: أسامة بن محمد بن عوض بن لادن, romanized: Usāma bin Muḥammad bin ʿAwaḍ bin Lādin, Najdi Arabic pronunciation: [ʔu.saː.ma ben laː.din].
2. ^ Depending on the time zone, the date of his death may be different locally.

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Fair, C. Christine; Watson, Sarah J. (18 February 2015). Pakistan's Enduring Challenges. University of Pennsylvania Press. p. 246\. ISBN 978-0-8122-4690-2. Archived from the original on 31 January 2016. "Osama bin Laden was a hard-core Salafi who openly espoused violence against the United States in order to achieve Salafi goals."
2. ^ Brown, Amy Benson; Poremski, Karen M. (18 December 2014). Roads to Reconciliation: Conflict and Dialogue in the Twenty-first Century. Routledge. p. 81\. ISBN 978-1-317-46076-3. Archived from the original on 31 January 2016.
3. ^ Osama bin Laden (2007) Suzanne J. Murdico
4. ^ Armstrong, Karen (11 July 2005). "The label of Catholic terror was never used about the IRA". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 26 December 2016.
5. ^ Tedder, Jim (2013). "Voice of America pronunciation of "Osama Bin Laden" from the region of Saudi Arabia". Voice of America. Retrieved 9 June 2025.
6. ^ Davies, William D.; Dubinsky, Stanley (2018). Language Conflict and Language Rights: Ethnolinguistic Perspectives on Human Conflict. Cambridge University Press. p. 74\. ISBN 978-1-107-02209-6.
7. ^ Scheuer 2011, p. 21.
8. ^ bin Laden, Najwa; bin Laden, Omar; Sasson, Jean (2009). Growing up Bin Laden: Osama's Wife and Son Take Us Inside Their Secret World. New York: St. Martin's Press. p. 301\. ISBN 978-0-312-56016-4. Archived from the original on 7 April 2015.
9. ^ "Usama bin Laden". Rewards for Justice. 29 December 2006. Archived from the original on 29 December 2006.
10. ^ "Frontline: Hunting Bin Laden: Who is Bin Laden?: Chronology". PBS. Archived from the original on 10 February 2006. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
11. ^ a b Scheuer, Michael (7 February 2008). "Yemen still close to al Qaeda's heart". Asia Times Online. Archived from the original on 2 July 2016. Retrieved 6 May 2011.
12. ^ Strozier, Charles B.; Offer, Daniel; Abdyli, Oliger (24 May 2011). The Leader: Psychological Essays. Springer Science & Business Media. ISBN 978-1-4419-8387-9.
13. ^ Johnson, David. "Osama bin Laden". infoplease. Archived from the original on 20 January 2008. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
14. ^ a b c Coll, Steve (12 December 2005). "Letter From Jedda: Young Osama- How he learned radicalism, and may have seen America". The New Yorker. Archived from the original on 17 January 2010. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
15. ^ Scheuer 2011.
16. ^ "Osama bin Laden Part 01 of 03". Federal Bureau of Investigation. Archived from the original on 3 November 2016. Retrieved 10 December 2021.
17. ^ "The Mysterious Death of Osama bin Laden". 3 August 2011. Archived from the original on 25 April 2012. Retrieved 4 November 2011.
18. ^ "Osama bin Laden Archived 20 May 2011 at the Wayback Machine", The Economist, 5 May 2011, p. 93.
19. ^ Beyer, Lisa (24 September 2001). "The Most Wanted Man in the World". Time. Archived from the original on 16 September 2001. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
20. ^ Bergen 2006, p. 52
21. ^ "Bin Laden's Oxford days". BBC News. 12 October 2001. Archived from the original on 4 September 2017. in, Burke, Jason; Kareem, Shaheen (November 2017). "This article is more than 2 years old Bin Laden's disdain for the west grew in Shakespeare's birthplace, journal shows". The Guardian 1 November 2017 20.50 GMT. Guardian News & Media Limited. Archived from the original on 2 November 2017. Retrieved 9 March 2020.
22. ^ Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden, Verso, 2005, p. xii.
23. ^ Encyclopedia of World Biography Supplement, vol. 22, Gale Group, 2002, archived from the original on 18 May 2008
24. ^ "A Biography of Osama bin Laden". PBS Frontline. Archived from the original on 29 March 2010. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
25. ^ Hug, Aziz (19 January 2006). "The Real Osama". The American Prospect. Archived from the original on 30 April 2008. Retrieved 6 January 2012.
26. ^ Gunaratna, Rohan (2003). Inside Al Qaeda (3rd ed.). Berkley Books. p. 22. ISBN 0-231-12692-1.
27. ^ Wright 2006, p. 79.
28. ^ Hirst, Michael (24 September 2008). "Analysing Osama's jihadi poetry". BBC News. Archived from the original on 30 September 2009. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
29. ^ "Osama bin Laden's bodyguard: I had orders to kill him if the Americans tried to take him alive". Daily Mirror. 4 May 2011. Archived from the original on 10 June 2012. Retrieved 20 April 2012.
30. ^ Klausen, Jytte (2021). Western Jihadism: A Thirty Year History (1st ed.). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. pp. 44, 45. ISBN 978-0-19-887079-1.
31. ^ Slackman, Michael (13 November 2001). "Osama Kin Wait and Worry". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 26 September 2009. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
32. ^ Najwa bin Laden, Omar bin Laden, Jean Sasson. Growing Up Bin Laden: Osama's Wife and Son Take Us Inside Their Secret World. p. 414.`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
33. ^ Todd, Brian; Lister, Tim (5 May 2011). "Bin Laden's wives – and daughter who would 'kill enemies of Islam'". CNN Edition: International. Archived from the original on 6 May 2011. Retrieved 5 May 2011.
34. ^ The 24 children are listed accurately in Peter L. Bergen, The Rise and Fall of Osama bin Laden, New York: Simon and Schuster, 2021, pp. x-xi, the first 20 of them are listed in Najwa bin Laden, Omar bin Laden and Jean Sasson, Growing Up Bin Laden: Osama’s Wife and Son Take Us Inside Their Secret World, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2010, pp. 294-300, and 19 of them are also detailed in various places in Cathy Scott-Clark & Adrian Levy, The Exile: The Stunning Inside Story of Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda in Flight, New York: Bloomsbury, 2017, as can be seen in the index on pp. 601-604, including the four missing from the Sasson book.
35. ^ "Osama bin Laden's family 'stranded' in Iran, son says". The Daily Telegraph. 19 July 2010. Archived from the original on 12 March 2011.
36. ^ Al-Bahri, Nasser (June 2013). Guarding Bin Laden: My Life in al-Qaeda. London: Thin Man Press. pp. 150–160\. ISBN 978-0-9562473-6-0.
37. ^ "Blood Brothers: Could Osama Have Been Tamed?". ABC News. Archived from the original on 1 January 2016.
38. ^ "Interview with US Author Steve Coll: 'Osama bin Laden is Planning Something for the US Election'". Der Spiegel. 2 April 2008. Archived from the original on 13 February 2011. Retrieved 26 January 2011.
39. ^ "Best of the Web: Osama's Brother Died in San Antonio, Red Velvet Onion Rings-WOAI: San Antonio News". 13 January 2012. Archived from the original on 13 January 2012.
40. ^ "Osama bin Laden". www.fbi.gov. Retrieved 31 March 2024.
41. ^ Wright 2006, p. 83.
42. ^ Schmidle, Nicholas (1 August 2011). "Getting Bin Laden". The New Yorker. Archived from the original on 25 August 2019. Retrieved 14 September 2021.
43. ^ "Most Wanted Terrorist – Usama bin Laden". FBI. Archived from the original on 10 March 2006. Retrieved 8 June 2006.
44. ^ "I met Osama bin Laden". BBC News. 26 March 2004. Archived from the original on 16 March 2006. Retrieved 15 May 2006.
45. ^ Scheuer, Michael (2004). Imperial Hubris. Dulles, Virginia: Brassey's, Inc. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-9655139-4-4. "The focused and lethal threat posed to U.S. national security arises not from Muslims being offended by what America is, but rather from their plausible perception that the things they most love and value—God, Islam, their brethren, and Muslim lands—are being attacked by America."
46. ^ Scheuer, Michael (2004). Imperial Hubris. Dulles, Virginia: Brassey's, Inc. p. 256. ISBN 978-0-9655139-4-4. "Because Muslim leaders—with bin Laden in the van—repeatedly have told us that they hate Americans for what we do and not for what we think, look like, talk about..."
47. ^ a b c "6 October 2002. Appeared in Al-Qala'a website and then The Observer and The Guardian on 24 November 2002". TheGuardian.com. 24 November 2002. Archived from the original on 26 August 2013.
48. ^ Messages, 2005, p. 218. "Resist the New Rome", audiotape delivered to al-Jazeera and broadcast by it on 4 January 2004.
49. ^ Halverson, Jeffry R. (2010). Theology and Creed in Sunni Islam: The Muslim Brotherhood, Ash'arism, and Political Sunnism. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 80\. ISBN 978-0-230-10658-1. Archived from the original on 1 January 2016. "It was there that he met the Athari-Wahhabite militant Osama bin Laden ..."
50. ^ Eikmeier, Dale C. (Spring 2007). "Qutbism: An Ideology of Islamic-Fascism". Parameters: 85–98\. Archived from the original on 9 June 2007. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
51. ^ Messages, (2005), p. 143. from an interview published in Al-Quds Al-Arabi in London, 12 November 2001 (originally published in Pakistani daily, Ausaf, 7 Nov.)
52. ^ Messages to the World, (2005), pp. xix–xx, editor Bruce Lawrence.
53. ^ "Full text: bin Laden's 'letter to America'". The Guardian. 24 November 2002. Archived from the original on 8 October 2014. Retrieved 7 January 2019.`{{cite news}}`: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
54. ^ "Full text: bin Laden's 'letter to America'". Archived from the original on 14 October 2023.
55. ^ Randal, John (2005). Osama: The Making of a Terrorist. I B Tauris & Co Ltd.
56. ^ A Capitol Idea Donald E. Abelson p. 208.
57. ^ Goodnough, Abby (8 July 2007). "Mysteries, Legal and Sartorial, at Padilla Trial". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 5 November 2013. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
58. ^ Gordon, Michael R. (17 September 2001). "After the attacks: the strategy; A New War And Its Scale". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 1 December 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
59. ^ "Is global terror threat falling?". BBC News. 21 May 2008. Archived from the original on 16 February 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
60. ^ ""Osama bin Laden's operation" has "perpetrated the worst act of terrorism ever witnessed on U.S. soil". Al Jazeera. 17 August 2008. Archived from the original on 5 June 2011. Retrieved 11 February 2011.
61. ^ Bergen 2006
62. ^ Scheuer 2002
63. ^ Sageman, Marc (2008). Leaderless Jihad: Terror Networks in the Twenty-First Century. University of Pennsylvania Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctt3fhbht. ISBN 978-0-8122-4065-8. JSTOR j.ctt3fhbht.
64. ^ Hoffman, Bruce (Spring 2004). "Redefining Counterterrorism: The Terrorist Leader as CEO". RAND Review. Archived from the original on 28 May 2004.
65. ^ A Devil's Triangle: Terrorism, Weapons Of Mass Destruction, And Rogue States Peter Brookes Rowman & Littlefield, 2005.
66. ^ a b "Wanted: bin Laden, Usama". Interpol. Archived from the original on 3 March 2008. Retrieved 3 September 2011.
67. ^ Bin Laden, Osama (2005). "Declaration of Jihad". In Lawrence, Bruce (ed.). Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden. 6 Meard Street, London W1F OEG: Verso. pp. 70, 119. ISBN 1-84467-045-7.`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: location (link)
68. ^ Feldman, Noah (12 February 2006). "Becoming Bin Laden". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 14 September 2019. Retrieved 12 June 2019.
69. ^ Bin Laden, Osama (2005). "Declaration of Jihad". In Lawrence, Bruce (ed.). Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden. 6 Meard Street, London W1F OEG: Verso. p. 140\. ISBN 1-84467-045-7.`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: location (link)
70. ^ "Bin Laden: Goal is to bankrupt U.S." CNN. 2 November 2004. Archived from the original on 5 March 2016.
71. ^ "Full transcript of bin Ladin's speech". Al Jazeera. 1 November 2004. Archived from the original on 16 November 2008. Retrieved 16 November 2008.
72. ^ Messages to the World, Statements of Osama bin Laden, Verso, 2005, p. 168
73. ^ Shirazi, S (31 March 2006). "Listening to Bin Laden". printculture.com. Archived from the original on 22 November 2006. Retrieved 29 March 2018.
74. ^ Rodenbeck, Max (9 March 2006). "Their Master's Voice, [a review of Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden]". The New York Review of Books. Archived from the original on 2 December 2020. Retrieved 29 March 2018.
75. ^ "Conversation With Terror". Time. January 1999. Archived from the original on 5 February 2016. Retrieved 22 March 2015.
76. ^ a b c "frontline: the terrorist and the superpower: who is bin laden?: interview with osama bin laden (in may 1998)". pbs.org. Archived from the original on 8 May 1999.
77. ^ Messages, (2005), p. 190. from a 53-minute audiotape that "was circulated on various websites" dated 14 February 2003. "Among a Band of Knights"
78. ^ Wright 2006, p. 303 "From interview with Ali Soufan – a Lebanese Sunni FBI agent"
79. ^ Wright 2006, p. 167
80. ^ Wright 2006, p. 172
81. ^ Landay, Jonathan (1 March 2016). "Bin Laden called for Americans to rise up over climate change". Reuters. Archived from the original on 3 April 2016. Retrieved 3 April 2016.
82. ^ Chasmar, Jessica (2 March 2016). "Osama bin Laden called for Americans to help Obama fight climate change". The Washington Times. Archived from the original on 3 April 2016. Retrieved 3 April 2016.
83. ^ "Who is Osama bin Laden?". BBC News. 18 September 2001. Archived from the original on 24 December 2008. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
84. ^ Interview with Robert Fisk, 22 March 1997, The Great War For Civilisation, 2005, p. 7.
85. ^ Coll, Steve (2004). Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to 10 September 2001. Penguin Group. pp. 144–145, 238. ISBN 978-1-59420-007-6.
86. ^ Burke, Jason (11 May 2011). "The 10 key myths about Osama bin Laden". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 28 December 2019. Retrieved 10 October 2020.
87. ^ Hiro, Dilip (28 January 1999). "The Cost of an Afghan 'Victory'". The Nation. Archived from the original on 2 March 2014.
88. ^ Bergen, Peter L. (2021). The Rise and Fall of Osama bin Laden: The Biography. Simon & Schuster. p. 43\. ISBN 9781982170530. Archived from the original on 18 May 2023. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
89. ^ Coll, Steve (2004). Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to 10 September 2001. Penguin Group. pp. 72, 87–88\. ISBN 978-1-59420-007-6.
90. ^ Interview with FBI special agent Jack Cloonan Archived 21 March 2012 at the Wayback Machine, Frontline, PBS, 18 October 2005.
91. ^ Wright 2006, p. 145 "Lawrence Wright estimates his share of the Saudi Binladin Group circa fall 1989 as amounted to 27 million Saudi riyals – a little more than [US]$7 million."
92. ^ a b c Bergen 2006, pp. 49–51
93. ^ a b c Fisk, Robert (2005). The Great War for Civilisation. p. 4.
94. ^ Hunzai, Izhar. "Conflict Dynamics in Gilgit-Baltistan" (PDF). United States Institute of Peace. Archived (PDF) from the original on 9 May 2017. Retrieved 5 July 2017. "In 1988, a rumor alleging a Sunni massacre at the hands of Shias resulted in an attack by thousands of armed tribesmen from the south, the killing of nearly four hundred Shias"
95. ^ Murphy, Eamon (2013). The Making of Terrorism in Pakistan: Historical and Social Roots of Extremism. Routledge. p. 134\. ISBN 978-0-415-56526-4. Archived from the original on 3 October 2017. "Shias in the district of Gilgit were assaulted, killed and raped by an invading Sunni lashkar-armed militia-comprising thousands of jihadis from the North West Frontier Province."
96. ^ "B Raman, one of RAW founders, passes away". The Indian Express. 17 June 2013. Archived from the original on 2 August 2017. Retrieved 5 July 2017.
97. ^ Raman, B (7 October 2003). "The Shia Anger". Outlook. Archived from the original on 1 January 2017. Retrieved 31 December 2016. "Because they have not forgotten what happened in 1988. Faced with a revolt by the Shias of the Northern Areas (Gilgit and Baltistan) of Jammu & Kashmir (J&K), under occupation by the Pakistan Army, for a separate Shia State called the Karakoram State, the Pakistan Army transported Osama bin Laden's tribal hordes into Gilgit and let them loose on the Shias. They went around massacring hundreds of Shias – innocent men, women, and children."
98. ^ Raman, B (26 February 2003). "The Karachi Attack: The Kashmir Link". Rediiff News. Archived from the original on 10 May 2017. Retrieved 31 December 2016. "A revolt by the Shias of Gilgit was ruthlessly suppressed by the Zia-ul Haq regime in 1988, killing hundreds of Shias. An armed group of tribals from Afghanistan and the North-West Frontier Province, led by Osama bin Laden, was inducted by the Pakistan Army into Gilgit and adjoining areas to suppress the revolt."
99. ^ United States v. Usama bin Laden et al., S (7) 98 Cr. 1023, Testimony of Jamal Ahmed Mohamed al-Fadl (SDNY 6 February 2001), archived from the original.
100. ^ Bergen 2006, pp. 74–88
101. ^ Wright 2006, pp. 133–134.
102. ^ Wright 2006, p. 260.
103. ^ Asthana, N. C (1 January 2009). Urban Terrorism : Myths And Realities. Pointer Publishers. p. 108\. ISBN 978-81-7132-598-6. Archived from the original on 2 December 2020. Retrieved 18 November 2020.
104. ^ Hegghammer, Thomas (2020). The Caravan: Abdallah Azzam and the Rise of Global Jihad. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 352–354\. doi:10.1017/9781139049375. ISBN 978-0-521-76595-4.
105. ^ Hamid, Mustafa; Farrall, Leah (2015). The Arabs at War in Afghanistan. London: Hurst & Company. pp. 108–111\. ISBN 978-1-84904-420-2.
106. ^ a b c d e "Who is Bin Laden?: Chronology". PBS. Archived from the original on 14 April 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
107. ^ Wright 2006, pp. 146
108. ^ Wright 2006, pp. 173–176
109. ^ Fleiss, Alex (5 April 2022). "What happened in the battle of Jalalabad?". Rebellion Research. Archived from the original on 26 June 2023. Retrieved 28 June 2023.
110. ^ a b Coll, Steve (2004). Ghost wars : the secret history of the CIA, Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet invasion to 10 September 2001. New York: Penguin Press. ISBN 1-59420-007-6. OCLC 52814066. Archived from the original on 11 August 2021. Retrieved 2 July 2021.
111. ^ a b Roy Gutman (2008). How we missed the story. Internet Archive. US Inst Peace Pr. ISBN 978-1-60127-024-5.
112. ^ Wright 2006, p. 178–179.
113. ^ Jehl, Douglas (27 December 2001). "A Nation Challenged: Holy war lured Saudis as rulers looked Away". The New York Times. pp. A1, B4. Archived from the original on 18 November 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
114. ^ Jehl, Douglas (27 December 2001). "A Nation Challenged: Saudi Arabia; Holy War Lured Saudis As Rulers Looked Away". The New York Times. p. 1. Retrieved 21 November 2024.
115. ^ Wright 2006, p. 180
116. ^ Murdico, Suzanne J. (2004). Osama bin Laden. New York, NY : Rosen Pub. Group. p. 32\. ISBN 978-0-8239-4467-5.
117. ^ "USA v. Omar Ahmad Ali Abdel-Rahman et al: 93-CR-181-KTD". MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base. Archived from the original on 9 January 2008. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
118. ^ a b "Timeline: Osama bin Laden, over the years". CNN. 2011. Archived from the original on 17 July 2011. Retrieved 17 October 2019.
119. ^ Emerson, Steve. "Abdullah Assam: The Man Before Osama bin Laden". International Association of Counterterrorism & Security Professionals. Archived from the original on 18 February 2007. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
120. ^ Soufan, Ali. The Black Banners: The Inside Story of 9/11 and the War Against al-Qaeda. W.W. Norton and Company. New York and London: 2011.Page 325
121. ^ Gutman (2008), p. 37.
122. ^ a b Coll, Steve, "Ghost Wars," (Penguin Books, 2004)
123. ^ Reeve, Simon (27 June 2002). The new jackals: Ramzi Yousef, Osama bin Laden and the future of terrorism. UPNE. p. 172\. ISBN 978-1-55553-509-4. Archived from the original on 29 May 2013. Retrieved 7 May 2011.
124. ^ Shay, Shaul; Liberman, Rachel (13 October 2006). The Red Sea terror triangle: Sudan, Somalia, Yemen, and Islamic terror. Transaction Publishers. p. 43\. ISBN 978-1-4128-0620-6. Archived from the original on 29 May 2013. Retrieved 7 May 2011.
125. ^ Fisk, Robert (6 December 1993). "Anti-Soviet warrior puts his army on the road to peace: The Saudi businessman who recruited mujahedin now uses them for large-scale building projects in Sudan. Robert Fisk met him in Almatig". The Independent. Archived from the original on 2 September 2022. Retrieved 7 December 2024.
126. ^ a b c Rose, David (January 2002). "The Osama Files". Vanity Fair. Archived from the original on 8 October 2014.
127. ^ Gallab, Abdullahi A. (2008). The first Islamist republic: development and disintegration of Islamism in Sudan. Ashgate Publishing, Ltd. p. 127\. ISBN 978-0-7546-7162-6. Archived from the original on 27 July 2013. Retrieved 7 May 2011.
128. ^ Fisk, Robert (2005). The Great War for Civilisation. p. 5.
129. ^ Ackman, Dan (14 September 2001). "The Cost Of Being Osama bin Laden". Forbes. Archived from the original on 29 July 2017. Retrieved 15 March 2011.
130. ^ Wright 2006, p. 195
131. ^ testimony of Jamal al-Fadl, US v. Usama bin Laden, et al.
132. ^ Hunting the Jackal: A Special Forces and CIA Soldier's Fifty Years on the Frontlines of the War Against Terrorism, 2004.
133. ^ "Responses to Al Qaeda's Initial Assaults" (PDF). 9/11 Commission. Archived (PDF) from the original on 15 October 2009. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
134. ^ Jacobsen, Annie (2019). Surprise, Kill, Vanish: The Secret History of CIA Paramilitary Armies, Operators, and Assassins. New York: Little, Brown and Company. pp. 281–288.
135. ^ Stack, Megan K. (6 December 2001). "Fighters Hunt Former Ally". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 19 September 2009. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
136. ^ "Profile: Mullah Mohamed Omar". BBC News. 18 September 2001. Archived from the original on 28 July 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
137. ^ "The Foundation of the New Terrorism" (PDF). 9/11 Commission. Archived (PDF) from the original on 27 August 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
138. ^ Wright 2006, p. 222
139. ^ Stern 2003, p. 253
140. ^ Bergen 2008, p. 14.
141. ^ a b Fisk, Robert (2005). The Great War for Civilisation. p. 22.
142. ^ "Bin Laden's Fatwa". PBS. August 1996. Archived from the original on 31 October 2001. Retrieved 25 June 2011.
143. ^ a b "Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders: World Islamic Front Statement". FAS Intelligence Resource Program. Archived from the original on 4 December 2021.
144. ^ Bruce Lawrence, ed. (2005). Messages to the World: The Statements of Osama bin Laden. 6 Meard Street, London W1F OEG: Verso. pp. 60, 61. ISBN 1-84467-045-7.`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: location (link)
145. ^ Van Atta, Dale (1998). "Carbombs & cameras: the need for responsible media coverage of terrorism". Harvard International Review. 20 (4). Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard International Relations Council: 66. ISBN 978-0-89526-485-5. ISSN 0739-1854. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
146. ^ Shaykh Usamah Bin-Muhammad Bin-Ladin; al-Zawahiri, Ayman; Abu-Yasir Rifa'i Ahmad Taha; Shaykh Mir Hamzah; Rahman, Fazlur (23 February 1998). "World Islamic Front for Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders: Initial "Fatwa" Statement". al-Quds al-Arabi (in Arabic). Archived from the original on 26 June 2016. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
147. ^ Shaykh Usamah Bin-Muhammad Bin-Ladin; al-Zawahiri, Ayman; Abu-Yasir Rifa'i Ahmad Taha; Shaykh Mir Hamzah; Rahman, Fazlur (23 February 1998). "Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders. World Islamic Front Statement". al-Quds al-Arabi. Archived from the original on 21 April 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010. English-language version of the fatwa translated by the Federation of American Scientists of the original Arabic document published in the newspaper al-Quds al-Arabi (London, UK) on 1998-02-23, p. 3 Archived 26 June 2016 at the Wayback Machine.
148. ^ Wright 2006, p. 250
149. ^ Stephen Braun; Judy Pasternak "Long Before Sept. 11, Bin Laden Aircraft Flew Under the Radar", Los Angeles Times. 18 November 2001.
150. ^ Merchant of Death: Money, Guns, Planes, and the Man Who Makes War Possible (2007), pp. 138–140
151. ^ Jailan Halawi, "Bin Laden behind Luxor Massacre?", Al-Ahram Weekly, 20–26 May 1999.
152. ^ Plett, Barbara (13 May 1999). "Bin Laden 'behind Luxor massacre'". BBC News. Archived from the original on 21 November 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
153. ^ "Profile: Ayman al-Zawahiri". BBC News. 27 September 2004. Archived from the original on 19 August 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
154. ^ Testimony of Abdurahman Khadr as a witness in the trial against Charkaoui, 13 July 2004.
155. ^ Rashid, Taliban, p. 139.
156. ^ Elbaz, Michel (18 July 2005). "Russian Secret Services' Links With Al-Qaeda". Axis Globe. Archived from the original on 3 July 2010.
157. ^ a b c "1998 US Embassies in Africa Bombings Fast Facts". CNN. 2013. Archived from the original on 24 October 2019. Retrieved 17 October 2019.
158. ^ "Bin Ladin Preparing to Hijack U.S. Aircraft and Other Attacks". Director of Central Intelligence. 4 December 1998. Archived from the original on 22 May 2010. Retrieved 3 March 2016.
159. ^ "Timeline: Al Qaeda's Global Context". PBS. 3 October 2002. Archived from the original on 9 August 2016. Retrieved 20 October 2019.
160. ^ "FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives". FBI.gov. Archived from the original on 3 January 2008. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
161. ^ Eggen, Dan (28 August 2006). "Bin Laden, Most Wanted For Embassy Bombings?". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 15 January 2010. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
162. ^ "'Most wanted terrorists' list released". CNN. 10 October 2001. Archived from the original on 10 April 2005. Retrieved 2 March 2018.
163. ^ "Resolution 1267 (1999)". unscr.org. UN Security Council. 15 October 1999. Archived from the original on 1 July 2022.
164. ^ a b Loeb, Vernon (24 December 2000). "Terrorists Plotted Jan. 2000 Attacks". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 21 May 2018. Retrieved 6 January 2012.
165. ^ Pyes, Craig; Meyer, Josh; Rempel, William C. (15 October 2001). "Bosnia – base for terrorism". The Seattle Times. Archived from the original on 19 November 2011. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
166. ^ Smith, R. Jeffrey (11 March 2000). "A Bosnian Village's Terrorist Ties". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 25 July 2012. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
167. ^ Canadian Security Intelligence Service, Summary of the Security Intelligence Report concerning Hassan Almrei, 22 February 2008.
168. ^ Baravalle, Giorgio (2004). Rethink: Cause and Consequences of September 11. de-MO. p. 584\. ISBN 0-9705768-6-2.
169. ^ Gossett, Sherrie (17 August 2005). "Jihadists find convenient base in Bosnia". Assyrian International News Agency. Archived from the original on 17 December 2005. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
170. ^ a b "Bin Laden was granted Bosnian passport", Agence France-Presse, 24 September 1999.
171. ^ a b Hedges, Chris (23 September 1996). "Outsiders Bring Islamic Fervor To the Balkans". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 5 July 2011. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
172. ^ "Bin Laden, Albania Link Reported". Associated Press. Archived from the original on 9 October 2018. Retrieved 8 October 2018.
173. ^ Mayer, Jane (2008). The Dark Side. Doubleday. p. 114\. ISBN 978-0-385-52639-5. (0-385-52639-3)
174. ^ Bodansky, Yossef (4 May 2011). Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America. Crown Publishing Group. pp. 398–403\. ISBN 978-0-307-79772-8. Archived from the original on 19 October 2017. Retrieved 26 October 2018.
175. ^ Roche, Andrew (15 February 2002). "Milosevic: U.S. was Ally of Al Qaeda in Kosovo". Reuters. Archived from the original on 20 February 2002 – via FindLaw.
176. ^ Scahill, Jeremy (13 March 2006). "Rest Easy, Bill Clinton: Milosevic Can't Talk Anymore". Huffington Post. Archived from the original on 2 December 2020. Retrieved 19 June 2020.
177. ^ "Al-Qaeda 'helped Kosovo rebels'". BBC News. 8 March 2002. Archived from the original on 9 August 2016. Retrieved 19 June 2020.
178. ^ "US backed Al Qaeda in Kosovo: Milosevic: Chinese embassy bombing termed deliberate". Dawn. 16 February 2002. Archived from the original on 24 July 2020. Retrieved 19 June 2020.
179. ^ Flade, Florian (2 May 2011). "The Untold Story of Gaddafi's Hunt For Osama bin Laden". Die Welt/Worldcrunch. Archived from the original on 22 November 2011. Retrieved 3 September 2011.
180. ^ Salama, Sammy (September 2004). "Was Libyan WMD Disarmament a Significant Success for Nonproliferation?". NTI. Archived from the original on 2 June 2011. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
181. ^ Interpol Arrest Warrant File No. 1998/20232, Control No. A-268/5-1998. Brisard Jean-Charles, Dasquie Guillaume. "Forbidden Truth". (New York: Thunder Mouth Press, 2002), p. 156.
182. ^ Frontline; The New York Times; Rain Media (c. 2001). "Osama bin Laden: A Chronology of His Political Life". Hunting Bin Laden: Who Is Bin Laden?. Frontline. WGBH Educational Foundation. Archived from the original on 17 July 2006. Retrieved 25 July 2006.
183. ^ "Bill Clinton: I got closer to killing Bin Laden". CNN. 25 September 2006. Archived from the original on 5 October 2006. Retrieved 27 May 2010.
184. ^ a b "Report: Clinton Targeted Bin Laden". CBS News. 16 September 2001. Archived from the original on 8 May 2011.
185. ^ a b Woodward, Bob; Ricks, Thomas E. (3 October 2001). "CIA Trained Pakistanis to Nab Terrorist But Military Coup Put an End to 1999 Plot". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 28 August 2016.
186. ^ "Indictment #S(9) 98 Cr. 1023" (PDF). U.S. Department of Justice. Archived (PDF) from the original on 26 February 2017. Retrieved 6 February 2023.
187. ^ "Embassy bombing defendant linked to Bin Laden". CNN. 14 February 2001. Archived from the original on 26 December 2007.
188. ^ "Profile: Osama bin Laden". Cooperative Research. Archived from the original on 29 December 2010. Retrieved 16 December 2018.
189. ^ "Osama bin Laden 'innocent'". BBC News. 21 November 1998. Archived from the original on 23 December 2011.
190. ^ Reeve, William (21 November 1998). "Osama bin Laden 'innocent'". BBC News. Archived from the original on 14 January 2010. Retrieved 27 May 2010.
191. ^ "Security Council demands that Taliban turn over Osama bin Laden to appropriate authorities". United Nations. 15 October 1999. Archived from the original on 16 August 2013.
192. ^ "God knows it did not cross our minds to attack the towers". The Guardian. 30 October 2004. Archived from the original on 28 August 2013. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
193. ^ "What the CIA knew before 9/11: New details". POLITICO. 13 November 2015. Retrieved 8 September 2024.
194. ^ "September 11 attacks | History, Summary, Location, Timeline, Casualties, & Facts | Britannica". www.britannica.com. 6 September 2024. Retrieved 8 September 2024.
195. ^ "Piece by piece, the jigsaw of terror revealed". The Independent. 15 September 2007. Archived from the original on 15 September 2007. Retrieved 8 September 2024.
196. ^ "A NATION CHALLENGED: GERMAN INTELLIGENCE; German Data Led U.S. to Search For More Suicide Hijacker Teams". The New York Times. 29 September 2001. Retrieved 8 September 2024.
197. ^ "America's Chaotic Road to War (washingtonpost.com)". The Washington Post. 27 April 2011. Archived from the original on 27 April 2011. Retrieved 8 September 2024.
198. ^ "President Freezes Terrorists' Assets". The White House. 24 September 2001. Archived from the original on 30 October 2011. Retrieved 26 June 2011.
199. ^ Watson, Dale L., Executive Assistant Director, Counter terrorism/Counterintelligence Division, FBI (6 February 2002). "FBI Testimony about 9/11 terrorists' motives". Federal Bureau of Investigation – (RepresentativePress). Archived from the original on 5 May 2011. Retrieved 11 February 2011.`{{cite web}}`: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
200. ^ "Responsibility for the Terrorist Atrocities in the United States, September 11, 2001". 10 Downing Street, Office of the Prime Minister of the UK. 15 May 2003. Archived from the original on 11 May 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
201. ^ Cameron, Carl; Lehner, Marla; Wagenseil, Paul (16 September 2001). "Pakistan to Demand Taliban Give Up Bin Laden as Iran Seals Afghan Border". Fox News Channel. Associated Press. Archived from the original on 23 May 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
202. ^ "Bin Laden on tape: Attacks 'benefited Islam greatly'". CNN. 14 December 2001. Archived from the original on 14 December 2013. Retrieved 17 September 2013.
203. ^ Restle, Georg; Sieker, Ekkehard (20 December 2001). "Bin-Laden-Video: Falschübersetzung als Beweismittel?". Monitor (in German). Westdeutscher Rundfunk. Archived from the original on 17 February 2003. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
204. ^ a b "Bin Laden claims responsibility for 9/11". CBC News. 29 October 2004. Archived from the original on 25 October 2006. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
205. ^ "Al-Jazeera: Bin Laden tape obtained in Pakistan". NBC News. 30 October 2004. Archived from the original on 15 April 2016. Retrieved 28 May 2010.—"In the tape, Bin Laden—wearing traditional white robes, a turban and a tan cloak—reads from papers at a lectern against a plain brown background. Speaking quietly in an even voice, he tells the American people that he ordered the September 11 attacks because 'we are a free people' who wanted to 'regain the freedom' of their nation."
206. ^ "Excerpts: Bin Laden video". BBC News. 29 October 2004. Archived from the original on 6 October 2010. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
207. ^ "Osama bin Laden tape transcript". NBC News. 23 May 2006. Archived from the original on 13 December 2013. Retrieved 11 February 2011.
208. ^ "Bin Laden 9/11 planning video aired". CBC News. 7 September 2006. Archived from the original on 13 October 2007. Retrieved 28 May 2010.
209. ^ Miller, Greg (14 July 2009). "CIA's secret program: paramilitary teams to strike Al Qaeda". Los Angeles Times. p. A1. Archived from the original on 5 February 2016. Retrieved 19 June 2020.
210. ^ "Most Wanted Terrorist – Usama Bin Laden". FBI. Archived from the original on 10 March 2006. Retrieved 26 May 2010.
211. ^ "Five Years Ago Today – Usama Bin Laden: Wanted for Murder". Federal Bureau of Investigation. 5 November 2003. Archived from the original on 9 January 2008. Retrieved 27 May 2010.
212. ^ "Senate doubles Bin Laden reward". BBC News. 13 July 2007. Archived from the original on 8 August 2010. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
213. ^ Katie Turner; Pam Benson; Peter Bergen; Elise Labott; Nic Robertson (24 September 2006). "Officials, friends can't confirm Bin Laden death report". CNN. Archived from the original on 26 March 2010. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
214. ^ "2001, President George W. Bush 'Bin Laden, Wanted dead or alive'". CNN. 2 May 2011. Archived from the original on 22 July 2013. Retrieved 7 January 2012.
215. ^ "Bush rejects Taliban offer to hand Bin Laden over". The Guardian. 14 October 2001. Archived from the original on 25 August 2013. Retrieved 27 May 2010.
216. ^ "Tora Bora Revisited: How We Failed to Get Bin Laden and Why It Matters Today". Archived from the original on 20 November 2022. Retrieved 24 July 2021.
217. ^ "As the Search for Bin Laden Intensifies, U.S. Moves Hunt to Spin Ghar Range". Wall Street Journal. 29 November 2001. Archived from the original on 24 July 2021. Retrieved 24 July 2021.
218. ^ Gellman, Barton; Ricks, Thomas E. (17 April 2002). "U.S. Concludes Bin Laden Escaped at Tora Bora Fight". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 16 May 2008. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
219. ^ DeYoung, Karen (2 October 2006). "Letter Gives Glimpse of Al-Qaeda's Leadership". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 25 April 2010. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
220. ^ "Letter Exposes New Leader in Al-Qa'ida High Command (PDF)" (PDF). Combating Terrorism Center at West Point. 25 September 2006. Archived from the original (PDF) on 8 August 2007. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
221. ^ "CIA Reportedly Disbands Bin Laden Unit". The Washington Post. Associated Press. 4 July 2006. Archived from the original on 12 November 2012. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
222. ^ Justin Balding; Adam Ciralsky; Jim Miklaszewski; Robert Windrem (26 September 2007). "Bin Laden may have just escaped U.S. forces". NBC News. Archived from the original on 11 October 2013. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
223. ^ "Experts warn of attack clues in Bin Laden video". Agence France-Presse. 6 September 2007. Archived from the original on 8 April 2008. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
224. ^ "Bin Laden urges Europe to quit Afghanistan". Reuters. 29 November 2007. Archived from the original on 12 January 2009.
225. ^ a b Arena, Kelli (28 December 2001). "Obama administration to ratchet up hunt for Bin Laden". CNN. Archived from the original on 19 January 2013. Retrieved 15 November 2008.
226. ^ Serwer, Adam (7 February 2011). "No, killing of Bin Laden does not represent 'continuity' with Bush – The Plum Line". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 12 May 2011. Retrieved 15 May 2011.
227. ^ Hirsh, Michael (5 May 2011). "Obama's War". National Journal. Archived from the original on 7 May 2011. Retrieved 15 May 2011.
228. ^ Gillespie, Thomas W.; et al. (2009). "Finding Osama bin Laden: An Application of Biogeographic Theories and Satellite Imagery" (PDF). MIT International Review. Archived (PDF) from the original on 5 August 2010. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
229. ^ Meek, James Gordon, "Tighten The Net on Evil", Daily News, 2009-03-15, p. 27.
230. ^ "Bin Laden not in Pakistan, PM says". CNN. 3 December 2009. Archived from the original on 6 December 2009. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
231. ^ a b "No Bin Laden information in years, says Gates". BBC News. 6 December 2009. Archived from the original on 6 December 2009. Retrieved 20 May 2010.
232. ^ a b "Gen McChrystal: Bin Laden is key to al-Qaeda defeat". BBC News. 9 December 2009. Archived from the original on 28 April 2010. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
233. ^ "Gen McChrystal: Bin Laden is key to al-Qaeda defeat". BBC News. 9 December 2009. Archived from the original on 23 July 2012. Retrieved 21 October 2011.
234. ^ Saletan, William (4 May 2012). "Reflections of a Terrorist". Slate. Archived from the original on 6 May 2012.
235. ^ "Saudi Arabia Wants Taliban to Expel Bin Laden". Associated Press. 2 February 2010. Archived from the original on 14 February 2021. Retrieved 11 February 2011.
236. ^ "Kuwaiti Daily 'Al-Siyassa': Bin Laden, Al-Zawahiri Guarded by Iranian Troops in Iranian Territory". Memrijttm.org. 7 June 2010. Archived from the original on 13 June 2010. Retrieved 26 January 2011.
237. ^ "Bin Laden, aides 'hiding in Iran'". The Australian. 9 June 2010.
238. ^ Crilly, Rob (18 October 2010). "Osama bin Laden 'living comfortably in Pakistan'". The Daily Telegraph. London. Archived from the original on 20 October 2010.
239. ^ Zengerle, Patricia; Bull, Alister (2 May 2011). "Bin Laden was found at luxurious Pakistan compound". Reuters. Archived from the original on 3 May 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2011.
240. ^ Osama bin Laden death: Pakistan locals flock to see villain's lair Archived 27 September 2016 at the Wayback Machine Declan Walsh The Guardian 5 May 2011
241. ^ "Map of Where Osama bin Laden Was Killed – Map". The New York Times. 2 May 2011. Archived from the original on 5 May 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2011.
242. ^ "Osama bin Laden's death: How it happened". BBC News. 7 June 2011. Archived from the original on 3 May 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2011.
243. ^ "Osama bin Laden, the face of terror, killed in Pakistan". CNN. 2 May 2011. Archived from the original on 6 May 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2011.
244. ^ "Spitzer: What role did Pakistan play in the killing of Osama bin Laden? – In the Arena". CNN. 2 May 2011. Archived from the original on 5 May 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2011.
245. ^ "President Obama Praises Troops Who Killed Osama bin Laden". ABC news. Archived from the original on 4 May 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2011.
246. ^ "Finding Osama bin Laden's Abbottabad mansion with Google Earth". 2 May 2011. Archived from the original on 7 November 2012. Retrieved 31 October 2012.
247. ^ "FBI – USAMA BIN LADEN". 25 September 2012. Archived from the original on 25 September 2012.
248. ^ Savage, Charlie (28 October 2015). "How 4 Federal Lawyers Paved the Way to Kill Osama bin Laden". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Archived from the original on 8 November 2020. Retrieved 23 April 2021.
249. ^ Miller, Greg (5 May 2011). "CIA spied on Bin Laden from safe house". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 10 May 2011. Retrieved 6 May 2011.
250. ^ Cooper, Helene (1 May 2011). "Obama Announces Killing of Osama bin Laden". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2 May 2011. Retrieved 1 May 2011.
251. ^ "Fbi – Usama bin Laden". Fbi.gov. 7 August 1998. Archived from the original on 15 May 2011. Retrieved 15 May 2011.
252. ^ "CNN.com – U.S. mulls $50 million Bin Laden bounty – Jan 24, 2005". www.cnn.com. Archived from the original on 18 June 2023. Retrieved 18 June 2023.
253. ^ Finkel, Gal Perl (8 November 2015). "Back to the ground?". Israel Hayom. Archived from the original on 17 August 2016.
254. ^ a b Sherwell, Philip (7 May 2011). "Osama bin Laden killed: Behind the scenes of the deadly raid". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on 10 May 2011. Retrieved 9 May 2011.
255. ^ Dilanian, Ken (2 May 2011). "CIA led U.S. special forces mission against Osama bin Laden". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 24 May 2011. Retrieved 14 May 2011.
256. ^ Jones, Nate (28 April 2023). "Newly released White House photos capture the day Bin Laden was killed". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 12 September 2023. Retrieved 28 July 2023.
257. ^ Fair, C. Christine (4 May 2011). "The Bin Laden aftermath: The U.S. shouldn't hold Pakistan's military against Pakistan's civilians". Foreign Policy. Archived from the original on 9 May 2011. Retrieved 10 May 2011.
258. ^ "Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda leader, dead – Barack Obama". BBC News. 1 May 2011. Archived from the original on 2 May 2011. Retrieved 2 May 2011.
259. ^ a b Hersh, Seymour M. (21 May 2015). "The Killing of Osama bin Laden". London Review of Books. pp. 3–12\. Archived from the original on 10 May 2015. Retrieved 3 May 2016.
260. ^ Bray, Chad (17 June 2011). "U.S. Formally Drops Charges Against Bin Laden". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on 10 July 2017.
261. ^ Walsh, Declan (25 February 2012). "Pakistan Razing House Where Bin Laden Lived". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 22 December 2017. Retrieved 25 February 2012.
262. ^ "Osama bin Laden's Pakistan compound demolished". BBC News. 26 February 2012. Archived from the original on 22 April 2012. Retrieved 28 April 2012.
263. ^ "Bin Laden hideout to become theme park". News 24. 6 February 2013. Archived from the original on 27 April 2019. Retrieved 11 February 2013.
264. ^ "Imran Khan claims Pakistani intelligence led CIA to Bin Laden". France 24. 23 July 2019. Archived from the original on 4 May 2021. Retrieved 4 May 2021.
265. ^ Warrick, Joby (6 November 2014). "Ex-SEAL Robert O'Neill reveals himself as shooter who killed Osama bin Laden". Archived from the original on 21 September 2021. Retrieved 17 November 2021.
266. ^ Cole, Matthew (10 January 2017). "The Crimes of Seal Team Six". The Intercept. Archived from the original on 2 June 2021. Retrieved 17 November 2021.
267. ^ Owen, Mark (4 September 2012). No Easy Day: The Firsthand Account of the Mission that Killed Osama bin Laden. Penguin. ISBN 978-1-101-61130-2.
268. ^ Walsh, Declan (30 March 2012). "On the Run, Bin Laden Had 4 Children and 5 Houses, a Wife Says". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 5 April 2012. Retrieved 30 March 2012.
269. ^ Westhead, Rick (1 April 2011). "Questions about Bin Laden embarrassing to Pakistan". Toronto Star. Toronto. Archived from the original on 2 December 2020. Retrieved 3 May 2011.
270. ^ Walker, Peter (6 May 2011). "Osama bin Laden lived in two rooms for five years, wife says". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 30 September 2013. Retrieved 12 May 2011.
271. ^ "U.S.: Bin Laden lived in Pakistan compound for at least 5 years". Haaretz. Reuters. 3 May 2011. Archived from the original on 6 May 2011. Retrieved 7 January 2012.
272. ^ Rodriguez, Alex (6 May 2011). "Mystery shrouds the quiet man who built Bin Laden's compound". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 25 July 2013. Retrieved 12 May 2011.
273. ^ Ross, Brian (3 May 2011). "Osama bin Laden Killed: U.S. Intelligence Probes Possible Pakistani Support System". ABC News. Archived from the original on 5 May 2011. Retrieved 3 May 2011.
274. ^ Laskar, Rezaul H (26 July 2011). "Osama raid took Pakistan Army by surprise". Rediff.com. Press Trust of India. Archived from the original on 24 September 2011.
275. ^ Gall, Carlotta (19 March 2014). "What Pakistan Knew About Bin Laden". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 20 March 2014. Retrieved 20 March 2014.
276. ^ Schultz, Marisa (3 May 2011). "Levin questions Pakistan's role". The Detroit News. p. 7A.
277. ^ "Death of Bin Laden: Live report". Yahoo!. Archived from the original on 18 January 2012.
278. ^ Bowden, Mark (12 October 2012). "Inside Osama bin Laden's Final Hours—and How the White House Chose Their Assassination Plot". Vanity Fair. Archived from the original on 18 February 2016.
279. ^ Toosi, Nahal; Khan, Zarar (3 May 2011). "Pakistan's president denies harboring Bin Laden". Yahoo Finance. Associated Press. Archived from the original on 19 January 2012. Retrieved 6 January 2011.
280. ^ "Zardari defends Pakistan over intel". Emirates 24/7. Agence France-Presse. 3 May 2011. Archived from the original on 7 June 2020. Retrieved 3 May 2011.
281. ^ Karon, Tony; Waraich, Omar (17 December 2009). "Under U.S. Pressure, Pakistan Balks at Helping on Afghan Taliban". Time. Archived from the original on 1 January 2016.
282. ^ Coll, Steve (2019). Directorate S: The C.I.A. and America's Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Penguin Group. pp. 547–554\. ISBN 978-0-14-313250-9.
283. ^ a b J. Cull, Culbert, Welch, Nicholas, David, David (2003). Propaganda and mass persuasion: A Historical Encyclopedia, 1500 to the Present. Santa Barbara, California 93116-1911, USA: ABC-CLIO, Inc. pp. 20, 222. ISBN 1-57607-820-5. "While many Middle Eastern countries have condemned.. Al Qaeda and have shown support to the United States, Bin Laden's reputation has reached cult status among some Arabs, who see him as the hero of the resistance against Western domination... In the wider Middle Eastern region, Bin Laden became a folk hero to the poor and disenfranchised: his picture appeared in bazaars in Pakistan and was placed in the hands of demonstrators in the Gaza strip. No Arab leader had commanded such popular appeal since Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918–1970) in the 1950s."`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: location (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
284. ^ Klausen, Jytte (2021). "2: The Founder". Western Jihadism: A Thirty-Year History. Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, ox2 6dp, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press. p. 69\. ISBN 978-0-19-887079-1.`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: location (link)
285. ^ Obaid, Nawaf (28 June 2004). "Opinion | an unprecedented poll of Saudi opinion : Yes to Bin Laden rhetoric; no to al Qaeda violence (Published 2004)". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 10 August 2023. Retrieved 9 August 2023.
286. ^ "Poll: Bin Laden tops Musharraf in Pakistan". CNN.com. Archived from the original on 11 August 2023. Retrieved 9 August 2023.
287. ^ Sly, Liz (3 May 2011). "Arab response to bin Laden's death muted". The Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved 6 April 2025.
288. ^ "Osama bin Laden Largely Discredited Among Muslim Publics in Recent Years". Pew Research Center. 2 May 2011. Retrieved 7 April 2025.
289. ^ "Bin Laden's death: miracle or murder?". El País. 4 May 2011. Retrieved 7 April 2025.
290. ^ Joseph, Manu (11 May 2011). "Bin Laden's Killing as Seen From India". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 6 April 2025.
291. ^ Masood, Salman (26 June 2020). "Pakistan's Prime Minister Suggests Osama Bin Laden Was a Martyr". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 28 June 2020.
292. ^ "Pakistan PM Imran Khan calls Osama bin Laden 'martyr' in Parliament". 26 June 2020. Archived from the original on 18 May 2023.
293. ^ "Pakistan PM Imran Khan calls Osama Bin Laden a 'martyr' in Parliament". WION. 25 June 2020. Archived from the original on 27 June 2020.
294. ^ Bergen, Peter (17 November 2023). "Opinion: Osama bin Laden was a mass murderer, not a TikTok influencer". CNN. Retrieved 2 September 2024.
295. ^ a b Zernike, Kate; Kaufman, Michael T. (2 May 2011). "The Most Wanted Face of Terrorism". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 6 April 2025.
296. ^ Hosenball, Mark (30 September 2001). "War on Terror: The Road To September 11". Newsweek. Retrieved 2 September 2024.

### Bibliography

[edit]

* Bergen, Peter (2006). The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of Al Qaeda's Leader. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-9592-7. Archived from the original on 2 December 2020. Retrieved 18 November 2020.
* Bergen, Peter (2008). "Al Qaeda, the Organization: A Five-Year Forecast". Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. 618: 14–30\. doi:10.1177/0002716208317599. ISSN 0002-7162. JSTOR 40375772. S2CID 145566133.
* Gutman, Roy (2008). How We Missed the Story: Osama bin Laden, the Taliban, and the Hijacking of Afghanistan. US Institute of Peace Press. ISBN 978-1-60127-024-5. Archived from the original on 24 December 2019. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
* Scheuer, Michael (2002). Through Our Enemies' Eyes. Washington, D.C.: Brassey's. ISBN 1-57488-553-7.
* Stern, Jessica (2003). Terror in the Name of God (1 ed.). New York: HarperCollins. ISBN 0-06-050533-8.
* Wright, Lawrence (2006). The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11. New York: Knopf. ISBN 1-4000-3084-6.`{{cite book}}`: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)

## Further reading

[edit]

* Al-Bahri, Nasser (2013). Guarding Bin Laden: My Life in Al-Qaeda. Thin Man Press. ISBN 978-0-9562473-6-0.
* Atwan, Abdel Bari (2012). After Bin Laden: Al-Qaeda, the Next Generation. Saqi. ISBN 978-0-86356-419-2.
* Atwan, Abdel Bari (2006). The Secret History of Al-Qaeda. Saqi. ISBN 978-0-86356-760-5. Archived from the original on 19 August 2020. Retrieved 14 May 2020.
* Berner, Brad K. (2007). Quotations from Osama bin Laden. Peacock Books. ISBN 978-81-248-0113-0. Archived from the original on 2 December 2020. Retrieved 18 November 2020.
* Bin Laden, Osama (2005). Lawrence, Bruce (ed.). Messages to the World: the Statements of Osama bin Laden. Translated by Howarth, James. Verso. ISBN 1-84467-045-7.
* Burke, Jason (2007). Al-Qaeda: The True Story of Radical Islam (2nd ed.). London: Penguin. ISBN 978-0-14-103136-1.
* Foreign Broadcast Information Service (2006) – Compilation of Usama Bin Laden Statements 1994 – January 2004 Archived 11 July 2015 at the Wayback Machine
* Mura, Andrea (2015). The Symbolic Scenarios of Islamism: A Study in Islamic Political Thought. London: Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-01450-8. Archived from the original on 7 July 2020. Retrieved 22 August 2017.
* Ibrahim, Raymond (2007). The Al Qaeda Reader. Broadway Books. p. 318\. ISBN 978-0-7679-2262-3. Archived from the original on 2 December 2020. Retrieved 18 November 2020.
* Lahoud, Nelly (2022). The Bin Laden Papers: How the Abbottabad Raid Revealed the Truth About al-Qaeda, Its Leader and His Family. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-26063-2. OCLC 1310854369.
* Scheuer, Michael (2011). Osama bin Laden. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-973866-3. Archived from the original on 2 December 2020. Retrieved 18 November 2020.

## External links

[edit]

Archival Documents

* Osama bin Laden from FBI Records: The Vault
* November 2017 Release of Abbottabad Compound Material from CIA, including Audio, Video, Images and Documents
* The Osama bin Laden File from the National Security Archive, posted 2 May 2011
* Letters from Abbottabad (archived) from Combating Terrorism Center

In the News

* Osama bin Laden collected news and commentary at Al Jazeera English
* Osama bin Laden collected news and commentary at Dawn
* Osama bin Laden collected news and commentary at The Guardian
* Osama bin Laden collected news and commentary at The New York Times
* Osama bin Laden news at JURIST
* Full text: Bin Laden's 'letter to America', The Observer, 24 November 2002
* Hunting Bin Laden, PBS Frontline, (November 2002)
* "5 Facts You Probably Didn't Know About Osama bin Laden", Dainik Bhaskar, (May 2016)
* Young Osama by Steve Coll, The New Yorker, 12 December 2005
* How the World Sees Osama bin Laden (archived 2011) – A photo slideshow by Life magazine (Photos date from 2000 to 2010)

* v
* t
* e

Osama bin Laden

Background|

* Childhood, education, and personal life
* Militant activity
* Beliefs and ideology
* Search
* Khartoum compound
* Abbottabad compound
* Death
* reactions
* code name controversy
* conspiracy theories

Family|

* Muhammad bin Ladin (father)
* Hamida al-Attas (mother)
* Najwa Ghanhem (first wife)
* Abdallah bin Laden (son)
* Hamza bin Laden (son)
* Saad bin Laden (son)
* Omar bin Laden (son)

Work|

* al-Qaeda
* Wadi al Aqiq
* Messages to the World
* Fatawā
* Videos and audio recordings
* 2004 video
* 19 January 2006 tape
* 6 September 2007 video
* 11 September 2007 video
* 20 September 2007 tape
* Letter to the American People

In media|

* In popular culture
* American Manhunt: Osama bin Laden
* Growing Up bin Laden
* Holy War, Inc.
* The Looming Tower
* No Easy Day
* Where in the World Is Osama bin Laden?
* Zero Dark Thirty
* Interviews

Related|

* Soviet–Afghan War
* Allegations of a support system in Pakistan for Osama bin Laden
* Bodyguards
* Issue Station
* Saddam–al-Qaeda conspiracy theory
* Timeline
* September 11 attacks
* Allegations of CIA assistance to Osama bin Laden
* Gary Brooks Faulkner

* v
* t
* e

Al-Qaeda

Leadership|

* Saif al-Adel
* Abd al-Rahman al-Maghrebi
* Ali Mohamed Rage
* Sa'ad bin Atef al-Awlaki
* Ahmad Umar
* Iyad Ag Ghaly
* Amadou Koufa
* Ezedin Abdel Aziz Khalil
* Abu Ubaidah Youssef al-Annabi
* Ali Sayyid Muhamed Mustafa al-Bakri
* Ibrahim al-Banna
* Ibrahim al Qosi
* Abu Walid al-Masri
* Mahad Karate
* Mohammed Showqi Al-Islambouli
* Abdukadir Mohamed Abdukadir
* Fuad Qalaf
* Jehad Mostafa
* Abu Humam al-Shami
* Sami al-Oraydi

Former
leadership|

| Killed|

* Osama bin Laden (killing)
* Ayman al-Zawahiri (killing)
* Mohammed Atef
* Qaed Salim Sinan al-Harethi (killing)
* Mustafa Mohamed Fadhil
* Haitham al-Yemeni
* Abu Hamza Rabia
* Muhsin Musa Matwalli Atwah
* Abu Musab al-Zarqawi
* Omar al-Faruq
* Haitham al-Badri
* Abu Yaqub al-Masri
* Abu Talha al-Sudani
* Abu al-Layth al-Libi
* Abu Sulayman Al-Jazairi
* Midhat Mursi
* Mohamed Moumou
* Khalid Habib
* Abu Ghadiya
* Abu Zubair al-Masri
* Rashid Rauf
* Mohammad Hasan Khalil al-Hakim
* Fahid Mohammed Ally Msalam
* Sheikh Ahmed Salim Swedan
* Saad bin Laden
* Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan
* Abdullah Said al Libi
* Saleh al-Somali
* Saeed al-Masri
* Hamza al-Jawfi
* Ahmed Mohammed Hamed Ali
* Mohamed Abul-Khair
* Sheikh Fateh
* Huthaifa al-Batawi
* Ilyas Kashmiri
* Fazul Abdullah Mohammed
* Atiyah Abd al-Rahman
* Anwar al-Awlaki
* Samir Khan
* Tariq al-Dahab
* Muhammad Sa'id Ali Hasan
* Fahd al-Quso
* Abu Yahya al-Libi
* Hassan Ghul
* Abu-Zaid al Kuwaiti
* Said Ali al-Shihri
* Farman Ali Shinwari
* Abdelhamid Abou Zeid
* Ibrahim Haji Jama Mee'aad
* Abu Mansoor Al-Amriki
* Said Bahaji
* Abu Khalid al-Suri
* Omar Ould Hamaha
* Ahmed Abdi Godane
* Abu Yusuf Al-Turki
* Adnan Gulshair el Shukrijumah
* Adam Yahiye Gadahn
* Harith bin Ghazi al-Nadhari
* Othman Ahmad Othman al-Ghamdi
* Ibrahim Sulayman Muhammad al-Rubaysh
* Nasser bin Ali al-Ansi
* Nasir al-Wuhayshi
* Muhsin al-Fadhli
* Abu Khalil al-Madani
* Matiur Rehman
* Abu Firas al-Suri
* Ahmed Refai Taha
* Mokhtar Belmokhtar
* Abu Khayr al-Masri
* Ibrahim al-Asiri
* Hamza bin Laden
* Sari Shihab
* Asim Umar
* Qasim al-Raymi
* Abdelmalek Droukdel (killing)
* Khalid al-Aruri
* Abdullah Ahmed Abdullah
* Abu Muhsin al-Masri

|

Captured|

* Mamdouh Mahmud Salim
* Wadih el-Hage
* Khalid al-Fawwaz
* Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri
* Khalid Sheikh Mohammed
* Walid bin Attash
* Riduan Isamuddin
* Ali al-Bahlul
* Abu Faraj al-Libbi
* Mustafa Setmariam Nasar
* Abdulhadi al-Iraqi
* Muhammad Jafar Jamal al-Kahtani
* Mohamed Atiq Awayd Al Harbi
* Younis al-Mauritani
* Sulaiman Abu Ghaith
* Abu Anas al-Libi
* Muhanad Mahmoud Al Farekh
* Mukhtar Robow
* Amin al-Haq

Other|

* Abu Ubaidah al-Banshiri (died)
* Abu Ubaidah al-Masri (died)
* Mahfouz Ould al-Walid (left)
* Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (expelled)
* Ahmed al-Sharaa (left)
* Abu Maria al-Qahtani (left)
* Ahmad Salama Mabruk (left)
* Abu Omar al-Turkistani (left)
* Abu Sulayman al-Muhajir (left)
* Khalid Batarfi (died)

Timeline
of attacks|

* 1992 Aden hotel bombings
* 1998 United States embassy bombings
* 2000 USS Cole bombing
* 2001 September 11 attacks
* 2002 Bali bombings
* 2004 Madrid train bombings
* 2005 London bombings
* 2007 Algiers bombings
* 2008 Islamabad Danish embassy bombing
* 2008 Islamabad Marriott Hotel bombing
* 2008 Sanaa United States embassy attack
* 2013 In Amenas hostage crisis
* 2013 Westgate shopping mall attack
* 2015 Charlie Hebdo shooting
* 2015 Garissa University College attack
* 2015 Bamako hotel attack
* 2016 Ouagadougou attacks
* 2016 Grand-Bassam shootings
* 2016 Bamako attack
* 2019 Naval Air Station Pensacola shooting

Wars|

* Soviet–Afghan War
* Afghan Civil War (1989–1992)
* Afghan Civil War (1992–1996)
* First Chechen War
* Afghan Civil War (1996–2001)
* Second Chechen War
* War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)
* Iraq War
* Somali Civil War
* War in North-West Pakistan (drone strikes)
* Insurgency in the Maghreb (2002–present)
* Syrian civil war
* Yemeni civil war (2014–present)
* Al-Qaeda insurgency in Yemen
* Houthi insurgency

Affiliates|

* Al-Shabaab (Somalia)
* Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (Yemen)
* Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (North Africa)
* Al-Qaeda in the Indian subcontinent (Indian subcontinent)
* Jama'at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (Mali)

Charity organizations|

* Benevolence International Foundation
* Al-Haramain Foundation

Media|

* Al Qaeda Handbook
* Al Neda
* As-Sahab
* Al-Andalus Media
* Al-Kataib Media Foundation
* Radio al-Andalus
* Shahada News Agency
* Al-Malahem Media
* Inspire
* Az-Zallaqa Foundation
* Fatawā of Osama bin Laden
* Al-Khansaa
* Kuala Lumpur al-Qaeda Summit
* Management of Savagery
* Voice of Jihad
* Qaedat al-Jihad
* Umar Media
* Global Islamic Media Front
* Al-I'tisam Media Foundation

Video and audio|

* Videos and audio recordings of Osama bin Laden
* Videos and audio recordings of Ayman al-Zawahiri

Related|

* Safe houses
* Saddam–al-Qaeda conspiracy theory
* Timeline

Category:Al-Qaeda

* v
* t
* e

War on terror

* September 11 attacks
* War in Afghanistan (2001–2021) (Withdrawal)
* Iraq War (2003–2011) (Withdrawal)

Participants|

| Operational|

* ISAF
* Operation Enduring Freedom participants
* Afghanistan
* Northern Alliance
* Iraq (Iraqi Armed Forces)
* NATO
* Pakistan
* United Kingdom
* United States
* European Union
* Philippines
* Ethiopia

|

Targets|

| Individuals|

* Osama bin Laden
* Hamza bin Laden
* Anwar al-Awlaki
* Sirajuddin Haqqani
* Jalaluddin Haqqani
* Anas Haqqani
* Khalil Haqqani
* Hafiz Saeed
* Mahmoud Mohamed Ahmed Bahaziq
* Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi

|

Factions|

* al-Qaeda
* al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula
* Abu Sayyaf
* Al-Shabaab
* Boko Haram
* Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami
* Hizbul Mujahideen
* Islamic Courts Union
* Jaish-e-Mohammed
* Jemaah Islamiyah
* Lashkar-e-Taiba
* Taliban
* Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan
* Islamic State

Conflicts|

| Operation
Enduring Freedom|

* War in Afghanistan
* OEF – Philippines
* Georgian involvement in the Iraq War
* OEF – Horn of Africa
* OEF – Trans Sahara
* Drone strikes in Pakistan

|

Other|

* Operation Active Endeavour
* Insurgency in the Maghreb (2002–present)
* Insurgency in the North Caucasus
* Moro conflict in the Philippines
* Iraq War
* Iraqi insurgency
* Operation Linda Nchi
* Terrorism in Saudi Arabia
* Insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
* War in Somalia (2006–2009)
* 2007 Lebanon conflict
* al-Qaeda insurgency in Yemen

Policies|

* Patriot Act (2001)
* Torture Memos (2002)
* Military Commissions Act of 2006
* Military Commissions Act of 2009
* President's Surveillance Program
* Protect America Act of 2007
* Terrorist Surveillance Program

Related|

* Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse
* Axis of evil
* Bush Doctrine
* Clash of Civilizations
* Cold War
* Combatant Status Review Tribunal
* Criticism of the war on terror
* CIA black sites
* Killing of Ayman al-Zawahiri
* Killing of Osama bin Laden
* Enhanced interrogation techniques
* Extrajudicial prisoners
* Extraordinary rendition
* Guantanamo Bay detention camp
* Iranian Revolution
* Islamic terrorism
* Islamism
* North Korea and weapons of mass destruction
* Operation Noble Eagle
* Operation Eagle Assist
* Situation Room photograph
* State Sponsors of Terrorism
* Targeted killing
* Targeted Killing in International Law
* Targeted Killings: Law and Morality in an Asymmetrical World
* Unitary executive theory
* Unlawful combatant
* CAGE

* Category
* Commons

Portals:

* Biography
* Islam
* Saudi Arabia
* Afghanistan
* Africa
* United States
* Pakistan
* Modern history

Osama bin Laden at Wikipedia's sister projects:

* Media from Commons
* News from Wikinews
* Quotations from Wikiquote
* Texts from Wikisource
* Data from Wikidata

Authority control databases

International|

* ISNI
* VIAF
* FAST
* WorldCat

National|

* Germany
* United States
* France
* BnF data
* Japan
* Australia
* Czech Republic
* Spain
* Portugal
* Netherlands
* Norway
* Latvia
* Croatia
* Chile
* Greece
* Korea
* Sweden
* Poland
* Israel
* Catalonia

Academics|

* CiNii

Artists|

* MusicBrainz

People|

* Trove
* Deutsche Biographie
* DDB

Other|

* IdRef
* NARA
* SNAC

*[c.]: circa
*[m.]: married
*[sep.]: separated
*[div.]: divorced
*[WIA]: Wounded in action
*[v]: View this template
*[t]: Discuss this template
*[e]: Edit this template