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Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. A small team of Americans carried out the operation with extraordinary courage and capability. After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body.
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Pakistani security officials arriving at the scene after the US raid found a spartan house. Each bedroom not only had an attached bathroom, which is common here, but also its own kitchen, an unusual feature that would have allowed its occupants to live independently in each bedroom. In a photograph, seen by the Guardian, of one of the bathrooms on the first floor there is a chair with the middle removed, which seemed to have been designed to allow a sick or elderly person to sit on the toilet more easily. Security officials speculated this may have ben the bedroom of Bin Laden, who has suffered for many years with kidney trouble. The woman lay quietly, her head in the girl's lap, though she seemed conscious, the officials told the Guardian.
How SEAL Team Six Took Out Osama bin Laden
US mansion owned by Bin Laden’s family now smudged in moss - The Times of India
US mansion owned by Bin Laden’s family now smudged in moss.
Posted: Sat, 18 Nov 2023 08:00:00 GMT [source]
For many families of 9/11 victims, bin Laden’s death symbolized justice and retribution. The compound’s unusual and extensive security features, along with further intelligence information, prompted suspicion that the residence was Osama bin Laden’s hideout. Before the conflict was fully resolved and a new routine established, SEAL team six arrived by helicopter the night of May 2, 2011, and Osama, the al-Kuwaiti brothers and some of their family members were dead. On the back of a door, he hung the thobe (an Arab man’s robe) he donned when filming videos to be distributed to followers. A snub-nosed Kalashnikov, a memento from his days fighting Russian invaders in Afghanistan, rested on a shelf above the door.
The September 11, 2001, attacks and the U.S. pursuit of bin Laden
His body, identified visually at the site of the raid, was taken out of Pakistan by U.S. forces for examination and DNA identification and soon after was given a sea burial. Hours after its confirmation, bin Laden’s death was announced by Obama in a televised address. Several days after Obama’s announcement, al-Qaeda released a statement publicly acknowledging bin Laden’s death and vowing revenge.
On 2 May 2011, Bin Laden was killed by US special operations forces at his compound in Abbottabad. His corpse was buried at the Arabian Sea and he was officially succeeded by his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri on 16 June 2011. Al-Arabiya, a Middle East news channel, reported that Bin Laden's 12-year-old daughter had told Pakistani investigators the US forces captured her father alive and shot him dead in front of family members. An official of the ISI, the Pakistani intelligence agency, told the Guardian the girl had seen her father killed but did not suggest Bin Laden had been captured at that point. On Wednesday officials gave the New York Times the most detailed version yet. They said that when the commandos moved into the main house they saw the courier's brother, who they believed was preparing to fire a weapon.
Bin Laden used women as human shields, including his wife who was killed in the process
In October 1999, the United Nations designated al-Qaeda as a terrorist organization. Bin Laden’s family lived isolated even from the al-Kuwaiti brothers and their families, with a locked metal door at the base of the stairwell to the terrorist's rooms. Only the two couriers left the compound on any kind of regular basis—to run errands, go to the mosque and occasionally attend funerals, weddings or other local ceremonies.
Bin Laden's brothers former home being torn down - FOX 35 Orlando
Bin Laden's brothers former home being torn down.
Posted: Wed, 24 Apr 2024 21:33:00 GMT [source]
Watch President Obama's final State of the Union address.
By late 2010, analysts were able to link the courier to a large, highly-secured compound in Abbottabad, a town about 35 miles north of Islamabad. Get HISTORY’s most fascinating stories delivered to your inbox three times a week. Explore this collection of extraordinary documentary films about one of the most challenging days in U.S. history.
Additionally, the compound was designed to obscure lines of sight from multiple directions. As the raid commenced, the tail of one of the helicopters grazed the compound wall, forcing it into a “soft crash” landing that fortunately did not result in major injuries, although the helicopter itself had to be destroyed so none of its tech would fall into the wrong hands. Over the next few months, the CIA used informants, surveillance and other intelligence gathering measures to arrive at the conclusion that bin Laden and his family were hiding out in the compound – but up until the attack, there was no hard proof that bin Laden was present, only the best guess available. The raid had begun on a moonless night, as highly modified "stealth" helicopters designed to avoid detection flew in secret through Pakistan airspace across the farmlands of the Orash valley towards their target. Osama bin Laden's daughter cradled the head of her wounded mother in the room where the al-Qaida leader had just been killed. Bin Laden was one of more than 50 children of Muhammad bin Laden, a self-made billionaire who, after immigrating to Saudi Arabia from Yemen as a labourer, rose to direct major construction projects for the Saudi royal family.
A senior Pentagon official told reporters on Monday in a background briefing that the American team engaged in a firefight and Bin Laden resisted. The official gave the strong impression Bin Laden had been armed and may have been shooting. US officials have given the clearest version yet of the killing of Osama bin Laden in an account that directly contradicts previous assertions by the director of the CIA, Leon Panetta, and White House chief security adviser, John Brennan, that he died in a firefight.
It is believed that the compound was owned by a shipping magnate based out of Waziristan. The raid also unearthed a family video from bin Laden’s son Hamza bin Laden’s wedding in Iran. “The only picture we had of Hamza prior to the video’s release was of him as a child. Hamza was being groomed for a leadership position, so seeing him as an adult was very valuable,” says Roggio. The residents burned their garbage rather than putting it out for collection. Bin Laden’s son Khalid did much of the maintenance, and the compound had chickens, goats, rabbits, honeybees, cow and kitchen gardens.
By the time of Muhammad’s death in an airplane accident in 1967, his company had become one of the largest construction firms in the Middle East, and the bin Laden family had developed a close relationship with the Saudi royal family. Each floor had several rooms, and in total, the house had nine bedrooms, eight bathrooms, and two kitchens (via History). The third floor is where bin Laden lived and spent the majority of his time, restricting himself to just two rooms, per The Guardian. The wedding guest list also proved revealing, as it included multiple members of al Qaeda’s inner circle. Hamza married the daughter of Abu Muhammad Al-Masri, another al Qaeda leader, and guests included Mohammed Showqi al-Islambouli, whose brother Khalid assassinated former Egyptian President Anwar-el Sadat.
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