Thursday, May 5, 2011

Death of Osama bin Laden

Osama bin Laden, the founder of the al-Qaeda organization responsible for the September 11 attacks in the United States, was killed by gunshot wounds to his head and chest[1][2][3] on May 2, 2011, around 01:00 Pakistan Standard Time,[4] in a 40-minute raid by United States special operations forces. 
Bin Laden in 1997

The raid, code name "Operation Neptune's Spear" also known as the "Abbottabad Operation", took place at his safe house[5] in Bilal Town, Abbottābad, Pakistan.[6] 
At the conclusion of the raid, U.S. forces took bin Laden's body to Afghanistan for identification before burying it at sea within 24 hours of his death.[7][8][9]
Osama bin Laden      أسامة بن لادن
March 10, 1957 – May 2, 2011 (aged 54)
Place of birthRiyadh, Saudi Arabia
Place of deathAbbottabad, Pakistan 34°10′9″N73°14′33″E
Resting placeNorth Arabian Sea
AllegianceAl-Qaeda
Service/branchSunni Islam (Wahhabism)
Battles/wars

Soviet war in Afghanistan
War on Terror:

The operation was authorized by President Barack Obama and carried out by members of the United States Navy SEALs from the Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU),[10] informally referred to by its former name, SEAL Team Six,[11] under the command of the Joint Special Operations Command, in conjunction with U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operatives. 

The team was sent across the border of Afghanistan to launch the attack.[12]

The killing of bin Laden received a favorable response in the United States and was welcomed by Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations,[13] NATO, the European Union, and a large number of countries as a positive and significant turning point for global security and the War on Terror. 

The Palestinian Hamas leader of the Gaza strip, Ismail Haniya, however, said: "We condemn the assassination of a Muslim and Arab warrior".[14]

The Pakistani government was criticized for failing to apprehend bin Laden, who had been living in a large prominent compound in a major Pakistani city, close to Pakistan's premier military academy and 30 miles from the capital, Islamabad. 

Pakistani officials denied knowingly harboring bin Laden, saying that they had no knowledge that he was there, and strongly denied allegations of official support for him.


Locating Osama bin Laden: American intelligence officials discovered the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden by tracking one of his couriers, as bin Laden was believed to have concealed his whereabouts from al-Qaeda foot soldiers or top commanders.

Identity of the courier

Identification of al-Qaeda couriers was an early priority for interrogators at CIA black sites and Guantanamo Bay detention camp.[15][16]

By 2002 interrogators had heard uncorroborated claims about an al-Qaeda courier with the nom de guerre Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti (sometimes referred to as Sheikh Abu Ahmed of Kuwait).[17] 


CIA aerial photo of the compound


In 2003 Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the alleged operational chief of al-Qaeda, revealed under interrogation that he was acquainted with al-Kuwaiti but that he was not active in al-Qaeda.

In 2004 an al-Qaeda prisoner named Hassan Ghul told interrogators that al-Kuwaiti was close to bin Laden as well as Khalid Sheik Mohammed and Mohammed's successor Abu Faraj al-Libi.[18] 

Ghul further revealed that al-Kuwaiti had not been seen in some time, a fact which led U.S. officials to suspect he was travelling with bin Laden. 

When confronted with Ghul's account, Khalid Sheik Mohammed stuck to his original story. 

Abu Faraj al-Libi was captured in 2005 and told CIA interrogators that bin Laden's courier was a man named Maulawi Abd al-Khaliq Jan. 

Al-Libi was transferred to Guantánamo in September 2006.[19][20] He denied knowing al-Kuwaiti. 

Because both Mohammed and al-Libi had minimized al-Kuwaiti's importance, officials speculated that he was part of bin Laden's inner circle.

In 2007 officials learned al-Kuwait's real name, though they will not disclose the name nor how they learned it. 

The CIA never found anyone named Maulawi Jan and believes al-Libi made it up. 

In 2010 a wiretap of another suspect picked up a conversation with al-Kuwaiti.[21] 

CIA officials located al-Kuwaiti and followed him back to bin Laden's compound. 

Al-Kuwaiti and his brother were killed along with bin Laden in the May 2, 2011 raid.[15]

Since the name Maulawi Abd al-Khaliq Jan appears in the JTF-GTMO detainee assessment for Abu Faraj al-Libi released by WikiLeaks on April 24, 2011,[22] there has been speculation that the US assault on the Abbottābad compound was expedited as a precaution.[23]

Location of the compound


A telephone conversation between al-Kuwaiti and another operative monitored by the CIA led the agency in August 2010 to track al-Kuwaiti to the compound in Abbottābad.[17] 

Using satellite photos and intelligence reports, the CIA determined the identities of the inhabitants of the mansion to which the courier was traveling. 

In September, the CIA concluded that the compound was "custom-built to hide someone of significance", and that bin Laden's residence there was very likely.[24][25] 

Officials surmised that he was living there with his youngest wife.[25]

Built in 2005, the three-story[26] compound was located "at the end of a narrow dirt road",[27] 2.5 miles (4 km) northeast of the city center of Abbottābad.[24] 

Abbottābad is about 100 miles from the Afghanistan border on the far eastern side of Pakistan (about 20 miles from India). 

The compound is 0.8 miles (1.3 km) southwest of the Pakistan Military Academy (PMA), Pakistan's "West Point".[28][29][30][31] 

On a plot of land eight times larger than those of nearby houses, it was surrounded by 12-to-18-foot (3.7–5.5 m)[25] concrete walls topped with barbed wire.[24] 

There were two security gates, and the third-floor balcony had a seven-foot-high (2.1 m) privacy wall (which could hide the 6' 4" [1.93 m] bin Laden).

There was no Internet or telephone service connected to the compound. 

Its residents burned their trash, unlike their neighbors, who set their garbage out for collection.[26] Local residents called the building the Waziristan Haveli (haveli is a term used in India and Pakistan that roughly translates to mansion) and believed it to be owned by a transporter from Waziristan, or possibly a gold merchant[32]. 

Bin Laden had previously spent time in the Waziristan area of Afghanistan.[33] 

Google Earth maps show that the compound was not present in 2001, but did exist on images taken in 2005.[34]

The U.S. National Counterterrorism Center, using drone-derived intelligence, developed "what amounted to a detailed four-dimensional 'map' of the bin Laden compound and its occupants and their patterns of living and working." 

This map was used to create a model of the compound for practice runs.[35]

CIA director Leon Panetta issued a memo that also credited the National Security Agency and National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency for contributing to the intelligence-gathering that made the raid possible. 

The National Journal reported that "NSA figured out, somehow, that there was no telephone or Internet service in the compound."[36]

Website of the Federal Bureau of Investigation listing bin Laden as deceased on the Most Wanted List on May 3, 2011.


Role of Pakistan: Pakistan's role in the operation was criticized by many people around the world. Pakistan defended its role and stated that it had no prior information that bin Laden was in Abbottabad.

Allegations against Pakistan

Numerous allegations were made that the government of Pakistan was involved in shielding bin Laden.[37][38][39] 

Aspects of the incident that have fueled the allegations include the proximity of bin Laden's heavily fortified compound to the Pakistan Military Academy, that the United States did not notify the Pakistani authorities before the operation, and the alleged double standards of Pakistan regarding the perpetrators of the 2008 Mumbai attacks.[39][40][41][42] 

U.S. government files leaked by Wikileaks disclosed that American diplomats were told that Pakistani security services were tipping off bin Laden every time U.S. forces approached. 

Pakistan Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) also helped smuggle al-Qaeda militants into Afghanistan to fight NATO troops. 

According to the leaked files, in December 2009, the government of Tajikistan had told U.S. officials that many in Pakistan were aware of bin Laden's whereabouts.[43]

In his first interview after the operation CIA chief Leon Panetta stated that the CIA had ruled out involving US nominal ally Pakistan in the operation, fearing that "any effort to work with the Pakistanis could jeopardize the mission. They might alert the targets."[44] 

However, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton stated that "cooperation with Pakistan helped lead us to bin Laden and the compound in which he was hiding".[45] 

Obama echoed her sentiments.[46]

U.S. Senator Joe Lieberman, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, said "This is going to be a time of real pressure on Pakistan to basically prove to us that they didn’t know that bin Laden was there".[47] 

John O. Brennan, the chief counterterrorism advisor to Obama, stated that it was inconceivable that bin Laden did not have support from within Pakistan. 

He further stated: "People have been referring to this as hiding in plain sight. We are looking at how he was able to hide out there for so long."[48] 

Air strikes on Tora Bora in 2001


Senator Dianne Feinstein stated that "it's hard for me to understand how the Pakistanis... would not know what was going on inside the compound" and said that top Pakistan officials may be "walking both sides of the street."[49] 

Senator Lindsey Graham questioned: "How could [bin Laden] be in such a compound without being noticed?", raising suspicions that Pakistan was either uncommitted in the fight against Islamist militants or was actively sheltering them while pledging to fight them.[50] 

A Pakistani intelligence official said that they had passed on raw phone tap data to U.S. that led to the operation but had failed to analyze this data themselves.[51]

Indian Minister for Home Affairs, P. Chidambaram said that bin Laden hiding "deep inside" Pakistan was a matter of grave concern for India and showed that "many of the perpetrators of the Mumbai terror attacks, including the controllers and the handlers of the terrorists who actually carried out the attack, continue to be sheltered in Pakistan". 

He also called on Pakistan to arrest them.[52]

Pakistani-born British MP Khalid Mahmood stated that he was "flabbergasted and shocked" after he learned that bin Laden was living in a city with thousands of Pakistani troops, reviving questions about alleged links between al-Qaeda and elements in Pakistan's security forces.[53]

Gulf News reported that the compound where bin Laden was killed had previously been used as a safe house by ISI but was no longer being used for this purpose.[54] 

The Globe and Mail reported local police saying that the compound belonged to Hizbul Mujahideen, a militant group supported by ISI which is fighting the Indian forces in Kashmir.[55]

Pakistani response

According to a Pakistani intelligence official, raw phone-tap data had been transferred to the United States without being analyzed by Pakistan. 

While the U.S. "was concentrating on this" information since September 2010, information regarding bin Laden and the compound's inhabitants had "slipped from" Pakistan's "radar" over the months. 

Bin Laden left "an invisible footprint" and he had not been contacting other militant networks. 

It was noted that much focus had been placed on a courier entering and leaving the compound. 

The transfer of intelligence to the U.S. was a regular occurrence according to the official, who also stated regarding the raid that "I think they came in undetected and went out the same day", and Pakistan did not believe that U.S. personnel were present in the area before the special operation occurred.[46]

According to the Pakistani high commissioner to the United Kingdom, Wajid Shamsul Hasan, Pakistan had prior knowledge that an operation would happen. 

Pakistan was "in the know of certain things" and "what happened happened with our consent. Americans got to know him—where he was first—and that's why they struck it and struck it precisely." 

Husain Haqqani, Pakistani ambassador to the U.S., had said that Pakistan would have pursued bin Laden had the intelligence of his location existed with them and Pakistan was "very glad that our American partners did. They had superior intelligence, superior technology, and we are grateful to them."[46]

Another Pakistani official stated that Pakistan "assisted only in terms of authorization of the helicopter flights in our airspace" and the operation was conducted by the United States. 

He also said that "in any event, we did not want anything to do with such an operation in case something went wrong."[46]

Operation Neptune's Spear

Operation Neptune's Spear
Operational scopeTactical
LocationOsama bin Laden's hideout compound,Bilal Town, Abbottābad, Pakistan
34°10′9″N 73°14′33″E
Planned by
ObjectiveKill or capture Osama bin Laden[56]
DateMay 2, 2011
01:00 PST (UTC+5)
Executed byUnited States Naval Special Warfare Development Group
OutcomeOsama bin Laden, one of his sons, his courier, the courier's brother, and one woman are killed
Casualties5 killed
2 injured

Objective

According to the Associated Press, "Officially, it was a kill-or-capture mission, since the U.S. doesn't kill unarmed people trying to surrender. But it was clear from the beginning that whoever was behind those walls had no intention of surrendering, two US officials said."[57]

ABC News wrote, after the fact, "as CIA director Leon Panetta explained to PBS' [NewsHour] yesterday[58], 'the authority here was to kill bin Laden. And obviously under the rules of engagement, if he in fact had thrown up his hands and surrendered and didn't appear to represent any kind of threat then they were to capture him. But they had full authority to kill him...' And they did. He was unarmed, but he resisted capture, his wife rushed a Navy SEAL, and there was no way the SEALs could have known in that split second whether bin Laden or the room was booby-trapped in any way."[59]

White House counterterrorism advisor John O. Brennan stated after the raid that “if we had the opportunity to take bin Laden alive, if he didn't present any threat, the individuals involved were able and prepared to do that.”[56] 

However, another U.S. national security official, who was not named, told Reuters that “'this was a kill operation,' making clear there was no desire to try to capture bin Laden alive in Pakistan.”[60] 

Another source referencing a kill (rather than capture order) states: “Officials described the reaction of the special operators when they were told a number of weeks ago that they had been chosen to train for the mission. 'They were told, "We think we found Osama bin Laden, and your job is to kill him,"' an official recalled. The SEALs started to cheer.”[61]

Planning

After an intelligence-gathering effort on the courier's Pakistan compound that began September 2010, Obama met with his national security advisers on March 14 to create an action plan. 

They met four more times (March 29, April 12, April 19 and April 28) in the six weeks before the raid, including once on March 29, 2011 when Obama personally discussed the plan with Vice Admiral William H. McRaven, the commander of the U.S. Joint Special Operations Command.[24][62] 

"Many multiple possible courses of action" were presented to Obama in March and "refined over the course of the next several weeks."[63]

According to ABC News, the first approach considered by U.S. officials was to bomb the house using B-2 Spirit stealth bombers, which could drop 32[64] 2,000-pound Joint Direct Attack Munitions (JDAMs). 

Obama rejected this option, opting for a raid that would provide definitive proof that bin Laden was inside, and limit civilian casualties. 

Another one of the "courses of action" (COA) suggested by JSOC was "a joint raid with Pakistani intelligence operatives who would be told about the mission hours before the launch."[64] 

Deploying drones was apparently not a feasible approach, in part because of limited firepower and in part because the compound's location was "within the Pakistan air defense intercept zone for the national capital."[65][66][67]

The commando-led course of action (COA) had multiple risks, including the fact that the extensive preparation and training necessary to pull it off "provided greater chances for information to leak out over the ensuing months, scuttling the mission and sending bin Laden deeper into hiding."[57]

Members of the Naval Special Warfare Development Group began training for the raid (the objective of which remained unknown to them) after the March 22 national security meeting, "holding dry runs at training facilities on both American coasts, which were made up to resemble the compound."[64] 

As plans progressed through the month of April, the DEVGRU SEALs began more specific training exercises on a one-acre replica of the Waziristan Haveli that was built inside Camp Alpha, a restricted section of the Bagram military base in Afghanistan[36], practicing rappelling down into it from helicopters, among other tactical approaches.[36][68] 

According to The Daily Telegraph, 24 Navy SEALs carried out practice runs on April 7 and April 13.[69]

On April 29, at 8:20 am, Obama convened with Brennan, Thomas E. Donilon, and other national security advisers in the Diplomatic Reception Room and gave the final order to raid the Abbottābad compound. 

A senior administration official told reporters after the operation was completed that the government of Pakistan had not been informed of the operation in advance.[70]

The raid planned for that day was postponed until the following day due to cloudy weather.[71]

Execution of the operation

Approach and entry


After President Obama authorized the mission to kill or capture Osama bin Laden, CIA Director Leon Panetta gave the go-ahead at midday on May 1.[72]

The raid was carried out by 20 to 25 helicopter-borne United States Navy SEALs from the United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU) of the Joint Special Operations Command, temporarily transferred to the control of the Central Intelligence Agency. 

According to The New York Times, "79 commandos and a dog were involved."[73]

Additional personnel on the mission included "tactical signals, intelligence collectors, and navigators using highly classified hyperspectral imagers."[36]

The SEALs flew into Pakistan from Jalalabad, Afghanistan. (Previous reports indicated that they may have staged through Tarbela Ghazi Airbase in northwest Pakistan, but Pakistan has denied that the U.S. used a location in Pakistan to launch the raid.[74][75][76]) 

The 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR), an airborne unit of the United States Army Special Operations Command sometimes called the "Nighthawks," provided two modified Black Hawk helicopters, and two Chinooks as backups.[68][61][36][77][76] 

The 160th SOAR helicopters were supported by multiple other aircraft, including fixed-wing fighter jets and drones.[78] 

According to CNN, "The Air Force also had a full team of combat search-and-rescue helicopters available."[78]

The raid was scheduled for a time with little moon luminosity so the helicopters could enter Pakistan "low to the ground and undetected,"[79] and the helicopters used hilly terrain and nap-of-the-earth techniques to reach the compound without appearing on radar and alerting the Pakistani military. 

Once the raid began, the Pakistani military scrambled their fighter jets but did not interfere with the raid.[74] 

According to Public Multimedia, Pakistan was informed by the U.S. about the raid once it had started, but was asked to stay out of the way.[80]

The DEVGRU operators fast-roped out of the Blackhawks. 

After the operators were on the ground, one of the hovering helicopters stalled[81] in a vortex created by its own prop wash and the high compound walls,[82] and "rolled onto its side"[83] during an emergency landing outside[81] the compound.

At approximately 1:00 a.m. local time (20:00, May 1 UTC),[84][85] the SEALs breached the compound's walls using explosives and attacked the compound's structures as the compound's occupants opened fire.[86][76]

Combat

The SEALs killed the guards, who may have consisted of only the courier and his brother, and then cleared the various structures in compound, including the main building, room-to-room.[87] 

CNN reported there were no armed guards around the compound and the couriers were killed on the first floor of the compound.[88] 

Fighting took place in the main building on the first floor, where two adult males lived, and on the second and third floors, where bin Laden lived with his family. 

The second and third floors were the last section of the compound to be cleared.[89] 

Personnel in the compound encountered and captured by the SEALs, including women and children, were restrained with plastic zip ties and left in place until the raid was over, at which point the SEALs moved them all outside.[90]

Bin Laden and the DEVGRU team encountered each other on the second floor[91] of the residence; bin Laden was "wearing the local loose-fitting tunic and pants known as a shalwar kameez."[64] 

"The encounter with bin Laden lasted only seconds," according to Politico, and took place during "the last five or 10 minutes" of the raid.[61] 

According to U.S. officials, Bin Laden resisted the American special operation team. He was unarmed when he was shot.[92] 

Bin Laden was killed by at least one and possibly two American bullets, one of which struck the left side of his head. (The second shot was either a second bullet to the head, or to the chest.)

Three other men and a woman present at the compound were also reportedly killed in the operation, including bin Laden's adult son, the courier and his relative (alias Arshad Khan and Tariq Khan)[93] and the courier's wife. 

Two other women were injured.[94] 

According to ABC News, bin Laden's fifth wife Amal Ahmed Abdul Fatah[95] was one of the injured women: "When the SEALs entered the room in which bin Laden was hiding, his wife charged them and was shot in the leg."[92] 

Bin Laden's 12-year-old daughter also saw him killed.[96][97] 

It remains unclear which of bin Laden's adult sons was killed in the raid. 

The New York Times reported that U.S. authorities determined that the man was Hamza bin Laden.[64] 

The Associated Press cited John O. Brennan as giving the man's identity as Khaled bin Laden.[98] 

While bin Laden's body was taken by U.S. forces, the bodies of the four others killed in the raid were left behind at the compound.[99] 

Pakistani television network GEO TV identifies the son as Ibrahim bin Laden.[100]

The exact number and identity of the people living in the compound is uncertain. 

Several appear to be members of the Osama bin Laden family, including possibly his fourth wife and their daughter. 

A Pakistani official told the New York Times that nine children ranging from two to 12 years old were placed in Pakistani custody[64]; seven of those children may have belonged to the courier and his relative.[93] 

According to the British Daily Mail, "four children and two women, including bin Laden's daughter Safia, were taken away in an ambulance."[75] 

One other person was reportedly taken away alive by the U.S. military.[96][101]

Wrap-up

The raid was intended to take 30 minutes. 

All told, the time between the team's entry in and exit from the compound was 38 minutes.[61] 

Time in the compound was split into exchanging gunfire with the defenders[89] and searching the compound for information.[102] 

U.S. personnel removed computer hard drives, documents, DVDs, thumb drives and "electronic equipment" from the compound for later analysis, including at least "10 cell phones, 10 computers and 100 thumb drives."[61][103][104]

The helicopter that had made the emergency landing was damaged[68] and could not fly the team out. 

It was consequently destroyed to safeguard its classified equipment; after they "moved the women and children to a secure area"[64] 

U.S. forces "improvise[d] by packing the helicopter with explosives and blowing it up."[25][105] 

The assault team "called in one of two backup [helicopters]" to ferry them back to their base.[27]

Diplomatic cooperation


According to Obama administration officials, U.S. officials did not share information about the raid with the government of Pakistan before the operation,[8] but did notify Pakistan after its successful completion.[106] 

According to the Pakistani foreign ministry, the operation was conducted entirely by the U.S. forces;[107] however, Pakistan Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) officials stated that they were also present at what they called a joint operation,[37] a claim which President Asif Ali Zardari has flatly denied.[108]

According to ABC News, Pakistani fighter jets were scrambled in an attempt to locate and identify what turned out to be the U.S. helicopters used in the raid.[68]

Eyewitness account: One of bin Laden's daughters said to Pakistani investigators that the SEALS captured him alive but shot him dead in front of family members. 

[109]

Local accounts of raid

Details of the raid, albeit observed from a distance, were tweeted by Abbottābad resident Sohaib Athar, who initially did not know what was happening; he had begun tweeting by complaining about the unaccustomed noise of low-flying helicopters.[110][111][112] 

Karachi's Geo News described a helicopter crash and "heavy firing" on the evening of May 1 "near the PMA Kakul Road".[113]

The UK Telegraph quoted a resident of the area who said: "We saw four helicopters at around 2 am. We were told to switch off lights of our homes and stay inside."[114]

According to BBC's Owen Bennett-Jones in Islamabad, reporting two days after the raid, ISI informed him after questioning survivors of the raid that there were 17 to 18 people in the compound at the time of the attack and that the Americans took away one person still alive, possibly a bin Laden son. 

The ISI also said that survivors included a wife, a daughter and eight to nine other children, not apparently bin Laden's.

Code name

There were conflicting reports in the media regarding what the official mission code name was. 

Originally reported as "Operation Geronimo" it subsequently was reported as "Operation Neptune['s] Spear"[59][115]; with "Geronimo" as the code name for bin Laden himself.[116]

The name derives from Geronimo, the Native American leader of the Chiricahua Apache who defied the U.S. government and eluded capture. 

Unlike bin Laden, Geronimo was never killed by U.S. military forces. 

Channel 4 News said "According to some analyses today, the U.S. military chose the code name because bin Laden, like Geronimo, had evaded capture for years. If they were trying to avoid mythmaking, it seems they chose the wrong code name."[117] 

Once bin Laden was killed, one of the commanders reported "Geronimo E-KIA", meaning that the mission had ended with the "Enemy Killed In Action" [118]

Native Americans objected to the use of the name Geronimo. 

"It's how deeply embedded the 'Indian as enemy' is in the collective mind of America," said Suzan Shown Harjo, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Morning Star Institute, a Native American advocacy group. 

"There is little doubt [the] use of a leader like Geronimo to refer to bin Laden is ill-advised," wrote Keith Harper, an attorney and member of the Cherokee Nation, in an email with a reporter for the The Washington Post.[119]

Identification of the body

Immediately following the raid, the body believed to be bin Laden's was taken to Jalalabad, Afghanistan.[62]

According to ABC News, identification methods included measurement of the body (both the corpse and bin Laden were 6' 4" (1.93 meters) tall); facial recognition software (a photograph transmitted by the SEALs to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia yielded a 90 to 95 percent likely match), and two women from the compound identified bin Laden's body after death.[62] 

ABC News, the Associated Press, and The New York Times reported that bin Laden's body was identified by DNA testing,[12][120][121] using tissue and blood samples taken from his sister who had died of brain cancer.[122] 

ABC News stated, "Two samples were taken from bin Laden: one of these DNA samples was analyzed, and information was sent electronically back to Washington, D.C., from Bagram. Someone else from Afghanistan is physically bringing back a sample."[62] 

Reuters reported, however, that DNA test results would be available in a few days, and that bin Laden's body had been identified using facial recognition techniques.[123]

A wife of bin Laden also apparently called him by name during the raid, inadvertently assisting in his identification by U.S. armed forces on the ground.[124][125][126] 

One of bin Laden's wives identified the body.[127]

Bin Laden had €500 and two phone numbers stitched into his clothes at the time of the raid.[104]

Photo-release debate

Bin Laden's body was photographed multiple times (in Pakistan, Afghanistan and aboard the USS Carl Vinson) before it was buried at sea, sparking a debate about whether to release the photos.[128] 

Those supporting the release of the photos said it would prove his death and prevent conspiracy theories that bin Laden is still alive, while others expressed concern that the photos would inflame anti-American sentiment in the Middle East.[129]

On May 3, 2011, CIA Director Leon Panetta said in an interview with NBC Nightly News that photographs of the deceased bin Laden would "ultimately" be released, but the White House immediately denied that any decision had been made, referring to the photos—which reportedly show that a portion of bin Laden's skull had been blown off—as "gruesome".[130] 

A source told ABC News, the photos depict the physical damage done by "high-caliber bullet."[104]

President Obama ultimately decided not release the photos, in hopes of ward off backlash to the violent imagery.[131]

Burial at sea


According to a U.S. official on May 2, bin Laden's body was handled in accordance with Islamic practice and tradition[132] and was buried at sea less than a day after his death.[133][134][135][136] 

The body was transported to the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Carl Vinson, the flagship of Carrier Strike Group One, operating in the northern Arabian Sea,[137] and at 1:10 am EDT, the body was "washed in accordance with Islamic custom, placed in a white sheet, then put inside a weighted bag". 

After religious statements translated into Arabic were made, the body "was placed onto a flat board, which was then elevated upward on one side, and... slid off into the sea".[127][138]

Under Islamic tradition, however, burial at sea is considered by some to be inappropriate when other, preferred forms of burial are available, and several prominent Islamic clerics criticized the decision.[127][139][140] 

Dr. Mohamed Ahmed el-Tayeb, the head of Al-Azhar University, Egypt's seat of Sunni Muslim learning, said the disposal of the body at sea was an affront to religious and human values.[141]

In the Sunni Shafi'i Fiqh book Umdat al-Salik wa Uddat al-Nasik, the condition for sea burial is given as follows: "It is best to bury him in the cemetery... If someone dies on a ship and it is impossible to bury him on land, the body is placed between two planks and thrown into the sea."[142]

The advantage to the United States of a burial at sea is that the burial site is not readily identified or accessed, thus preventing a burial site from becoming a focus of attention or "terrorist shrine".[143] 

The Guardian has questioned whether bin Laden's grave would have been a shrine, a concept rejected by Wahhabism. 

It also quotes a U.S. official explaining the difficulty of finding a country that would accept the burial of bin Laden in its soil.[144] 

A professor of Islamic Law at the University of Jordan, Mohammed Qudah, stated burying at sea was permitted only if there was nobody to receive the body and provide a Muslim burial.[145] 

Khalid Latif, an imam who serves as a chaplain and the director of the Islamic Center of New York University, argued that the sea burial was respectful.[146] 

Other American Muslim chaplains such as Imam Abdullah El-Amin of Detroit's Muslim Center have voiced concern against the sea burial, given that the deceased died on land.[147]

According to two Pentagon officials, a video of the burial may be released.[148]

Address of President Barack Obama


Late in the evening of May 1, 2011, major American news organizations were informed that the president would give an important speech on an undisclosed subject related to national security. 

Rumors initially spread wildly about the subject,[149] until it was revealed that President Barack Obama was to announce the death of Osama bin Laden. 

At 11:35 p.m. EDT (May 2, 2011, 3:35 UTC), Obama confirmed this and said that bin Laden had been killed by "a small team of Americans".[150][151] 

He explained how the killing of bin Laden was achieved after following up on a lead from August 2010, what his role was in the series of events, and what the death of bin Laden meant on a symbolic and practical level.[152]

“Today, at my direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound, in Abbottābad, Pakistan. A small team of Americans carried out the operation with extraordinary courage and capability. No Americans were harmed. They took care to avoid civilian casualties. After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body.”

—President Barack Obama, May 1, 2011[153]

Legality

Although Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama have stated that justice was done, some legal experts and others are not convinced.[154] 

Professor Nick Grief, an international lawyer at Kent University stated the attack had the appearance of an "extrajudicial killing without due process of the law."[154] 

On a note of caution he added: "It may not have been possible to take him alive... but no one should be outside the protection of the law." 

Even after the end of the second world war, Nazi war criminals had been given a "fair trial."[154]

Michael Mansfield QC also had his doubts about whether sufficient efforts had been made to capture bin Laden.[154] 

"The serious risk is that in the absence of an authoritative narrative of events played out in Abbottabad, vengeance will become synonymised with justice, and that revenge will supplant 'due process'."[154] 

"Assuming the mission was... intended to detain and not to assassinate, it is therefore imperative that a properly documented and verifiable narrative of exactly what happened is made public. Whatever feelings of elation and relief may dominate the airwaves," he said, "they must not be allowed to submerge core questions about the legality of the exercise, nor to permit vengeance or summary execution to become substitutes for justice."[154]

The human rights lawyer Geoffrey Robertson QC said that the killing risked undermining the rule of law.[154] 

"The security council could have set up an ad hoc tribunal in The Hague, with international judges (including Muslim jurists), to provide a fair trial and a reasoned verdict," he wrote in The Independent.[154] 

"This would have been the best way of demystifying this man, debunking his cause and de-brainwashing his followers."[154]

John Bellinger III, who served as the state department's senior lawyer during George Bush's second term as president, also insisted the strike was legitimate. 

"The killing is not prohibited by the long-standing assassination prohibition in executive order 12333 [signed in 1981] because the action was a military action in the ongoing US armed conflict with al-Qaida and it is not prohibited to kill specific leaders of an opposing force. The assassination prohibition also does not apply to killings in self-defence. The executive branch will also argue that the action was permissible under international law both as a permissible use of force in the US armed conflict with al-Qaida and as a legitimate action in self-defence, given that bin Laden was clearly planning additional attacks." 

A US embassy spokesman in London put forth the American justification as "in war you are allowed to attack your enemy."[155]

The Pakistan foreign ministry has called into question the legality of American action by expressing "deep concerns" about the "unauthorised unilateral action". 

According to former West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, "it was quite clearly a violation of international law".[156]

Navi Pillay, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights has asked the American government to explain whether US forces acted legally in their killing of Osama bin Laden.[157]

Amnesty International said it was seeking "greater clarification" about what went on, while New York-based Human Rights Watch said "law enforcement" principles should have applied.[157]

Aftermath

An unnamed Pakistani government official confirmed to Agence France-Presse on May 2 that bin Laden was killed in the operation.[158] 

The Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan issued a statement on May 2 denying that bin Laden had been killed.[159]

Hours later, Pakistani Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan said that if bin Laden had, in fact, been killed, it was, "a great victory for us because martyrdom is the aim of all of us" and vowed to take revenge on Pakistan and the United States.[160] 

Tehrik-i-Taliban later confirmed bin Laden's death.[161]

Reactions


Within minutes of the official announcement, large crowds spontaneously gathered outside the White House, Ground Zero, the Pentagon and in New York's Times Square to celebrate.[9] 

In Dearborn, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit with a large Muslim and Arab population, a small crowd gathered outside the City Hall in celebration, many of them being of Middle Eastern descent.[162]

From the beginning to the end of Obama's speech, 5,000 tweets per second were sent on microblogging platformTwitter.[163] 

Fans attending a nationally televised Major League Baseball game between two National League East rivals, the Philadelphia Phillies and the New York Mets, at Citizens Bank Park initiated "U-S-A!" cheers in response to the news.[164] 

In addition, at the conclusion of WWE Extreme Rules, which was occuring at the time, WWE Champion John Cena announced to the audience in attendence the capture and "compromise to a permanent end" of Osama Bin Laden, prompting chants while he exited the arena to the song "Stars and Stripes Forever".

This resultant euphoria has, however, been criticized by progressive[165][166][167][168] columnist David Sirota as an inappropriate reaction to human death.[169]

Mahmud Ezzat, the deputy leader of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, said that, with bin Laden dead, western forces should now pull out of Iraq and Afghanistan; authorities in Iran made similar comments.[170] 

Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas welcomed bin Laden's death; the rival Hamas administration in the Palestinian Gaza Strip condemned the killing of an "Arab holy warrior", possibly in order to "cool tensions in the territory with Al-Qaeda inspired Salafi groups" that consider Hamas "too moderate".[171]

Intelligence postmortem: A special CIA team has been tasked with combing through the digital material and documents removed from the bin Laden compound.[172]

Earlier death reports


  • December 2001: Quoting an unnamed Taliban official, the Pakistan Observer reported that bin Laden died of untreated lung complications and was buried in an unmarked grave in Tora Bora on December 15.[173] This report was picked up by Fox News in the U.S. on December 26.[174] Also on December 26, the Egyptian newspaper Al-Wafd carried a shortobituary by a "prominent official" of the Afghan Taliban, who was supposedly present at the funeral, stating bin Laden had been buried on or around December 13:[175]

    "[Osama bin Laden] suffered serious complications and died a natural, quiet death. He was buried in Tora Bora, a funeral attended by 30 Al Qaeda fighters, close members of his family and friends from the Taliban. By the Wahhabi tradition, no mark was left on the grave"

    A videotape was released on December 27 showing a gaunt, unwell bin Laden, prompting an unnamed White House aide to comment that it could have been made shortly before his death.[173] On CNN, Dr. Sanjay Gupta commented that bin Laden's left arm never moved during the video, suggesting a recent stroke and possibly a symptom of kidney failure.[176]According to Pakistani President Musharraf, bin Laden required two dialysis machines, which also suggested kidney failure.[177] "I think now, frankly, he is dead for the reason he is a... kidney patient," Musharraf said.[177] If bin Laden suffered kidney failure, he would have required a sterile environment, electricity, and continuous attention by a team of specialists, Gupta said.[176] In April 2002, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld stated, "We have heard neither hide nor hair of him since, oh, about December in terms of anything hard."[178] FBI Counterterrorism chief Dale Watson and President Karzai of Afghanistan also expressed the opinion that bin Laden probably died at this time.[179][180]
  • July 2002: FBI counterterrorism chief Dale Watson states that bin Laden "is probably not with us anymore but I have no evidence to support that."[181][182]
  • October 2002: Hamid Karzai stated that "I would come to believe that [bin Laden] probably is dead."[183]
  • November 2005: Senator Harry Reid stated that "I heard today that he may have died in the earthquake that they had in Pakistan, seriously."[184][185]
  • Late 2005: CIA disbands "Bin Laden Issue Station", codenamed "Alec Station", the CIA's bin Laden tracking unit, 1996–2005.[186]
  • September 2006: On September 23, 2006, the French newspaper L'Est Républicain quoted a report from the French secret service (Direction générale de la sécurité extérieure, DGSE) stating that bin Laden had died in Pakistan on August 23, 2006, after contracting a case of typhoid fever that paralyzed his lower limbs.[187] According to the newspaper, Saudi security services first heard of bin Laden's supposed death on September 4, 2006.[188][189][190] The supposed death was reported by the Saudi Arabian secret service to its government, which reported it to the French secret service. The French defense minister Michèle Alliot-Marie expressed her regret that the report had been published while French President Jacques Chirac declared that bin Laden's death had not been confirmed.[191] American authorities also could not confirm reports of bin Laden's death,[192] with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice saying only, "No comment, and no knowledge."[193] Later, CNN's Nic Robertson said that he had received confirmation from an anonymous Saudi source that the Saudi intelligence community has known for a while that bin Laden has a water-borne illness, but that he had heard no reports that it was specifically typhoid or that he had died.[194]
  • November 2007: Political interviewer David Frost interviewed Pakistani politician and Pakistan People's Party leader Benazir Bhutto on November 2, 2007. In answering a question as to who had previously attempted her assassination, Bhutto named Omar Sheikh as a possible suspect, identifying him as "the man who murdered Osama bin Laden." Despite the significance of such a statement, neither Bhutto nor Frost attempted to clarify it or discuss it further during the remainder of the interview.[195] Omar Chatriwala, a journalist for Al Jazeera English, said that he chose not to pursue the story at the time because he believed Bhutto misspoke, meaning to say that Sheikh had murdered Daniel Pearl — and not Osama bin Laden. The BBC drew criticism when it rebroadcast the Frost/Bhutto interview on its website, but edited out Bhutto's statement regarding bin Laden. Later the BBC apologized and replaced the edited version with the complete interview.[196] In October 2007, Bhutto stated in an interview that she would cooperate with the American military in targeting bin Laden.[197]
  • 2008: Robert Baer, a former CIA operative, stated that "Of course he’s dead" and questioned the relevancy of bin Laden.[198][181]
  • April 2009: During an interview with The Telegraph, Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari raised the prospect that bin Laden could be dead, after he said that intelligence officials could find "no trace" of the al Qaeda chief. Zardari's predecessor, Pervez Musharraf, similarly suggested that bin Laden could be dead. Additionally, Pakistan's intelligence agencies believed bin Laden possibly to be dead.[199]
  • March 2009: Angelo M. Codevilla, a professor emeritus of international relations at Boston University, wrote that "all the evidence suggests Elvis Presley is more alive today than Osama bin Laden."[200]
  • May 2009: In Osama Bin Laden: Dead or Alive?, it was argued that bin Laden had died of kidney failure.[175][181]

Previous attempts to capture or kill bin Laden

  • February 1994: A team of Libyans attacked bin Laden's home in Sudan. The government investigated and reported that they had been hired by Saudi Arabia, but Saudi Arabia accused them of lying to make bin Laden more amenable to Sudanese interests.[201]
  • August 20, 1998: In Operation Infinite Reach, the US Navy launched 66 cruise missiles at a suspected al Qaeda training camp outside Khost, Afghanistan, where bin Laden was expected to be. Reports said that 30 people may have been killed.[202]
  • 2000: Foreign operatives working on behalf of the CIA 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.[203]
  • December 2001: During the opening stages of the war in Afghanistan launched following the 9/11 attacks, the U.S. and its allies believed that bin Laden was hiding in the rugged mountains at Tora Bora. Despite overrunning the Taliban and al-Qaeda positions they failed to capture or kill him.[204]

Conspiracy theories

The claim that Osama bin Laden died on May 2, 2011, is not universally accepted,[205] despite extensive DNA testing having been conducted to verify his identity.[12][120][121] 

The swift burial of the body at sea, speed of the DNA results and refusal of President Obama to release the pictures has led to theories that bin Laden did not die in the May 2 raid.[206] 

The Daily Telegraph reported on May 3, 2011 that "several Facebook groups have sprung up with titles such as 'Osama bin Laden NOT DEAD'". 

Some Internet blogs have suggested that the US government feigned the raid, and Internet forums have seen debates over the alleged hoax.[207]

References

  1. ^ "Bin Laden 'shot in the head and chest'" - Daily News - May 03, 2011 - Retrieved 3 May 2011.
  2. ^ Doug Luzader (May 2, 2011). "Bin Laden Killed after Firefight in Pakistan". Fox News.
  3. ^ MacAskill, Ewen (May 2, 2011). "How was Osama bin Laden found?".The Guardian (London).
  4. ^ May 1, 20:00 UTC, 16:00 EDT/13:00 PDT.
  5. ^ "Bin Laden compound in Pakistan was once an ISI safe house". Gulf News. May 3, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  6. ^ Declan Walsh, Richard Adams, Ewen MacAskill (May 2, 2011). "Osama bin Laden is dead, Obama announces". The Guardian (London).
  7. ^ Cooper, Helene (May 1, 2011). "Obama Announces Killing of Osama bin Laden". The New York Times. Archived from the original on May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  8. ^ a b "Osama Bin Laden, al-Qaeda leader, dead - Barack Obama". BBC News. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  9. ^ a b Adams, Richard; Walsh, Declan; MacAskill, Ewen (May 2, 2011)."Osama bin Laden is dead, Obama announces". The Guardian (London). Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  10. ^ Michael Murray (May 2, 2011). "Osama Bin Laden Dead: The Navy SEALs Who Hunted and Killed Al Qaeda Leader". ABC News. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  11. ^ Foster, Daniel (May 2, 2011). "More Operational Details". The Corner. National Review Online. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  12. ^ a b c Schabner, Dean and Travers, Karen (May 1, 2011). "Osama bin Laden Killed; ID Confirmed by DNA Testing". ABC News. Retrieved May 1, 2011.
  13. ^ UN chief Ban hails bin Laden death as "watershed", Reuters May 2, 2011
  14. ^ Richard Spencer (May 2, 2011). "Osama bin Laden dead: Hamas condemns killing of bin Laden". London: The Telegraph. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  15. ^ a b Shane, Scott; Charlie Savage (3 May 2011). ""Bin Laden Raid Revives Debate on Value of Torture"". The New York Times. Retrieved 4 May 2011.
  16. ^ "Rumsfeld Exclusive: There Was No Waterboarding of Courier Source".Newsmax. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  17. ^ a b "Phone call by Kuwaiti courier led to bin Laden". Associated Press. May 3, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  18. ^ "Iraq - Morocco - Afghanistan - Pakistan: the rendition and torture of Hassan Ghul". Uruknet. November 15, 2010. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  19. ^ "Bin Laden skull blown apart, official says". CBS News. May 3, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  20. ^ "Tip to bin Laden may have come from Guantánamo". The Miami Herald. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  21. ^ "Tips Led To Kill Shots" - New York Daily News - May 3, 2011, page 2 - Retrieved 3 May 2011.
  22. ^ "JTF-GTMO Detainee Assessment". Wikileaks. September 10, 2008. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  23. ^ Sears, Neil (May 3, 2011). "Did latest WikiLeaks revelations force U.S. to take out Bin Laden?". London: Daily Mail. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  24. ^ a b c d Mazzetti, Mark; Cooper, Helene (May 2, 2011). "Detective Work on Courier Led to Breakthrough on Bin Laden". The New York Times. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  25. ^ a b c d Dedman, Bill. "How the U.S. tracked couriers to elaborate bin Laden compound". msnbc.com. Archived from the original on May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  26. ^ a b Zengerle, Patricia; Bull, Alister (May 2, 2011). "Bin Laden was found at luxurious Pakistan compound". Reuters. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  27. ^ a b Myers, Steven Lee; Elisabeth Bumiller (May 3, 2011). "Obama Calls World Safer After Death of Bin Laden". The New York Times. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  28. ^ "Pakistan defends Bin Laden role". BBC News. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  29. ^ "Spitzer: What role did Pakistan play in the killing of Osama bin Laden?". CNN. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  30. ^ "President Obama Praises Troops Who Killed Osama bin Laden". ABC News. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  31. ^ "Osama bin Laden, the face of terror, killed in Pakistan". CNN. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  32. ^ Nic Robertson on CNN last night
  33. ^ "Was Osama killed by US troops or his own guard?, Ismail Khan, Dawn 3 May 2011". Dawn.com. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  34. ^ Previous post Next post (January 4, 2009). "Video: Inside bin Laden's Drone-Proof Compound | Danger Room". Wired. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  35. ^ "National Counterterrorism Center: How A Little-Known Spy Agency Helped Track Down Osama Bin Laden".
  36. ^ a b c d e "The secret team that killed bin Laden". National Journal. May 2, 2011.
  37. ^ a b Rodriguez, Alex (May 2, 2011). "Suspicions grow over whether Pakistan aided Osama bin Laden". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  38. ^ Solomon, Jay (May 3, 2011). "Pakistan's bin Laden Connection Is Probed". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  39. ^ a b "Did Pakistan Army shelter Osama?". IndianExpress. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  40. ^ "Obama kept Pakistan in dark about Osama attack". News One.
  41. ^ "Did Pakistan Army shelter Osama?". IndianExpress.
  42. ^ "Did Pakistan know of U.S. raid to kill Osama?". Mid Day. May 2, 2011.
  43. ^ Ross, Tim (May 2, 2011). "WikiLeaks: Osama bin Laden 'protected' by Pakistani security". The Daily Telegraph (London). Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  44. ^ Calabresi, Massimo (3 May 2011). "CIA Chief Breaks Silence: Pakistan Would Have Jeopardized bin Laden Raid, ‘Impressive’ Intel Captured".TIME. Retrieved 3 May 2011.
  45. ^ "Clinton: Pakistan helped lead US to bin Laden". Forbes. Associated Press (Washington, DC). May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  46. ^ a b c d Walsh, Nick Paton; Peter Bergen (May 2, 2011). "Official: Pakistan had but didn't probe data that helped make raid". Islamabad, Pakistan: CNN. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  47. ^ "Pressure on Pakistan after bin Laden death-lawmaker". Dawn. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  48. ^ MacAskill, Ewen; Walsh, Declan (May 2, 2011). "Osama bin Laden: Dead, but how did he hide so long?". The Guardian (London). Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  49. ^ Doyle, Michael (May 2, 2011). "Feinstein got early head's up that something big was on". The Miami Herald. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  50. ^ "Pakistan's critics ask how bin Laden's refuge went unnoticed". The Washington Post. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  51. ^ "Official: Pakistan had but didn't probe data that helped make raid". CNN. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  52. ^ Wright, Tom (May 2, 2011). "India Uses Osama Death to Pressure Pakistan". The Wall Street Journal.
  53. ^ Woodcock, Andrew (May 2, 2011). "MP 'shocked' at bin Laden Pakistan discovery". The Independent (London). Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  54. ^ Ahmed, Ashfaq (May 3, 2011). "Compound in Pakistan was once a safe house". Gulf News. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  55. ^ Smith, Graeme (3 May 2011). "Bin Laden given haven by militants linked to Pakistani security forces". The Globe and Mail. Retrieved 4 May 2011.
  56. ^ a b "Bin Laden raid: US had plan to capture Osama", Chicago Sun-Times, May 2, 2011
  57. ^ a b LOLITA C. BALDOR. "Osama Bin Laden Death: Obama Ran Serious Risks With Mission To Kill Terrorist Leader". Associated Press.
  58. ^ Jim Lehrer (May 3, 2011). "CIA Chief Panetta: Obama Made 'Gutsy' Decision on Bin Laden Raid".
  59. ^ a b Jake Tapper. "US Official: "This Was a Kill Mission"". ABC News.
  60. ^ "Osama bin Laden dead". Huffington Post. May 2, 2011.
  61. ^ a b c d e "Osama bin Laden raid yields trove of computer data".
  62. ^ a b c d "President Obama to National Security Team: 'It's a Go'".
  63. ^ "In March, President Obama Authorized Development of Plan to Bomb Compound but Wanting Evidence of OBL's Death, Did Not Execute*- Political Punch". ABC News. February 5, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  64. ^ a b c d e f g Mazzetti, Mark (May 2, 2011). "Behind the Hunt for Bin Laden".The New York Times. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  65. ^ "Video: Inside bin Laden's Drone-Proof Compound". May 2, 2011.
  66. ^ Declan Walsh, Esther Addley, and Ewen MacAskill, "40 minutes of battle, and two shots to the head" (May 2, 2011). The Guardian.
  67. ^ Rebecca Boyle, "Before the Raid, SEALs Rehearsed in a Full-Scale Replica of the Bin Laden Compound" (May 2, 2011). Popular Science.
  68. ^ a b c d Tapper, Jake (May 2, 2011). "Some White Knuckle Moments for Elite Navy SEALs Team". ABC News.
  69. ^ Gordon Rayner and Toby Harnden, "Osama bin Laden killed by special forces after aerial bombing ruled out by Obama" (May 2, 2011), The Telegraph.
  70. ^ Osama bin Laden killed while hiding in Pakistan, USA: NPR, May 2, 2011
  71. ^ "President Obama to national security team: it's a go". ABC News. May 2, 2011.
  72. ^ Dilanian, Ken (May 2, 2011). "CIA led U.S. special forces mission against Osama bin Laden". Los Angeles Times.
  73. ^ Myers, Steven Lee; Bumiller, Elisabeth (May 2, 2011). "Obama Calls World 'Safer' After Pakistan Raid". The New York Times.
  74. ^ a b Roggio, Bill, "Pakistan critical of 'unilateral' US raid that killed Osama bin Laden", Public Multimedia, May 3, 2011.
  75. ^ a b Greenhill, Sam; Williams, David; Hussain, Imtiaz (May 3, 2011). "How a 40-minute raid ended ten years of defiance, as American troops' head cameras relayed every detail to the President". Daily Mail (London).
  76. ^ a b c Martin, David, CBS Evening News, 3 May 2011.
  77. ^ "SEALs Sent to Kill bin Laden".
  78. ^ a b "CNN liveblog of Osama death".
  79. ^ "President Obama had authorized bombing of compound in March but, wanting evidence of OBL's death, cancelled it". ABC News. May 2, 2011.
  80. ^ Roggio, Bill, "Pakistani complicity in sheltering Osama bin Laden",Public Multimedia, May 2, 2011.
  81. ^ a b "Osama Bin Laden Unarmed When Killed, White House Says". May 3, 2011.
  82. ^ Gorman, Siobhan; Entous, Adam (May 3, 2011). "U.S. Rolled Dice in bin Laden Raid". The Wall Street Journal.
  83. ^ ADAM GOLDMAN and MATT APUZZO. "Osama Bin Laden Dead: How One Phone Call Led U.S. To Bin Laden's Doorstep". Associated Press.
  84. ^ "Bin Laden raid was revealed on Twitter". BBC News. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  85. ^ Ross, Brian; Jake Tapper, Richard Esposito, Nick Schifrin (May 2, 2011)."Osama Bin Laden Killed By Navy SEALs in Firefight". ABC News. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  86. ^ Katie Couric, CBS Evening News, May 2, 2011.
  87. ^ NBC News, May 2, 2011.
  88. ^ "U.S. revises story on bin Laden's raid, offers more details". CNN. 4 May 2011. Retrieved 4 May 2011.
  89. ^ a b "How U.S. forces killed Osama bin Laden". CNN. May 3, 2011.
  90. ^ Benac, Nancy (Associated Press). "Bin Laden was unarmed when SEALs stormed room", Yahoo! News. May 3, 2011. Retrieved May 4, 2011.
  91. ^ "Bin Laden: How Obama team saw drama unfold". May 3, 2011.
  92. ^ a b Brian Ross; Lee Ferran (May 3, 2011). "Osama Bin Laden Unarmed When Killed, White House Says". ABC News. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  93. ^ a b "Behind High Walls, Model Neighbors Were Harboring a Fugitive". May 3, 2011.
  94. ^ Agence France-Presse/GEO News, "Osama, son among five killed in raid: US", May 2, 2011.
  95. ^ Brian Ross (May 4, 2011). "The Young Wife Who Defended Osama Bin Laden". ABC News.
  96. ^ a b "Pakistan admits Bin Laden intelligence failure". BBC News. May 3, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  97. ^ Walsh, Declan. "Osama bin Laden killing prompts US-Pakistan war of words". The Guardian (London).
  98. ^ "Bin Laden's demise: Long pursuit, burst of gunfire". Associated Press. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  99. ^ Drogin, Bob; Parsons, Christi; Dilanian, Ken (May 3, 2011). "How Bin Laden met his end". Los Angeles Times.
  100. ^ "Image of Osama’s Yemeni wife passport received". GEO TV. May 04, 2011.
  101. ^ Kimberly Dozier (May 2, 2011). "US official: 23 children, 9 women with bin Laden". The San Francisco Chronicle. Associated Press. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  102. ^ Ross, Brian (May 2, 2011). "Osama Bin Laden: Navy SEALS Operation Details of Raid That Killed 9/11 Al Qaeda Leader". ABC News. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  103. ^ Adam Goldman and Chris Brummitt, "Bin Laden's demise: Long pursuit, burst of gunfire" (May 3, 2011). Associated Press.
  104. ^ a b c "Osama Bin Laden Escape Plan: Money Found Stitched in Bin Laden's Clothes". ABC. 4. Retrieved 4 May 2011.
  105. ^ "Wild moments during daring SEAL assault". May 2, 2011.
  106. ^ "Osama bin Laden killed in Pakistan, says Obama". Dawn. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  107. ^ "Bin Laden operation conducted by U.S. forces: Pakistan". Dawn.com. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  108. ^ Ali, Asif (May 3, 2011). "Pakistan did its part". The Washington Post. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  109. ^ Yusufzai, Mushtaq (2011), Bin Laden’s daughter confirms her father shot dead by US Special Forces in Pakistan, retrieved 2011-05-04
  110. ^ Athar, Sohaib. "Helicopter hovering above Abbottābad at 1 am (is a rare event)". Twitter. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  111. ^ Hadid, Diaa (May 2, 2011), "Pakistani programmer unknowingly tweets bin Laden operation", The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
  112. ^ "From Abbottabad, Live-Tweeting the Bin Laden Attack". Shefali Anand.The Wall Street Journal. May 2, 2011
  113. ^ "Chopper crashes, three blasts heard near PMA Kakul". Thenews.com.pk. February 5, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  114. ^ Ashfaq Yusufzai (May 2, 2011). "Osama Bin Laden Dead: as seen by local residents". The Telegraph (London). Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  115. ^ @GMA Twitter, 5/3
  116. ^ Elizabeth Flock (05/04/2011). "Geronimo, Operation Desert Storm, and other code names that surprised us".
  117. ^ "Target bin Laden: why was he code named 'Geronimo'?." Channel 4 News. May 3, 2011. Retrieved on May 3, 2011.
  118. ^ "To the bottom of the sea: Bin Laden's last day." CBS News. May 2, 2011. Retrieved on May 4, 2011.
  119. ^ Tucker, Neely (May 3, 2011). "American Indians object to 'Geronimo' as code for bin Laden raid". The Washington Post. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  120. ^ a b "AP sources: DNA testing confirms bin Laden death". Forbes. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  121. ^ a b Lee, Steven (May 3, 2011). "Obama Calls World Safer After Death of Bin Laden". The New York Times (Pakistan). Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  122. ^ "Osama Bin Laden's body 'identified by sister's brain'". The Daily Telegraph (London). May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  123. ^ Zakaria, Tabassum (May 2, 2011). "U.S. tests bin Laden's DNA, used facial ID: official". Reuters. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  124. ^ Jeff Mason, Alister Bull (May 2, 2011). "Bin Laden hid behind women in firefight: White House". Reuters. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  125. ^ Flock, Elizabeth (February 7, 2011). "Bin Laden's wife used as human shield - BlogPost". The Washington Post. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  126. ^ "AP source: DNA IDs bin Laden, wife named him in raid". USA Today. May 2, 2011.
  127. ^ a b c Leland, John; Bumiller, Elisabeth (May 2, 2011), "Islamic Scholars Split Over Sea Burial for Bin Laden", The New York Times, retrieved May 3, 2011
  128. ^ Winter, Michael (2011-01-05). "To release or not: Bin Laden death photos spark debate". Content.usatoday.com. Retrieved 2011-05-03.
  129. ^ "9/11 Families Calling for Osama Bin Laden Death Photo". Abcnews.go.com. 2001-09-11. Retrieved 2011-05-03.
  130. ^ "Panetta: Bin Laden death photo to be released". msnbc.msn.com. 2011-03-05. Retrieved 2011-05-03.
  131. ^ Jake Tapper. "Concerned About Potential Backlash, President Obama Won’t Release Photo of Bin Laden Corpse".
  132. ^ Mason, Jeff (May 2, 2011). "U.S. handling bin Laden's body in Islamic tradition". Reuters. London, UK. Archived from the original on May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  133. ^ Jonathan Karl. "Osama Bin Laden Body Headed for Burial at Sea, Officials Say". ABC News. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  134. ^ "How U.S. forces killed Osama bin Laden". Cable News Network. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  135. ^ "US forces kill Osama bin Laden in Pakistan". msnbc.com. February 5, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  136. ^ "Bin Laden remains given burial at sea". Toronto Star. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  137. ^ Jim Garamone (May 2, 2011). "Bin Laden Buried at Sea". American Forces Press Service. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  138. ^ "Burial at sea is routine for US Navy". Associated Press. May 3, 2010. Retrieved 2011-05-04.
  139. ^ "Osama Bin Laden Dead: Muslim Scholars Call Al Qaeda Leader's Sea Burial 'Humiliating". Hamza Hendawi. The Huffington Post. May 2, 2011
  140. ^ Agile Telecom Ltd. and Xidemia (May 3, 2011). "Local Muslims question sea-burial, By AZARD ALI, Trinidad and Tobago Newsday, Tuesday, May 3, 2011". Newsday.co.tt. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  141. ^ "Obama says world safer without Bin Laden, AlJazeera English, 3 May 2011". English.aljazeera.net. May 3, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  142. ^ Reliance of the Traveller, Ahmad ibn Naqib al-Misri, p 237, Translated by Nuh Ha Mim Keller, Amanah publications, ISBN 0-915957-72-8
  143. ^ "Osama Bin Laden Body Headed for Burial at Sea, Officials Say – The Note". ABC News. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  144. ^ Whitaker, Brian (May 2, 2011). "Bin Laden's body buried at sea". The Guardian (London). Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  145. ^ Hamza Hendawi (2 May 2011). "Islamic scholars criticize bin Laden's sea burial". San Diego Union Tribune. Retrieved 4 May 2011. "But Mohammed Qudah, a professor of Islamic law at the University of Jordan, said burying the Saudi-born bin Laden at sea was not forbidden if there was nobody to receive the body and provide a Muslim burial. "The land and the sea belong to God, who is able to protect and raise the dead at the end of times for Judgment Day," he said. "It's neither true nor correct to claim that there was nobody in the Muslim world ready to receive bin Laden's body.""
  146. ^ Latif, Khalid. "My Take: Burial at sea shows compassion of Islamic law." CNN. May 2, 2011. Retrieved on May 3, 2011.
  147. ^ "Bin Laden's burial at sea criticized by metro Detroit funeral home operators, Detroit Free Press, May 3, 2011". Freep.com. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  148. ^ "AP sources: bin Laden burial video may be released". Yahoo! News. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  149. ^ Stelter, Brian (May 1, 2011). "How the bin Laden Announcement Leaked Out". The New York Times. Retrieved May 1, 2011.
  150. ^ "Obama's statement on the death of bin Laden". CNN. July 16, 2010. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  151. ^ Goldman, Julianna (May 1, 2011). "Obama to Announce Bin Laden is Dead, US Official Says". Bloomberg. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  152. ^ Goldman, Adam; Brummitt, Chris (2011-05—02). "Bin Laden's demise: US rejoices after a decade". Associated Press. SFGate. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  153. ^ Obama, President Barack (May 2, 2011). "Obama's Remarks on bin Laden's Killing". The New York Times. Retrieved May 1, 2011.
  154. ^ a b c d e f g h i http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/may/03/osama-bin-laden-killing-legality
  155. ^ Bowcott, Owen (May 3, 2011). "Osama bin Laden: US responds to questions about killing's legality". The Guardian (London).
  156. ^http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2011/05/20115319011610215.html
  157. ^ a bhttp://www.vancouversun.com/news/human+rights+boss+questions+legality+Laden+killing/4725624/story.html
  158. ^ GEO News, "Security official confirms bin Laden killed", May 2, 2011.
  159. ^ GEO News, "TTP says Osama alive", May 2, 2011.
  160. ^ Agence France-Presse, "Taliban threaten US, Pakistan over Osama",GEO News, May 2, 2011.
  161. ^ GEO News, "We will avenge Osama killing: TTP", May 3, 2011.
  162. ^ Salazar, Evan (May 2, 2011). "Crowds gather in NYC, DC after bin Laden killed". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  163. ^ "Bin Laden Announcement Twitter Traffic Spikes Higher Than The Super Bowl". Techcrunch. May 2, 2011. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  164. ^ Rubin, Adam (May 2, 2011). "Phillies crowd erupts in 'U-S-A' cheers".ESPNNewYork.com. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  165. ^ "Progressive references".
  166. ^ "Editor & Publisher". Editorandpublisher.com. Retrieved 2011-05-04.
  167. ^ David Sirota (June 4, 2008). "Book World: 'The Uprising'". The Washington Post. Retrieved 2009-09-23.
  168. ^ Nate Silver (2009-02-15). "The Two Progressivisms". FiveThirtyEight – Politics Done Right. Retrieved 2009-09-24.
  169. ^ David Sirota. ""USA! USA!" is the wrong response". Salon.
  170. ^ "Death of Bin Laden: Live report". AFP. Google News. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  171. ^ Nidal al-Mughrabi (April 26, 2011). "Abbas government welcomes bin Laden death, Hamas deplores". Reuters. Retrieved May 2, 2011.
  172. ^ . http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/osama-bin-laden-evidence-trove-us-al-qaedas/story?id=13517804.
  173. ^ a b David Ray Griffin, Osama Bin Laden: Dead or Alive?, pp. 3–5.
  174. ^ "Report: Bin Laden Already Dead". Fox News. December 26, 2001. Archived from the original on October 18, 2006. Retrieved May 25, 2010.
  175. ^ a b Reid, Sue (September 11, 2009). "Has Osama Bin Laden been dead for seven years - and are the U.S. and Britain covering it up to continue war on terror?". Daily Mail (London). Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  176. ^ a b "Dr. Sanjay Gupta: Bin Laden would need help if on dialysis". CNN. January 21, 2002. Archived from the original on October 23, 2006. Retrieved May 24, 2010.
  177. ^ a b "Musharraf: bin Laden likely dead". CNN. January 19, 2002. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  178. ^ Robert Burns (April 26, 2002). "Bin Laden Missing since December".Deseret News. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  179. ^ "Bin Laden 'probably' dead". BBC News. July 18, 2002. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  180. ^ "Karzai: bin Laden 'probably' dead". CNN. October 7, 2002. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  181. ^ a b c Weiner, Robert; James Lewis (December 23, 2010). "WEINER: Osama bin Laden is dead". The Washington Times. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  182. ^ Roberts, Joel (July 17, 2002). "FBI Official Thinks Bin Laden Is Dead". CBS News. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  183. ^ "Karzai: bin Laden 'probably' dead". CNN. October 7, 2002. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  184. ^ "Reid thinks Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan earthquake". KRNV. November 25, 2005. Archived from the original on October 15, 2008. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  185. ^ White, Deborah (November 25, 2005). "Deborah White Senator Harry Reid Told Osama Bin Laden Killed in Pakistan Earthquake". About.com. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  186. ^ "C.I.A. Closes Unit Focused on Capture of bin Laden". The New York Times. July 4, 2006. Retrieved May 20, 2010. "The Central Intelligence Agency has closed a unit that for a decade had the mission of hunting Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, intelligence officials confirmed Monday. The unit, known as Alec Station, was disbanded late last year and its analysts reassigned within the CIA Counterterrorist Center, the officials said."
  187. ^ "Officials, friends can't confirm Bin Laden death report". CNN. September 24, 2006. Archived from the original on January 3, 2008. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  188. ^ "French paper says bin Laden died in Pakistan". Epoch Times (Reuters). September 23, 2006.[dead link]
  189. ^ Sammari, Laïd (September 23, 2006). "Oussama Ben Laden serait mort" (in French). L'Est Républicain. Archived from the original on October 11, 2007. Retrieved September 23, 2006.
  190. ^ "Chirac says no evidence bin Laden has died". msnbc.com. Associated Press. September 24, 2006. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  191. ^ "Information sur la mort de ben Laden: Washington ne confirme pas" (in French). Le Monde. Agence France-Presse. September 23, 2006.[dead link]
  192. ^ Anna Willard and David Morgan (September 23, 2006). "France, US, unable to confirm report bin Laden dead". China Daily (Reuters).
  193. ^ "Doubts over bin Laden death". Melbourne: The Age. September 24, 2006. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  194. ^ "Conflicting reports: Bin Laden could be dead or ill". CNN. September 23, 2006.
  195. ^ "Frost over the World – Benazir Bhutto". November 2, 2007. Retrieved January 15, 2008.
  196. ^ Steve Herrmann (January 4, 2008). "Editing Interviews". BBC News. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  197. ^ "Bhutto would take US aid against bin Laden". The Boston Globe. Associated Press. October 2, 2007. Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  198. ^ Baer, Robert (November 18, 2008). "When Will Obama Give Up the Bin Laden Ghost Hunt? - TIME". Time. Retrieved May 3, 2011.
  199. ^ Dean Nelson and Emal Khan (April 27, 2009). "Pakistan's President says Osama bin Laden could be dead". The Daily Telegraph (London). Retrieved May 20, 2010.
  200. ^ Codevilla, Angelo M. (March 2009). "Osama bin Elvis". The American Spectator.
  201. ^ Riedel, Bruce. "The Search for al-Qaeda", 2008
  202. ^ "CIA Trained Pakistanis to Nab Terrorist But Military Coup Put an End to 1999 Plot", The Washington Post, October 3, 2001.
  203. ^ "Report: Clinton Targeted Bin Laden", CBS News, September 16, 2001.
  204. ^ "Lost at Tora Bora", New York Times Magazine, Sept. 11, 2005.
  205. ^ Gold, Matea (May 2, 2011). "Osama bin Laden dead: Bin Laden's burial at sea fuels 'death hoax' rumor". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 2011-05-04.
  206. ^ Egan, Mark (2011-04-26). "Bin Laden dead? Again? Conspiracy theories abound". Reuters. Retrieved 2011-05-04.
  207. ^ "Osama bin Laden killed: conspiracy theories proliferate in wake of raid".The Daily Telegraph (London). 3 May 2011. Retrieved 3 May 2011.

External links


View of Abbottābad, Pakistan
Google Earth view of Osama bin Laden's compound
Diagram of Osama bin Laden's hideout, showing the high concrete walls that surround the compound
The U.S. national security team gathered in the Situation Room to monitor the progress of Operation Geronimo.
USS Carl Vinson conducting flight operations in Persian Gulf (April 4, 2011)

On May 2, news correspondents documenting reaction filled Church Street between Vesey Street and Barclay Street, adjacent to Ground Zero.
People celebrating in front of the White House after Osama bin Laden's death

Posted by Đặng-Vũ Chính at 12:32 AM 0 comments
Reactions: 
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)