In a dramatic late-night appearance in the East Room of the White House, Obama declared that “justice has been done” as he disclosed that American military and CIA operatives had finally cornered Bin Laden, the al Qaeda leader who had eluded them for nearly a decade, in the early hours of Monday local time. American officials said 54-year-old Bin Laden resisted and was shot in the head.
In an operation straight out of Hollywood movies, four helicopters carrying elite US commandos swooped on a three-storey house in the Pakistan town of Abbottabad in the dead of night and after a 40-minute operation left, carrying the body of world’s most wanted terrorist.
According to some reports, the Arab bodyguards of the chief of al Qaeda fired at the US commandos from the roof of the mansion as they descended on his hideout.
In addition to Osama, three men were killed during the raid, one believed to be his son and the other two his couriers, according to an American official who briefed reporters under White House ground rules forbidding further identification. A woman was killed when she was used as a shield by a male combatant, the official said, and two others wounded.
“No Americans were harmed,” Obama said. “They took care to avoid civilian casualties. After a firefight, they killed Osama bin Laden and took custody of his body.”
Muslim tradition requires burial within 24 hours, but by doing it at sea, American authorities presumably were trying to avoid creating a shrine for his followers.
“For over two decades, Bin Laden has been al-Qaeda’s leader and symbol,” the president said in a statement televised around the world.
“The death of Bin Laden marks the most significant achievement to date in our nation’s effort to defeat Al Qaeda. But his death does not mark the end of our effort. There’s no doubt that Al Qaeda will continue to pursue attacks against us. We must and we will remain vigilant at home and abroad.”
The strike could exacerbate deep tensions with Pakistan, which has periodically bristled at American counterterrorism efforts even as Bin Laden evidently found safe refuge on its territory for nearly a decade. Since taking office, Obama has ordered significantly more drone strikes on suspected terrorist targets in Pakistan, stirring public anger there and prompting the Pakistani government to protest.
When the end came for Bin Laden, he was found not in the remote tribal areas along the Pakistani-Afghan border where he has long been presumed to be sheltered, but in a massive compound in Abbottabad, about an hour’s drive north from the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, home to a large Pakistani military base and a military academy of the Pakistani Army.
The house at the end of a narrow dirt road was roughly eight times larger than other homes in the area, but had no telephone or Internet connections. When American operatives converged on the house on Sunday, Bin Laden “resisted the assault force” and was killed in the middle of an intense gun battle, a senior administration official said.
The official said that military and intelligence officials first learned last summer that a “high-value target” was being protected in the compound and began working on a plan for going in to get him. Beginning in March, Obama presided over five national security meetings at the White House to go over plans for the operation and on Friday morning, just before leaving Washington to tour tornado damage in Alabama, gave the final order for special forces and CIA. operatives to strike.
Obama called it a “targeted operation,” although officials said one helicopter was lost because of a mechanical failure and had to be destroyed to keep it from falling into hostile hands.
Bin Laden’s death came nearly 10 years after Al Qaeda terrorists hijacked four American passenger jets, crashing three of them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon outside Washington. The fourth hijacked jet, United Flight 93, crashed into the Pennsylvania countryside after passengers fought the militants.
Obama said Pakistan had helped develop the intelligence that led to Bin Laden, but an American official said the Pakistani government was not informed about the strike in advance.
“We shared our intelligence on this compound with no other country, including Pakistan,” the official said.
The US president called President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan to tell him about the strike after it was set in motion, and his advisers called their Pakistani counterparts.
“They agree that this is a good and historic day for both of our nations,” Obama said.