On May 2, 2011, a night raid by elite U.S. commandos resulted in the death of the world’s most wanted man.
Ten Years Later: The Killing Of Osama Bin Laden
- By Amos Chapple
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The September 11 terror attacks in New York (pictured), Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania in 2001 gave renewed urgency to the hunt for Saudi terrorist leader Osama bin Laden. The search had begun in the 1990s.
![A photograph believed to show bin Laden at a judo class in Saudi Arabia in the early 1980s. Bin Laden was the son of a billionaire construction mogul with close personal links to the Saudi royal family. Jimmy Wu, a judo instructor who shared this photo from his time in Saudi Arabia, told Reuters that he remembers the tall martial arts student once scolding him after Wu's wife walked into the judo center, telling him that no women should be there. "[Bin Laden] did not approve [of her presence]," he said.](https://gdb.rferl.org/fceb6ad1-516b-486c-be4a-e409971bbd96_w1024_q10_s.jpg)
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A photograph believed to show bin Laden at a judo class in Saudi Arabia in the early 1980s. Bin Laden was the son of a billionaire construction mogul with close personal links to the Saudi royal family.
Jimmy Wu, a judo instructor who shared this photo from his time in Saudi Arabia, told Reuters that he remembers the tall martial arts student once scolding him after Wu's wife walked into the judo center, telling him that no women should be there. "[Bin Laden] did not approve [of her presence]," he said.
Jimmy Wu, a judo instructor who shared this photo from his time in Saudi Arabia, told Reuters that he remembers the tall martial arts student once scolding him after Wu's wife walked into the judo center, telling him that no women should be there. "[Bin Laden] did not approve [of her presence]," he said.
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A training camp for jihadists fighting against the Soviet forces who invaded Afghanistan in 1979
Bin Laden used his inherited wealth to fund training camps in Pakistan, where foreign fighters could drill for combat and cross the border into Afghanistan to fight Soviet troops. The Saudi millionaire personally fought in the latter stages of the war, which ended in 1989 when the Soviet Union pulled out of Afghanistan.
Bin Laden used his inherited wealth to fund training camps in Pakistan, where foreign fighters could drill for combat and cross the border into Afghanistan to fight Soviet troops. The Saudi millionaire personally fought in the latter stages of the war, which ended in 1989 when the Soviet Union pulled out of Afghanistan.
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Around the end of the Soviet-Afghan War, bin Laden (photographed at center in 1998) formed what became known as Al-Qaeda. The terrorist leader then declared war on “Jews and crusaders" and proclaimed that killing Westerners is "an individual duty for every Muslim.”
