Laden was shot and killed 2nd may 2011

 Usama ibn Mohammed ibn Awad ibn Ladin (Arabic: أسامة بن محمد بن عوض بن لادن‎, usāmah ibn muḥammad ibn ‘awaḍ ibn lādin), often anglicized as Osama bin Laden (/oʊˈsɑːmə bɪn ˈlɑːdən/; March 10, 1957 – May 2, 2011),[7] was a founder of al-Qaeda, the organization responsible for the September 11 attacks in the United States and many other mass-casualty attacks worldwide.[8][9][10] He was a Saudi Arabian until 1994 (stateless thereafter), a member of the wealthy bin Laden family, and an ethnic Yemeni Kindite.[11]

Osama bin Laden

أسامة بن لادن

Osama bin Laden portrait.jpg

bin Laden c. 1997–1998

1st General Emir of Al-Qaeda

In office

August 11, 1988 – May 2, 2011

Preceded by

Position created

Succeeded by

Ayman al-Zawahiri

Co-founder of Al-Qaeda (With Abdullah Azzam and Ayman al-Zawahiri), 1988

Co-founder of Maktab al-Khidamat, 1984

Personal details

Born

Usama ibn Mohammed ibn Awad ibn Ladin

March 10, 1957

Riyadh, Riyadh Mintaqah, Saudi Arabia

Died

May 2, 2011 (aged 54)

Abbottabad, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan

Cause of death

Shot by US forces

Nationality

Saudi Arabian (1957–1994)

Stateless (1994–2011)[1]

Height

1.95 m (6 ft 5 in)[6]

Spouse(s)

Najwa Ghanhem

Khadijah Sharif

Khairiah Sabar

Siham Sabar

Amal Ahmed al-Sadah

Children

20 to 26

Religion

Islam (Wahhabism/Salafism)[2][3][4][5]

Military service

Allegiance

 Maktab al-Khidamat (1984–1988)

 Al-Qaeda (1988–2011)

Years of service

1984–May 2, 2011

Rank

General Emir of Al-Qaeda

Battles/wars

Soviet War

Battle of Jaji

Global War on Terrorism

War in Afghanistan

Battle of Tora Bora

War in North-West Pakistan

Operation Neptune Spear †

Bin Laden's father was Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden, a Saudi billionaire from Hadhramaut, Yemen.[12] His mother, Alia Ghanem, was from a secular middle-class family based in Latakia, Syria.[13] He was born in Saudi Arabia and studied at university in the country until 1979, when he joined Mujahideen forces in Pakistan fighting against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. He helped to fund the Mujahideen by funneling arms, money and fighters from the Arab world into Afghanistan, and gained popularity among many Arabs.[14] In 1988, he formed al-Qaeda.[15] He was banished from Saudi Arabia in 1992, and shifted his base to Sudan, until U.S. pressure forced him to leave Sudan in 1996. After establishing a new base in Afghanistan, he declared a war against the United States, initiating a series of bombings and related attacks.[16] Bin Laden was on the American Federal Bureau of Investigation's (FBI) lists of Ten Most Wanted Fugitives and Most Wanted Terrorists for his involvement in the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings.[17][18][19]

From 2001 to 2011, bin Laden was a major target of the United States, as the FBI offered a $25 million bounty in their search for him.[20] On May 2, 2011, bin Laden was shot and killed[21] inside a private residential compound in Abbottabad, where he lived with a local family from Waziristan, during a covert operation conducted by members of the United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group and Central Intelligence Agency SAD/SOG operators on the orders of U.S. President Barack Obama.[22]