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La muerte de Bin Laden es justa y admiro al gobierno de Obama por darnos un mundo más seguro




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“Is she like Bin Laden?”

An interesting question from an Arab man to a bookstore worker that led to a Gospel conversation.




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Osama bin Laden, The Face Of Terror, Killed In Pakistan





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Bin Laden and oil: Some things change, others stay the same

In the 10 years since Osama bin Laden became a household name, we have fought a war on terror, watched oil prices skyrocket and continued to get oil from the sa




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Bin Laden's death could mean second life for cap-and-trade

Bill Richardson says the terrorist's death gives President Obama an opportunity to tackle one of the most contentious issues in Washington.




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The Man Who Captured The Bin Laden Of His Day - A Bee In His Bonnet By Award Winning Author Bernard Fleury

Bernard Fleury's sweeping saga relates the little-known tale of an All-American military hero who was instrumental in the capture of Faustino Ablen




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How matchbooks were used to track down Osama bin Laden

From big beer and tobacco companies, to the war effort, to Hollywood, to the smallest mom and pop businesses, matchbook advertising was effective and affordable for everyone. And believe it or not, even the U.S. State Department used matchbook advertising recently to hunt down Osama bin Laden.



  • Radio/Under the Influence

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Bin Laden's death: A cathartic moment for the US

President Barack Obama is making it clear that the killing of Osama Bin Laden didn't occur by accident - and that it happened while he was in charge. He told former Presidents Bush and Clinton what he was about to announce before he made his televised White House statement. I am sure he resisted any suggestion that he had done what they had only talked about. Yet he made it clear that his administration had been determined.


The president said that on taking office he had told the CIA that the al-Qaeda chief's death or capture was to be the agency's top priority. Senior administration officials say that he chaired five meetings in March working out the plans for this attack. It's really not clear to me if the political leadership makes much difference to operations like this, but it is certainly the impression Mr Obama wants to linger.

The raid took 40 minutes. The intelligence operation took years. It started with the search for a courier, perhaps something of a misnomer for a senior aide to Bin Laden, one of the few men he trusted, according to prisoners who had been interrogated. Four years ago they uncovered his identity. The very high level of precautions the man took made them all the more suspicious. Two years ago they discovered the areas in which he operated. Last summer they identified the compound, in an affluent suburb of Islamabad. Eight times the size of similar homes in the area, it had 18ft-high walls topped with barbed wire and inner walls 7ft high. A large place, worth a million dollars, but with no phone, no internet access. The CIA believes it was purpose-built to hide Bin Laden.

The US didn't tell the Pakistanis about the compound or about the raid until it had happened. That may create some diplomatic friction.

But the mood in America is exultant. As Twitter proclaimed the death of Bin Laden, before the president spoke, crowds gathered outside the White House, waving the stars and stripes and chanting "USA, USA". This is not a country that does quiet satisfaction. This is a cathartic moment for the nation, a moment when America's military might, know how and sheer will power seem to have come together to produce a result.

At a time when there are so many doubts about America's role in the world, and so much economic gloom, there is something clear and plain about celebrating the "rubbing out" of a bad guy, an enemy. The president has been congratulated by even his opponents, and this success allows him to appear grimly resolute in pursuit of America's core interests.

Senior administration officials say Bin Laden's death is not just a symbol, it removes a charismatic and respected leader whom al-Qaeda cannot replace. The official suggests the organisation is on a downward path that will be difficult to reverse. The domestic implications for Mr Obama are in the opposite direction, but may be just as important.




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The White House backtracks on Bin Laden

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The White House has had to correct its facts about the killing of Bin Laden, and for some that has diminished the glow of success that has surrounded all those involved in the operation.

Bin Laden wasn't armed when he was shot. It raises suspicions that this was indeed a deliberate shoot-to-kill operation.

Here are the inaccuracies in the first version. The woman killed was not his wife. No woman was used as a human shield. And he was not armed.

The president's press secretary Jay Carney suggested this was the result of trying to provide a great deal of information in a great deal of haste.

I can largely accept that. There is no mileage in misleading people and then correcting yourself. But the president's assistant national security advisor John Brennan had used the facts he was giving out to add a moral message - this was the sort of man Bin Laden was, cowering behind his wife, using her as a shield. Nice narrative. Not true. In fact, according to Carney this unarmed woman tried to attack the heavily armed Navy Seal. In another circumstance that might even be described as brave.

Jay Carney said that Bin Laden didn't have to have a gun to be resisting. He said there was a great deal of resistance in general and a highly volatile fire fight. The latest version says Bin Laden's wife charged at the US commando and was shot in the leg, but not killed. The two brothers, the couriers and owners of the compound, and a woman were killed on the ground floor of the main building. This version doesn't mention Bin Laden's son, who also died.

By this count only three men, at the most, were armed. I do wonder how much fight they could put up against two helicopters' worth of Navy Seals.

Does any of this matter? Well, getting the fact right is always important. You can't make a judgment without them. We all make mistakes, and journalists hate doing so because it makes people trust us less. For those involved an operation like this, time must go past in a confused and noisy instant, and they aren't taking notes. Confusion is very understandable. But you start to wonder how much the facts are being massaged now, to gloss over the less appealing parts of the operation.

And of course there is the suspicion that the US never wanted to take Bin Laden alive. Here at least many see a trial as inconvenient, awkward - a chance for terrorists to grandstand. Look at all the fuss about the trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

In the confusion of a raid it's hard to see how the Seals could be sure that Bin Laden wasn't armed, didn't have his finger on the trigger of a bomb, wasn't about to pull a nasty surprise. If he had his hands in the air shouting "don't shoot" he might have lived, but anything short of that seems to have ensured his death.

I suspect there will be more worry about this in Britain and Europe than in the US. That doesn't mean we are right or wrong. It is a cultural difference. We are less comfortable about frontier justice, less forgiving about even police shooting people who turn out to be unarmed, perhaps less inculcated with the Dirty Harry message that arresting villains is for wimps, and real justice grows from the barrel of a gun. Many in America won't be in the slightest bit bothered that a mass murderer got what was coming to him swiftly, whether he was trying to kill anyone in that instant or not.




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Osama Bin Laden’s First Draft

Jonathan Mahler’s piece on the Osama bin Laden raid is as much about the nature of journalism as it is about the facts surrounding the event.




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Sulaiman Abu Ghayth, Associate of Usama Bin Laden, Arrested for Conspiring to Kill Americans

Sulaiman Abu Ghayth, a/k/a “Suleiman Abu Gayth”, a former associate of Usama Bin Laden, has been arrested and charged in an indictment unsealed today in New York City with conspiracy to kill U.S. nationals.



  • OPA Press Releases

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New Lessons From Old Buildings: Bin Laden's Medieval Hideout

I write often about the lessons that one can learn from old buildings, usually discussing ventilation and lighting. It turns out that there are lessons in security and defence as well; Eli Lehrer of Frum Forum notices some




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Admiral who ran Osama bin Laden raid: Revoke my security clearance

William McRaven, commander of the raid condemned Trump for revoking the security clearance of ex-CIA chief John Brennan saying the spy was 'of unparalleled integrity'.




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Donald Trump boasts that al-Baghdadi strike is bigger than Obama's hit on Osama bin Laden

Donald Trump has boasted that the U.S. military raid on Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi that led to his death is a bigger triumph that Barack Obama's strike against Osama bin Laden.




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Navy SEAL who killed Bin Laden has a message for dead ISIS leader al-Baghdadi

After President Trump announced Sunday morning that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi 'died like a dog' in an overnight raid Robert J. O'Neill took to Twitter to bid adieu to the ISIS leader.




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How the murder of Qasseem Soleimani may be even more significant than Osama bin Laden assassination

Donald Trump's decision to order the killing of Qassem Soleimani, the leader of Iran's formidable Quds Force, could prove to be the spark that sets the whole of the Middle East on fire.




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Ex-Trump associate Felix Sater was a globe-trotting 'spy' gave Osama bin Laden's phone number to US

The Russian-American businessman, 53, was an invaluable FBI source who helped the US government 'combat terrorists', a letter filed by prosecutors in 2009 and unsealed on Friday reveals.




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Joe Biden 'confuses Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden' during rally in Iowa

The former Vice President, 77, reportedly made the gaffe in Des Moines last weekend while responding to a voter who had concern's about his foreign policy decisions.




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Bin Laden wanted to kill Obama because he thought Joe Biden was totally unprepared to be president

Declassified documents seized from Bin Laden's Pakistan compound as he was killed in May 2011 reveal his plans to throw the U.S. 'into a crisis' by killing Obama and leaving Joe Biden in charge.




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US general Petraeus says killing of Suleimani is 'MORE significant than Osama bin Laden'

US general David Petraeus, who led the CIA from 2011 to 2012, said Friday's killing of Qassem Suleimani by Baghdad International Airport was also more important than ISIS's al-Baghdadi's death.




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Donald Trump confirms Osama Bin Laden's son Hamza was killed in a US counter-terrorism operation

Hamza bin Laden, the son of former Al Qaeda leader and 9/11 mastermind Osama, was killed in a counter-terrorism operation, the White House said. It is unclear when he was killed.




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The exile : the stunning inside story of Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda in flight / Cathy Scott-Clark and Adrian Levy

Scott-Clark, Cathy, 1965- author




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Osama bin Laden cited Mahatma Gandhi as inspiration in 1993 speech: audio tapes




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Osama Bin Laden’s relatives killed in private jet crash in UK, say reports



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