A US drone strike killed al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri at a hideout in Kabul, US President Joe Biden said on Monday, adding that “justice had been delivered” to the families of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.
In a televised address, Biden said he gave the final go-ahead for the high-precision strike that successfully targeted al-Zawahiri in the Afghan capital over the weekend.
“Justice has been delivered and this terrorist leader is no more,” Biden said, adding that he hoped al-Zawahiri’s death would bring “closure” to families of the 3,000 people killed in the US in the 2001 attacks.
Photo: AFP
A senior administration official said that al-Zawahiri was on the balcony of a house in Kabul when he was targeted with two Hellfire missiles, an hour after sunrise on Sunday, and that there had been no US boots on the ground in Afghanistan.
“We are not aware of him ever leaving the safe house. We identified [al]-Zawahiri on multiple occasions for sustained periods of time on the balcony of where he was ultimately struck,” the official said.
Biden on Monday last week gave permission for the airstrike to proceed, the official said.
Photo: AFP
Biden said that there were no civilian casualties in the operation.
However, the strike intensified scrutiny of Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers.
The Taliban had promised in the 2020 Doha Agreement on the terms of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan that it would not harbor al-Qaeda members.
Nearly a year after the US military’s chaotic pullout from Afghanistan, al-Zawahiri’s killing raises questions about the involvement of Taliban leaders in sheltering a mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks and one of the US’ most-wanted fugitives.
The safe house was in Kabul’s Shirpur neighborhood, home to several Taliban leaders who had moved into mansions of former top Afghan officials of the toppled Western-backed government.
The Taliban initially sought to describe the strike as the US violating the Doha deal, which also includes a Taliban pledge not to shelter those seeking to attack the US — something that al-Zawahri had done for years in Internet videos and online screeds.
The Taliban yesterday had yet to say who was killed in the strike.
Meanwhile, rumors persist of unease in the Taliban ranks — particularly between a group known as the Haqqani network, which apparently sheltered al-Zawahiri, and other Taliban figures.
“The killing of Ayman al-Zawahiri has raised many questions,” said one Pakistani intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to speak publicly to reporters.
Al-Zawahiri took over as al-Qaeda’s leader after Osama bin Laden was killed in Pakistan in 2011 in an operation by US Navy SEALs.
“The Taliban were aware of his presence in Kabul, and if they were not aware of it, they need to explain their position,” the official said.
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