Bilal Town | |
|---|---|
Town | |
  Bilal Town | |
| Coordinates: 34°10′18″N73°14′17″E / 34.17167°N 73.23806°E | |
| Country |  Pakistan |
| Province | Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa |
| District | Abbottabad |
| Tehsil | Abbottabad |
Bilal Town is a wealthy northeastern suburb of Abbottabad, Pakistan. It lies between central Abbottabad and Kakul, where the Pakistan Military Academy is located. The upper-class neighborhood contains some large houses and open fields and has a high number of retired military officials living in the community.
In May 2011, the house of Osama bin Laden was invaded by the U.S. military in the southeastern outskirts of Bilal Town and he was killed. [1]
Osama bin Laden was a Saudi Arabian–born Islamist dissident and militant leader who was the founder and first general emir of al-Qaeda. Ideologically a pan-Islamist, Bin Laden participated in the Afghan mujahideen against the Soviet Union, and supported the Bosnian mujahideen during the Yugoslav Wars. Opposed to the United States' foreign policy in the Middle East, Bin Laden declared war on the U.S. in 1996 and advocated attacks targeting US assets in various countries, and supervised the execution of September 11 attacks inside the U.S. in 2001.
Tora Bora is a cave complex, part of the Spin Ghar mountain range of eastern Afghanistan. It is situated in the Pachir Aw Agam District of Nangarhar, approximately 50 kilometres west of the Khyber Pass and 10 km (6 mi) north of the border of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan. Tora Bora and the surrounding Spin Ghar range had natural caverns formed by streams eating into the limestone, that had later been expanded into a CIA-financed complex built for the Afghan mujahideen. Tora Bora was known to be a stronghold location of the Afghan mujahideen, used by military forces against the Soviet Union during the 1980s.
Abbottabad is a city in the Hazara Division of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Pakistan. It is the 40th largest city in the country and 6th largest in the province by population, and serves as the headquarter of its namesake tehsil and district. It is about 120 km (75 mi) north of Islamabad-Rawalpindi and 150 km (95 mi) east of Peshawar, at an elevation of 1,256 m (4,121 ft). Kashmir lies a short distance to the east.
Bilal may refer to:
Kakul (Kakol) is a village situated in the Tehsil and District Abbottabad, at an elevation of 1300 metres, 5 km northeast of center of Abbottabad city near the Thandiani Hills. Abbottabad is a District of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. The population is around 30,000. It is also famous for The Pakistan Military Academy (PMA), also known as PMA Kakul, that is Officer Training Academy of Pakistan Army. The posterior gate of PMA is also named as Kakul gate owing to its proximity with the village.
Osama bin Laden, the founder and former leader of al-Qaeda, went into hiding following the start of the War in Afghanistan in order to avoid capture by the United States for his role in the September 11 attacks, and having been on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list since 1999. After evading capture at the Battle of Tora Bora in December 2001, his whereabouts became unclear, and various rumours about his health, continued role in al-Qaeda, and location were circulated. Bin Laden also released several video and audio recordings during this time.
On May 2, 2011, the United States conducted Operation Neptune Spear, in which SEAL Team Six shot and killed Osama bin Laden at his "Waziristan Haveli" in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Bin Laden, who founded al-Qaeda and masterminded the September 11 attacks, had been the subject of a United States military manhunt since the beginning of the War in Afghanistan, but escaped to Pakistan—allegedly with Pakistani support—during or after the Battle of Tora Bora in December 2001. The mission was part of an effort led by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), with the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) coordinating the Special Mission Units involved in the raid. In addition to SEAL Team Six, participating units under JSOC included the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne) and the CIA's Special Activities Division, which recruits heavily from among former JSOC Special Mission Units.
Hamza bin Laden was a Saudi Arabian-born key member of al-Qaeda. He was a son of Osama bin Laden. On 14 September 2019, U.S. President Donald Trump announced that he was killed in a U.S. counterterrorism operation on the Afghanistan–Pakistan border. In 2024, unconfirmed media reports claimed that he was still alive and a senior leader of al-Qaeda.
General Khawaja Ziauddin Abbasi, also known as Ziauddin Butt, is a retired four-star rank army general in the Pakistan Army, who served as the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), for few hours, until Chairman joint chiefs General Pervez Musharraf reasserted the command and control of the military despite his termination on 12 October 1999.
On May 2, 2011, United States President Barack Obama confirmed that al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden had been killed in his compound in Abbottabad, northeastern Pakistan. Bin Laden's death was welcomed by many as a positive and significant turning point in the fight against al-Qaeda and related groups. Those who welcomed it included the United States, the United Nations, European Union, NATO, and some nations in Asia, Africa, Oceania, South America, and the Middle East, including Yemen, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, India, Israel, Indonesia, Somalia, the Philippines, Turkey, Iraq, Australia, Argentina, and the rebel Libyan Republic.
The death of Osama bin Laden on May 2, 2011, gave rise to various conspiracy theories, hoaxes and rumors. These include the ideas that he had died earlier, or that he lived beyond the reported date. Doubts about Bin Laden's death were fueled by the U.S. military's supposed disposal of his body at sea, the decision to not release any photographic or DNA evidence of Bin Laden's death to the public, the contradicting accounts of the incident, and the 25-minute blackout during the raid on Bin Laden's compound during which a live feed from cameras mounted on the helmets of the U.S. special forces was cut off.
Osama bin Laden's compound, known locally as the Waziristan Haveli, was a large, upper-class house within a walled compound used as a safe house for Saudi militant Islamist Osama bin Laden, who was shot and killed there by U.S. forces on 2 May 2011. The compound was located at the end of a dirt road 1,300 metres southwest of the Pakistan Military Academy in Bilal Town, Abbottabad, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan, a suburb housing many retired military officers. Bin Laden was reported to have evaded capture by living in a section of the house for at least five years, having no Internet or phone connection, and hiding away from the public, who were unaware of his presence.
Pakistan was alleged to have provided support for Osama bin Laden. These claims have been made both before and after Osama was found living in a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan and was killed by a team of United States Navy SEALs on 2 May 2011. The compound itself was located just half a mile from Pakistan's premier military training academy Kakul Military Academy (PMA) in Abbottabad. In the aftermath of bin Laden's death, American president Barack Obama asked Pakistan to investigate the network that sustained bin Laden. "We think that there had to be some sort of support network for bin Laden inside of Pakistan", Obama said in a 60 Minutes interview with CBS News. He also added that the United States was not sure "who or what that support network was." In addition to this, in an interview with Time magazine, CIA Director Leon Panetta stated that US-officials did not alert Pakistani counterparts to the raid because they feared the terrorist leader would be warned. However, the documents recovered from bin Laden's compound 'contained nothing to support the idea that bin Laden was protected or supported by the Pakistani officials'. Instead, the documents contained criticism of Pakistani military and future plans for attack against the Pakistani military installations.
Arshad Khan, commonly known as Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti was a Kuwaiti-born Pakistani courier for Osama bin Laden.
Chak Shah Muhammad is a feudal village in Haripur District in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan. A small farming village of low brick houses, poultry farms and wheat fields, Osama bin Laden allegedly lived in the village for two and a half years prior to moving to a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan on 6 January 2006, after he fled from Tora Bora caves to avoid capture by U.S. forces in December 2001. Bin Laden arrived in Pakistan in January 2002, 4 months after 9/11. It has a population of 1,500.
Shakil Afridi, or Shakeel Afridi, is a Pakistani physician who allegedly helped the CIA run a fake hepatitis vaccine program in Abbottabad, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan, in order to confirm Osama bin Laden's presence in the city by obtaining DNA samples. Details of his activities emerged during the Pakistani investigation of the deadly raid on bin Laden's residence. This account is disputed in a recent account of events which implies Afridi was implicated as a cover for the real CIA operative. Afridi was arrested at the Torkham while trying to flee the country days after the raid. On 23 May 2012, he was sentenced to 33 years' imprisonment for treason, initially believed to be in connection with the bin Laden raid, but later revealed to be due to alleged ties with a local Islamist warlord Mangal Bagh. Lawyers appealed against the verdict on 1 June 2012. On 29 August 2013, his sentence was overturned and a retrial ordered.
The Abbottabad Commission was a judicial inquiry commissioned to provide reports on the circumstantial events leading up to the United States decision to take unilateral military actions in Abbottabad in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Province of Pakistan, with the objective of neutralizing al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden on May 2, 2011. Constituted by the Supreme Court of Pakistan on the request of the Government of Pakistan on 21 June 2011, the commission was chaired by the Senior Justice Javaid Iqbal and other members selected by the Supreme Court.
The Abbottabad Commission Report is a judicial inquiry paper authored and submitted by the Abbottabad Commission, led by Justice Javaid Iqbal, to the Prime Minister of Pakistan on 4 January 2013. The report investigates the circumstances surrounding the death of Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad. Upon submission, the report was immediately classified by the Prime Minister and its findings were not made public.
Manhunt: The Ten Year Search for Bin Laden From 9/11 to Abbottabad is Peter Bergen's fourth book on the subject of Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. It was originally published in 2012 and became a New York Times bestseller later that year. It would then become the basis for an HBO documentary, Manhunt: The Search for Bin Laden.
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