Bin Laden’s Death, Afghanistan and Pakistan and the U.S. Media Reaction

Last night, president Obama announced that Osama Bin Laden the leader of global terrorist network of Al Qaeda responsible for many atrocities against people all over the world and responsible for the September 11 attacks on the U.S. was killed by U.S. anti-terror operatives in Pakistan.

The helicopters that took the U.S. team to Bin Laden’s compound near Pakistani capital of Islamabad took reportedly off from bases inside Afghanistan.

Osama Bin Laden came in early 80s at the heights of Cold War to the Pakistani city of Peshawer, to wage Jihad against the Soviet occupied Afghanistan. He financed, trained and lead bands of Arab and other international Islamists who wanted to channel their destructive energy against the “infidel” Soviet backed Afghan government, and so against the people of Afghanistan. He set up bases inside the country and high jacked with help of Afghan warlords the cause of anti-Soviet struggle into destruction of a Islamic country and an Islamic nation of Afghanistan. He provided the necessary funds, among others, to the most extreme groups among Afghan Mujaheddin, and later joined the Taliban. It was Osama Bin Laden who bestowed upon Mulla Omar, the title “Amir ul Momenin” (commander of Faithful), a title once used by the original Islamic Khalifs. Throughout this time, his actions and operations were controlled, observed and coordinated by the Pakistani military intelligence ISI. He was closely associated with the Taliban leadership, including the Haqqani network. ISI helped coordinate the use of Al Qaeda’s specially trained units in the ranks of Taliban to subjugate the majority of Afghan people to the harsh and barbaric rule of the medieval Taliban ideology. Bin Laden provided the needed ideological guidance and the funds necessary to finance the Taliban campaign. In return, he enjoyed absolute freedom of movement and action, and was so able to build his deadly terror network of networks and plan his attacks, including the September 11 attacks.



Beside American people, no other nation has suffered more at the hands of Al Qaeda and its leader Bin Laden than the people of Afghanistan yet there are in U.S. media no commentaries from Afghan officials of the allied Karzai government, no interviews with Afghans regarding the death of Bin Laden, or any reporting form Afghanistan in this regard.

However, the U.S. news channels are dominated by the Pakistani officials, diplomats, journalists and experts who comment in such a way on the operation as if Bin Laden was not found and killed only few miles away from Pakistan’s capital but that it were the Pakistanis working with U.S. who helped find and kill him. His million dollar house was built reportedly in 2005, during the ongoing Operation Enduring Freedom in neighboring Afghanistan. He was not hiding in the “lawless” tribal belt on the Pakistani side of the “Durrand” lane separating Afghanistan from Pakistan but was openly “hiding” in a mansion with multiple security barriers around it, not too far from a Pakistani military academy.

As is the case with Taliban and Haqqani networks, ISI and the Pakistani military decided that Osama Bin Laden could be useful for their national and regional interests. They played long with the fire of supporting and tolerating extremist groups in the hope of using them as proxies against Pashtun and Baluch autonomy movements in Pakistan and against their historic nemeses India and Afghanistan. They lost in process their total control over the monster they helped create. ISI did a good job of selling its agenda as inline with the American strategy in the region.

It’s true that many people in Pakistan have been victims of Islamists. That doesn’t change the fact though, however, that Bin Laden lived in suburbs of the Pakistani capital, among many retired Pakistani high ranking army officers, and well protected in a million-dollar mansion built in 2005.


Most Afghans share with American people the joy of Bin Laden’s death. His death is good news for the Afghan people who suffered so much at hands of his deadly organization and through his stone-age allies, Taliban, for so many years, and continue to suffer the burden of the Al Qaeda, Taliban, Haqqani and Hekmatyar terrorist attacks. All of these enemies of humanity, after their deadly attacks against Afghan people and U.S. and coalition forces on Afghan soil, return to the safety and impunity of their sanctuaries inside Pakistan, and as we know now, some of them not in the “lawless” tribal areas of Pakistan but very close to the Pakistani center of power.