Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri has been killed in a CIA drone strike in Afghanistan, US officials told Reuters on Monday, the biggest blow to the militant group since its founder Osama bin Laden was killed in 2011.
Zawahiri, an Egyptian doctor and surgeon, helped coordinate the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in which four civilian aircraft were hijacked and slammed into the World Trade Center's twin towers in New York, the Pentagon near Washington and a Pennsylvania field, killing nearly 3,000 people.
"Over the weekend, the United States conducted a counterterrorism operation against a significant Al Qaeda target in Afghanistan," a senior administration official said.If confirmed, his death in a CIA drone strike raises questions about whether he was being given sanctuary by the Taliban following their takeover of Kabul in August 2021 as the last US-led troops were leaving Afghanistan after 20 years of war.
U.S. President Joe Biden will deliver remarks on Monday at 7:30 p.m. on what the White House described as a "successful counter-terrorism operation.""A house was hit by a rocket in Sherpoor. There were no casualties as the house was empty," Abdul Nafi Takor, spokesman of the interior ministry, said earlier.
With other senior al Qaeda members, Zawahiri is believed to have plotted the October 12, 2000 attack on the USS Cole naval vessel in Yemen which killed 17 US sailors and injured more than 30 others, the Rewards for Justice website said.
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