Florida Senator views bin Laden pictures, is satisfied

Florida Sen. Bill Nelson on Thursday reviewed the still-classified photographs of Osama bin Laden’s corpse and said he’s convinced the U.S. got its long-sought target. | 05/12/11 16:37:15 By - Lesley Clark

Bin Laden photos 'quite gruesome,' Kentucky's Chandler says

Rep. Ben Chandler, D-Ky., is among a select group of lawmakers who have viewed the graphic photos of Osama bin Laden's body. "They were gruesome, quite gruesome," said Chandler, who sits on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and who saw the photos Thursday morning. | 05/12/11 15:53:14 By - Halimah Abdullah and Michael Doyle

Even after bin Laden, U.S. can't walk away from Pakistan

If Pakistani officials helped hide Osama bin Laden, there are unlikely to be serious consequences because the government is too weak and the United States has bigger priorities, such as ending the Afghan war and helping to stabilize poor, terrorism-plagued Pakistan, which has the world's fastest-growing nuclear arsenal. | 05/11/11 21:08:07 By - Jonathan S. Landay and Saeed Shah

After seeing bin Laden photos, lawmakers differ over release

Lawmakers who've seen graphic photos of a dead Osama bin Laden differ over whether the photos should be made public. | 05/11/11 20:03:02 By - Michael Doyle

U.S. commander: Bin Laden's death doesn't end Afghan war

Osama bin Laden's death hasn't changed the U.S. military mission in Afghanistan, and it must continue, the U.S. commander in charge of the country's east said Tuesday. | 05/10/11 19:01:11 By - Nancy A. Youssef

Pakistan names general to probe bin Laden scandal

Pakistan's prime minister on Monday dismissed as "absurd" allegations that the nation's powerful military was "complicit or incompetent" in the case of Osama bin Laden, the al Qaida leader who was killed a week ago by U.S. Navy SEALs inside a walled compound 35 air miles from Pakistan's capital. | 05/09/11 17:52:36 By - Saeed Shah and Jonathan S. Landay

Following bin Laden's death, terrorism tips rise across U.S.

As a result of a more alert, or perhaps more anxious American public, counterterrorism tips have spiked in the days following the death of Osama bin Laden, law enforcement officials say. | 05/08/11 23:20:49 By - Marisa Taylor

Obama calls for explanation of bin Laden's network in Pakistan

President Barack Obama, in an interview broadcast on Sunday, demanded to know what kind of "support network" Osama bin Laden had in Pakistan, adding to the pressure on Pakistan's government to explain the al Qaida chief's presence in the country. | 05/08/11 23:20:22 By - Saeed Shah

Pentagon releases videos of bin Laden found at Pakistan home

The Pentagon has released videos of Osama bin Laden that are part of the intelligence it collected in the raid on Pakistan that killed him. | 05/07/11 18:01:55 By - Nancy A. Youssef

Bin Laden's family lived a life of isolation at Pakistan home

Osama bin Laden's last hideout was a dusty compound less than a mile from Pakistan's premier military academy, a place where he was confined to the house for five years, with three of his wives and several children. If he weren't the personification of evil, it would sound like a bad reality TV plot. | 05/06/11 19:23:00 By - Saeed Shah

Obama thanks bin Laden raid team in person

President Barack Obama on Friday privately thanked some of the special military operators who killed Osama bin Laden and told an enthusiastic crowd of more than 2,000 soldiers that America ultimately will defeat al Qaida. | 05/06/11 19:02:22 By - Jack Brammer and Steven Thomma

Al Qaida faithful mourn bin Laden, but few others do

Hundreds of Egyptians chanting for revenge marched Friday to the U.S. Embassy in Cairo to protest the killing of Osama bin Laden, whose death al Qaida finally acknowledged. But bin Laden leaves a mixed legacy in the Arab world, where few mourned his death publicly, even if many privately agreed with the general al Qaida message — if not the murderous tactics — against American and other Western involvement in the region. | 05/06/11 17:55:09 By - Hannah Allam

Text of al Qaida's statement on the death of Osama bin Laden

This is the text of al Qaida's statement acknowledging the death of Osama bin Laden. It was translated by McClatchy Special Correspondent Mohannad Sabry. | 05/06/11 16:55:57 By -

Mississippi's Stennis Space Center also trains Navy SEALs

The highly covert U.S. Navy SEAL Team Six recently became the toast of the nation after they killed global terrorist Osama bin Laden in a raid in Pakistan. But few Americans realize that between 200 and 300 Navy SEALs from several different teams are trained each year at Naval Special Warfare Group 4’s Western Maneuver Area joint training facility at Stennis Space Center in Hancock County, Mississippi. | 05/06/11 14:53:07 By - Michael Newsom

9/11 memories haunt those who crossed paths with hijackers

On Sept. 7, 2001, Mohamed Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi pounded down drinks at Shuckums Oyster Bar on Young Circle in Hollywood, Fla. They played video games, then argued with a waitress and a manager over a $48 tab. Four days later, Atta and al-Shehhi flew passenger jets into the World Trade Center, killing 2,752 people, and forever changing life for some in South Florida who unknowingly entered their orbit. | 05/06/11 07:01:06 By - Elinor J. Brecher

Bin Laden down, 29 more to go on FBI most wanted list

Osama bin Laden may have been the most wanted man in the world until Monday, but the FBI still has a list of 29 other men it considers the "most wanted" terrorists in the world, including three facing charges in California. | 05/05/11 21:29:40 By - Sam Stanton

Obama's Pakistan policy sets low bar for aid requirements

In March, the Obama administration certified to Congress that Pakistan had shown a "sustained commitment" to ending its support for Islamic militants. Two days later, the top U.S. military officer accused Pakistan's premier spy agency of supporting Afghanistan's deadliest insurgent group. | 05/05/11 19:32:03 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Bin Laden's death hit the Internet and keeps on blazing

In some ways it's the perfect Twitter story. Arguably the top breaking news event of the last 10 years, the death of Osama bin Laden is still reverberating through the vast Internet ether that gives each of us access to global conversations. | 05/05/11 19:22:49 By - Kate Howard

Pakistanis: Bin Laden lived in Abbottabad house for 5 years

One of Osama bin Laden's wives has told interrogators that the al Qaida leader and his family, including perhaps as many as three wives, had lived in this Pakistani resort city for five years when U.S. special forces stormed the compound shortly before 1 a.m. Monday and shot him dead, a senior Pakistani military official said Thursday. | 05/05/11 19:22:18 By - Saeed Shah

Obama visits Ground Zero to honor bin Laden's victims

It took nearly 10 years. But long after one president stood amid the rubble of the World Trade Center to vow that the guilty would soon hear from an outraged America, another returned Thursday to mark the hard-won moment of justice. "When we say we will never forget, we mean what we say," President Barack Obama said during a sober but triumphant visit to New York. | 05/05/11 17:52:47 By - Steven Thomma

S.C. Sen. Graham wants bin Laden photos released

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., criticized President Barack Obama’s decision Wednesday not to release death photos of terrorist Osama bin Laden. Graham on Monday had congratulated Obama on Sunday’s daring raid that killed the al Qaida leader, but he said withholding photos of bin Laden’s corpse would raise questions about whether he is really dead. | 05/05/11 07:31:35 By - James Rosen and Steven Thomma

Discussing Osama bin Laden's death is a struggle for some parents

The killing of Osama bin Laden has dominated the news for three days, and with it images of celebration. For parents struggling to explain the events to their children, the public rejoicing — and subsequent backlash against it — has added another layer of complexity to an already difficult task. How to explain joy over death? | 05/05/11 06:46:14 By - Laurel Rosenhall

Pakistani officer's photos show blood, but not bin Laden

Photos taken by a Pakistani security official inside Osama bin Laden's hideout provide the most graphic images — and perhaps the only ones that will ever be made public — of the chaos that engulfed the three-story house in the moments before a U.S. special forces team killed the terrorist leader with automatic weapons fire to the head. | 05/04/11 19:33:12 By - Saeed Shah

Was killing instead of capturing bin Laden the right call?

As details surface about the mission earlier this week to find Osama bin Laden, one thing is clear: Capturing the long-sought terrorist mastermind alive might have been an option, but it wasn't a top priority | 05/04/11 19:12:22 By - David Goldstein

Obama rules out showing photos of dead bin Laden

President Barack Obama said Wednesday that the U.S. will not release photos of Osama bin Laden's corpse, saying it would amount to gloating that would only inflame anti-American sentiment and do nothing to satisfy skeptics. | 05/04/11 15:32:50 By - Steven Thomma

Bush official cautions against releasing bin Laden photos

If Gordon England was still in the inner circle of top defense officials, as he was for the entire Bush administration, he's pretty sure what advice he'd give when the subject turned to whether to release photos of Osama bin Laden's body. He wouldn't be a Yes. "I don't think it serves any purpose," the former deputy defense secretary said Tuesday. | 05/03/11 21:34:12 By - Chris Vaughn

Is it time to revisit scope and cost of war on terror?

From buying nuclear radiation detectors to putting droves of air marshals on passenger flights, the U.S. government has spent hundreds of billions of dollars since the Sept. 11 attacks to build defenses around every major target of terrorism. The death of Osama bin Laden doesn't end those threats. | 05/03/11 19:58:03 By - Greg Gordon and Marisa Taylor

Bin Laden's death could force Obama to change Afghan war plan

Osama bin Laden's death could force President Barack Obama to change his strategy for ending the nearly decade-long Afghan war, including keeping tens of thousands of U.S. troops in Afghanistan at least until 2014, according to some Western experts and officials. | 05/03/11 19:57:35 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Bin Laden's daughter saw U.S. troops kill him, official says

Osama bin Laden's young daughter has told Pakistani officials that she saw her father shot and killed by armed Americans when they raided a house here early Monday morning, an official with Pakistan's spy agency said Tuesday. | 05/03/11 19:57:17 By - Saeed Shah

White House corrects details; bin Laden wasn't armed

Osama bin Laden wasn't armed when U.S. forces hunted him down and killed him, the chief White House spokesman said Tuesday. That was but one of several details that Press Secretary Jay Carney corrected in the public account of Sunday's breathtaking raid on a compound in Pakistan where the long-sought leader of the terrorist group al Qaida was hiding. | 05/03/11 19:35:51 By - Margaret Talev and Saeed Shah

Lawmakers re-evaluate financial support for Pakistan

Congress is seriously weighing the amount of its aid package to Pakistan as lawmakers on Tuesday demanded to know more about what Islamabad officials knew about Osama bin Laden's secret compound. | 05/03/11 18:35:29 By - David Lightman and William Douglas

Washington state admiral key planner in bin Laden raid

A Tacoma, Wash., native who rose from Stadium High School's Class of 1969 to the highest levels of U.S. Special Operations was at the side of the CIA director as a team of American forces carried out the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, lawmakers said Monday. | 05/03/11 18:06:40 By - Adam Ashton

Merced, California,-area Muslims relieved to hear of U.S. action

se of relief.

That's the sentiment some local Muslims in Merced, California, feel about the news of Osama bin Laden's death in Abbottabad, Pakistan, on Sunday. | 05/03/11 17:57:46 By - Ameera Butt

Taliban: Reports of bin Laden's death greatly exaggerated

Afghanistan's Taliban, who sheltered Osama bin Laden when they governed the country prior to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, said Tuesday that it would be "premature" to comment on U.S. claims that the al Qaida leader had been killed during a raid on a compound in Pakistan. | 05/03/11 17:24:27 By - Hashim Shukoor

With bin Laden dead, Zawahiri becomes world's most wanted

With Osama bin Laden dead, U.S. authorities are training their sights on his top deputy, an Egyptian surgeon-turned-jihadist whose tactical acumen will be tested as al Qaida struggles to regroup. | 05/03/11 16:41:35 By - Hannah Allam

Bin Laden compound raid puts Navy SEALs in spotlight

The private Internet site for Navy SEALs lit up like the Fourth of July all day Monday as SEALs past and present exchanged attaboys over the killing of Osama bin Laden. The raid on the compound where bin Laden lived was reportedly led by SEALs. Because SEAL teams often operate in the shadows of the military structure on highly classified missions, this weekend's publicity is a bit uncomfortable. | 05/03/11 07:40:09 By - Chris Vaughn

For Bush, getting bin Laden was 'unfinished business'

When he left office in January 2009, President George W. Bush knew he was leaving behind what he would later describe as "unfinished business" — tracking down Osama bin Laden. The Sept. 11 attacks that killed took nearly 3,000 lives helped define much of Bush's presidency and put the nation into a war footing that has extended into the Obama presidency. | 05/02/11 21:40:44 By - Dave Montgomery

N.C. commissioner says Bin Laden's sea burial was undeserved

Mecklenburg, N.C. commissioner Bill James sparked criticism Monday with an email in which he wrote Osama bin Laden's body should have been put on public display and "disrespected - defecated on - (and) urinated on." The remarks came one day after the al-Qaida leader was killed after a firefight with U.S. forces in Pakistan, and hours after his body was placed in the northern Arabian Sea. | 05/03/11 07:26:43 By - April Bethea and Tim Funk

How could Pakistan not know bin Laden was hiding there?

The U.S. military's successful takeout of Osama bin Laden raised big questions — and a chorus of skepticism — about whether Pakistan's military and intelligence services knew all along that the global terrorist leader was hiding in their back yard. | 05/02/11 20:34:55 By - Greg Gordon, David Goldstein and Jonathan S. Landay

Months of planning led U.S. team to Pakistan, bin Laden

Even as the Navy SEALs slid down ropes from their hovering helicopters, there still was some uncertainty that the man they were after was inside the massive, night-shrouded compound on the edge of the sleeping city in northeastern Pakistan. After all, Osama bin Laden was long thought to be hiding in a cave or other refuge in Pakistan's rugged tribal area bordering Afghanistan. But one of the raiders thought he recognized the leader of al Qaida, and dropped him with a shot to his left eye as the SEALs stormed into a third-floor room of the main house during a nearly 40-minute firefight. | 05/02/11 20:00:36 By - Jonathan S. Landay

N.C. Muslims express relief over Bin Laden's death

Muslims in North Carolina's Triangle area applauded Osama bin Laden's demise with a sense of long-awaited justice Monday, welcoming an end to the al Qaida leader's violent take on their faith. They hoped for healing of the wounds opened a decade ago following the Sept. 11 attacks, both for his victims and the nation that sometimes mistakenly linked terrorism with Islam. | 05/03/11 07:23:08 By - Josh Shaffer

A world without bin Laden already a world long gone

Without him, there would likely be no Department of Homeland Security, no Patriot Act, no Quran-burning pastors. Had Osama bin Laden never been born, there would surely be fewer gold star mothers and fathers, less need for prosthetic limbs for young troops, an American public still largely ignorant to the Muslim concept of martyrdom. | 05/02/11 21:10:28 By - Scott Canon and Rick Montgomery

Feinstein got early head's up that something big was on

When Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the chair of the Senate intelligence committee, picked up her phone in San Francisco on Saturday, CIA Director Leon Panetta was on the line, telling her something big was afoot. | 05/02/11 19:44:36 By - Michael Doyle

Bin Laden's death isn't likely to mark end of al Qaida

Political analysts who closely monitor Islamist militant groups said Monday that the circumstances of Osama bin Laden's death — far from the battlefield in a million-dollar mansion — support what they've claimed for years: that while bin Laden remained the spiritual figurehead for al Qaida, he was far removed from its daily operations. | 05/02/11 19:20:02 By - Hannah Allam and Adam Baron

Bin Laden's death polishes CIA's public image

Every day that Osama bin Laden was alive was a day that the CIA's reputation took a hit. His killing begins the process of erasing a decade-long image problem. | 05/02/11 19:17:54 By - Kevin G. Hall

U.S. hopes to bury rest of al Qaida with bin Laden

Americans reveled Monday in the death of Osama bin Laden, a moment the Obama administration hoped would be a pivot point in the long war against terrorism by showing the world that bin Laden lived and died as a hypocrite and a coward, and that his terror network is headed toward destruction as well. | 05/02/11 19:15:47 By - Steven Thomma

Obama praised by (some) S.C. Republicans

Some — but not all — of South Carolina's seven Republican members of Congress offered rare praise of President Barack Obama on Monday for authorizing the special forces raid that killed Osama bin Laden. Sens. Lindsey Graham and Jim DeMint, along with others, commended Obama for the high-risk operation. Rep. Joe Wilson, who famously yelled "You lie!" at Obama in September 2009 as he addressed Congress, didn't so much as mention the president in hailing bin Laden's death. Neither did new Reps. Tim Scott or Trey Gowdy. | 05/02/11 19:15:26 By - James Rosen

Tip that led to bin Laden may have come from Guantanamo

More than 8,000 miles from the walled compound where U.S. forces killed Osama bin Laden, some of the men who helped make it happen are probably sitting today in cells at Guantanamo. While it's not publicly known which detainees gave CIA or Guantanamo interrogators the nom de guerre of one of the few al Qaida couriers trusted by bin Laden, a senior U.S. official confirmed that crucial piece of intelligence was gathered from "detainees in the post-9/11 period." | 05/02/11 18:48:11 By - Tom Lasseter

Bin Laden's burial observed Islamic law, White House says

Osama bin Laden's burial at sea largely followed widely accepted interpretations of Islamic law — a politically expedient step by a White House carefully navigating the delicate balance of satisfying Americans' desire for justice and the powder keg of geopolitics. | 05/02/11 18:35:55 By - Halimah Abdullah

Pakistan, Afghanistan ties will change post-bin Laden

Osama bin Laden's death is likely to alter U.S. relations with Pakistan profoundly, and may open a door to negotiations with the Taliban in Afghanistan, according to lawmakers in Congress and analysts of the war on terror. | 05/02/11 18:35:24 By - William Douglas and David Lightman

Congress' Intelligence committee had their eyes on bin Laden compound

For some time, a few members of Congress have known that intelligence operatives were watching a mysterious compound a few dozen miles outside Islamabad, Pakistan. The operatives had gleaned certain details from ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’ of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other high-value terrorism suspects – information that in turn led them to couriers frequently visiting the compound, said U.S. Sen. Richard Burr, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. | 05/02/11 18:29:54 By - Barbara Barrett

Families of 9/11 victims say justice was done

Like many survivors across the nation, Richard Murach and Beverly Burnett found solace on Monday, agreeing with President Barack Obama that justice had been done with the killing of Osama bin Laden. | 05/02/11 17:59:31 By - Rob Hotakainen and Barbara Barrett

Nabbing bin Laden boosts Obama, but maybe not for long

President Barack Obama has gained stature from the dramatic killing of Osama bin Laden, but history shows that a burst of national euphoria many months before an election doesn't assure victory for an incumbent who's seeking another term. | 05/02/11 17:51:35 By - David Lightman and Margaret Talev

Bin Laden's 'neighbors' profess ignorance of his presence

To hear the residents of Abbottabad tell it, the first hint they had that Osama bin Laden had lived among them for perhaps the last six years came at 12:45 a.m. Monday, when they heard the sound of low-flying helicopters, followed by three explosions and gunfire that lasted about 30 minutes. | 05/02/11 17:39:44 By - Saeed Shah

Bin Laden's death summons joy, relief from U.S. allies

Congratulations poured in from around the globe. From London and Paris, to Nairobi and New Delhi, nations touched by the scourge of terrorism hailed the news of Osama bin Laden's elimination. | 05/02/11 17:31:25 By - Tim Johnson

President Obama: U.S. kills Osama bin Laden in Pakistan

Osama Bin Laden is dead. President Barack Obama made the dramatic late-night announcement Sunday from the East Room of the White House, ending the long, elusive international manhunt for the leader of the al Qaida terror organization responsible for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. "Justice has been done," the president said in a 10-minute address shortly before midnight. | 05/01/11 22:36:28 By - Margaret Talev and Jonathan S. Landay

Osama bin Laden: Born into privilege, died the face of evil

The tall, lean, rich man's son could have spent his life lounging about Saudi Arabia in luxury. Instead, Osama bin Laden chose to kill. As a young man, he shot at Soviet invaders in Afghanistan. In middle age, he turned his wrath and far-reaching resources against the United States — the superpower he saw as spoiler of his homeland's sacred cities. By the time of his death, his was the face of terrorism. | 05/02/11 00:00:00 By - Rick Montgomery and Scott Canon

Bin Laden raid years in the making, minutes in execution

It took years for the U.S. military to track Osama bin Laden down, finding him not in a cave in the inaccessible tribal regions of Pakistan, but in a sumptuous luxury compound built just six years ago in the same city that is home to Pakistan's most prestigious military academy. The raid that killed him lasted just 40 minutes. | 05/02/11 02:46:00 By - Jonathan S. Landay

Bin Laden's violent legacy stretches back decades

Osama bin Laden earned his combat spurs by fighting with Afghanistan's ragtag Mujahadeen army to drive occupying Soviet troops out of their homeland in the 1980s. Bin Laden, though, had a far bigger vision, one that would lead him to be reviled by Western civilization. | 05/02/11 00:52:00 By - Greg Gordon

Across from the White House, a time-capsule moment

The Fourth of July came early on a cool spring night in the nation's capital on Sunday. There were people entrenched in front of the White House joyously waving the American flag; there were people across the street perched in trees and draped with Old Glory at Lafayette Park in a scene of immense pride. One guy shouted, "We killed the (blankety-blank)." That "blankety-blank" was Osama bin Laden. | 05/02/11 03:16:42 By - Gregory Clay

Afghans: Bin Laden raid shows Pakistan should be war's focus

Afghans used the death of Osama bin Laden to plead for the end of the war in their country, saying the killing of the al Qaida leader in Pakistan proves that Pakistan, not Afghanistan, is where the war needs to be fought. | 05/02/11 14:21:00 By - Hashim Shukoor

Transcript: Remarks by President Obama on Osama bin Laden

Tonight, President Obama addressed the Nation to announce that the United States has killed Osama bin Laden, the leader of al Qaida. | 05/02/11 00:35:46 By -

We got the bastard: Graham, Biden share news of bin Laden's death

Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Lindsey Graham, old-style politicians who wear their emotions on their sleeves, traveled the world together when Biden served in the Senate. Graham guessed why Biden might be calling him at home on a Sunday night. | 05/02/11 01:07:00 By - James Rosen

Spain, another victim of bin Laden, praises U.S. actions

The killing of Osama bin Laden brought immediate expressions of support from U.S. allies across the Spanish-speaking world. Spain hailed the U.S. commando action as "a decisive step in the fight against international terrorism" while both Peru and Mexico said bin Laden's death makes the world safer. | 05/02/11 09:34:43 By - Tim Johnson

Texas relative of man killed in 9/11 attack 'relieved' over bin Laden's death

Marty Fangman was finishing some work leftovers when he heard the news alert on his television. Osama bin Laden was dead, a reporter said. Fangman stiffened, and the Keller man's thoughts immediately turned to his younger brother Robert Fangman, a flight attendant who died on one of the doomed 9/11 flights. | 05/02/11 13:52:29 By - Alex Branch

In Columbus, Georgia, military members react to bin Laden death

Lucia Hellein remembers watching the first tower fall. She was in basic training when an instructor came into the room and said there had been an attack. A soldier next to her began screaming. Everyone tried to calm her down, explaining that they were safe. That wasn’t the problem, Hellein said. The soldier’s mother worked in the Twin Towers. | 05/02/11 14:48:38 By - Alan Riquelmy