Hamza bin Laden, son of slain Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and chosen heir of the terror group, has been killed, according to US media reports. US officials confirmed the same, but did not provide details of the place or date of Hamza's death.
NBC News first reported the information citing US officials.
When asked to confirm the news regarding Hamza's death and if he had prior intelligence it, President Donald Trump said he didn't want to comment on it.
The New York Times reported that the US was involved int he operation that led to Hamza's death, which it said took place in the past two years.
Hamza had a bounty of USD 1 million on his head. Hamza, the 15th of Osama's 20 children, was “emerging as a leader in the Al Qaeda franchise,” the US State Department said in announcing the bounty in February 2019. He is likely to have been around 30 years old.
Osama bin Laden was killed by US special forces in Pakistan in 2011.
The US State Department had designated Hamza as a global terrorist in 2017, believing he is the figure “best placed to reunify the global jihadi movement”. He had also repoirtedly threatened to take revenge on the United States for his father's death. The State Department further said that he called for terrorist attacks on Western countries.
According to reports, Hamza was being groomed to take over the leadership of Al Qaeda. He was believed to have been under house arrest in Iran after his father's death, but he was reportedly in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Syria.
Al Qaeda is the group behind the deadly September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States. However, the terror group's prominence has diminished in the past decade since the emergence of the Islamic State.
(With inputs from agencies)
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