Introduction
Osama bin Laden is the leader of the terrorist group al-Qaeda. A terrorist is a
person who tries to control people through violence and fear. Bin Laden and others
founded al-Qaeda in the late 1980s. Their goal was to protect the religion of
Islam.
Early Life
Bin Laden was born in 1957 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He grew up in a large and very
rich family. He attended King Abdul Aziz University and became an engineer.
Organizing al-Qaeda
In 1979 troops from the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, a Muslim country. Bin
Laden went to Afghanistan to help fight the invaders. It was during this period
that he helped found al-Qaeda. He returned to Saudi Arabia as a hero.
Soon after he returned the Persian Gulf War broke out. The Saudi government allowed
troops from the United States to establish a military base there. Bin Laden was
angry with his government for letting the U.S. troops into the country. He was also
angry with the U.S. government because he believed that it was interfering in the
Muslim world.
In 1994 Saudi Arabia accused bin Laden of trying to overthrow the government. Bin
Laden escaped to Sudan. There he ran training camps for terrorists. Sudan threw
out bin Laden in 1996, so he set up his headquarters in Afghanistan.
Attacks
Al-Qaeda carried out attacks worldwide throughout the 1990s. On September 11, 2001,
members of al-Qaeda hijacked four airplanes. They crashed three of them into the
World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. The fourth airplane crashed
in a field in Pennsylvania. About 3,000 people died in these attacks. Afterward
U.S. forces invaded Afghanistan to try to capture or to kill bin Laden.