SAN’A, Yemen – Anwar al-Awlaki, a radical U.S.-born Muslim cleric and one of the most influential al-Qaida leaders, was killed Friday in a U.S. drone strike in northern Yemen, U.S. and Yemeni authorities said, eliminating a prominent terrorist recruiter who inspired attacks on U.S. soil.
The strike also killed a second U.S. citizen, Samir Khan, the co-editor of an al-Qaida magazine, and two other unidentified al-Qaida operatives, the Yemeni government said. Tribal leaders in the area said at least seven people were killed.
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Al-Awlaki’s death comes less than five months after U.S. Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden, leader of the al-Qaida network, in a raid on his hideout in Abbottabad, Pakistan. The Obama administration in recent months has escalated the use of drones to target al-Qaida-linked militants in Yemen and Somalia.
President Obama called al-Awlaki’s death “a major blow to al-Qaida’s most active operational affiliate” and described him as “the leader of external operations for al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula,” a group known as AQAP.
Al-Awlaki’s death could have far-reaching implications for Yemen, the poorest country in the Middle East and one that has been gripped for eight months by a standoff between the government and demonstrators determined to bring an end to the 33-year rule of President Ali Abdullah Saleh.
Saleh, who returned to Yemen last week after a three-month absence for medical treatment following an assassination attempt, has long portrayed himself as a U.S. ally who is essential to counterterrorism efforts. Critics say that his refusal to resign is the main source of instability in the country, and that his government has allowed al-Qaida to thrive on Yemeni soil.
On Friday, Yemeni officials were pointing to al-Awlaki’s death as evidence of Saleh’s effectiveness as a U.S. partner, while opposition leaders said they feared it would ease international pressure on the president to step aside.
Al-Awlaki, born in New Mexico to Yemeni parents, has been implicated in helping to motivate several attacks in the United States.
He is believed to have inspired an Army officer charged with killing 13 people in a November 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas, a Nigerian student accused of attempting to bomb a Detroit-bound airliner the following month, and a Pakistani-American man who tried to set off a car bomb in New York City in May 2010.
Al-Awlaki has also been linked to an attempt in 2010 to send parcel bombs on cargo planes bound for the United States.
As a fluent speaker of English and Arabic and a savvy user of websites, al-Awlaki was able to gather a following online and radicalize Muslims he had never met, earning him a reputation as “the bin Laden of the Internet,” U.S. officials said.
In April 2010, the Obama administration authorized his killing. Al-Awlaki had been the target of previous U.S. strikes and was quoted as laughing off an attempt to kill him in May.
Khan, a member of AQAP, co-edited the group’s English-language Internet magazine, Inspire, which was intended to recruit Westerners to al-Qaida’s fold.
Al-Awlaki was also believed to have played a role in creating the online-only magazine, whose first issue in July 2010 included an article titled “Making a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom.”
The first word of Friday’s strike came from the Yemeni Defense Ministry, which sent a text message to journalists announcing that “the terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki has been killed along with some of his companions.”
In a separate emailed statement, the Yemeni government said al-Awlaki was “targeted and killed” five miles from the town of Khashef in Yemen’s northern Jawf province, 87 miles east of the capital, San’a. The attack, the statement said, was launched at 9:55 a.m. Friday local time.
Mohammed al-Basha, a Yemeni government spokesman, said in an email that Yemeni intelligence had pinpointed al-Awlaki’s hideout and monitored his movements before the airstrike. A U.S. official also said that there was close cooperation with the Yemenis.
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