Senior al-Qaeda leader killed in U.S. airstrike

A top al-Qaeda leader was reported killed last Thursday in northern Pakistan. The death marks an enormous victory in the United States fight against terrorism.

According to an American official and Islamic extremist Web sites, Abu Laith al-Libi was killed when a Predator surveillance aircraft missile struck a compound in North Waziristan.

The attack marks one of several U.S. attempts using Predator air strikes in Pakistan’s northern tribal area.

The al-Qaeda commander was one of 12 terrorists on the “most wanted” list issued in October by the Combined Joint Task Force-82. A U.S. official told CNN that al-Libi is “not far below the importance of the top two al-Qaeda leaders”—Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri.

According to American officials, the 40-year-old was a lieutenant for top al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. Al-Libi operated recruiting and training in north Pakistan in a provisional compound. Al-Qaeda has built compounds in Pakistan to train forces and plotting attacks.

The CIA air strike also killed around a dozen others, according to a security official who asked not to be named by The Associated Press.

The New York Times reports that the attack could signal a rise in covert attacks intended for terrorist leaders and the dismemberment of tribal networks.

“Al-Libi has been waging jihad for more than 10 years and it will be a blow to both al-Qaeda and the Taliban, but not in a way that will lead to the downfall of those organizations,” said terror expert Eric Rosenbach to Fox News.

“His death is a major accomplishment in the global war on terror, yet our work is not done,” said John Carroll University political science major Dan O’Leary. “He will most likely be replaced within the al-Qaeda hierarchy,” he added. Al-Libi was the mastermind behind the attempted assassination of Vice President Dick Cheney in February 2007 at the U.S. base at Bagram in Afghanistan. The attack killed 23 people. Cheney was unharmed.

According to a senior U.S. official, Mike McConnell, the director of national intelligence, and Gen. Michael V. Hayden, CIA director, visited Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf in hopes of achieving more freedom to operate in Pakistan’s tribal area.

Musharraf denied the U.S. expansion of combat in Pakistan’s North Waziristan, but the U.S. and Pakistan have agreed to consider a wider range of attacks using the un-manned Predator, according to The New York Times.

“Overall, this successful mission stresses the ongoing importance of international cooperation and diplomacy and the need for a strong commitment from the world’s intelligence agencies,” said O’Leary.

Al-Libi posted an audio recording in 2002 on an Islamist Web site saying they intended to extend the war by means of assassinations and attacks against infrastructures, according to CNN.com. The Libyan native also appeared in a 2004 video attacking an Afghan army base. In a 2007 video, a man identified as al-Libi accused Shiite Muslims as fighting with American troops in Iraq. He vowed to crush any foreign presence in Afghanistan, according to FoxNews.com.