Bin Laden is most well known for his role in masterminding the September 11 attacks , which resulted in the deaths of nearly 3,000 and prompted the United States to initiate the War on Terror . He subsequently became the subject of a decade-long international manhunt . From 2001 to 2011 , bin Laden was a major target of the United States , as the FBI offered a $ 25 million bounty in their search for him . On May 2 , 2011 , bin Laden was shot and killed by United States Navy SEALs inside a private residential compound in Abbottabad , where he lived with a local family from Waziristan , during a covert operation conducted by members of the United States Naval Special Warfare Development Group and Central Intelligence Agency SAD/SOG operators on the orders of U.S. President Barack Obama . Under his leadership , the al-Qaeda organization was responsible for , in addition to the September 11 attacks in the United States , many other mass-casualty attacks worldwide
September 11 attacks
September 11 attacks
Osama bin Laden