Hamza bin Laden, the son and possible successor to terror kingpin Osama bin Laden, is dead, it was reported Wednesday.
The United States has gathered intelligence that the al Qaeda leader’s son had died, NBC News reported, citing three American officials.
The sources would not discuss details of where or when the younger bin Laden died or if the US played a role in his demise, and President Trump declined to elaborate at the White House.
“I don’t want to comment on it. I don’t want to comment on that,” he said.
State Department officials also declined to comment during an unrelated news conference on sanctions against Iran’s foreign minister, although the reports said the younger bin Laden was killed in Iran.
The feds were expected to make an announcement, though, a US official said.
The official provided no further details.
Hamza, believed to be about 30 years old, was at his father’s side in Afghanistan before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and spent time with him in Pakistan after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan pushed much of al Qaeda’s senior leadership there, according to the Brookings Institution think tank in Washington, DC.
Hamza’s last known public statement, released by al Qaeda in 2018, included threats against Saudi Arabia and called on the people of the Arabian Peninsula to revolt against their rulers.
Navy SEALs killed Osama bin Laden in 2011 during a raid on his hideout in Abbottabad, Pakistan.
Hamza was not found at the compound, but letters seized there suggested the top 9/11 plotter wanted his son to join him in Abbottabad so he could groom him as a terrorist kingpin.
“Hamza is being prepared for a leadership role in the organization his father founded” and was “likely to be perceived favorably by the jihadi rank-and-file,” counterterror expert and former FBI agent Ali Soufan said in 2017.
“With the Islamic State’s ‘caliphate’ apparently on the verge of collapse, Hamza is now the figure best placed to reunify the global jihadi movement.”
The State Department in March announced a $1 million reward for help in hunting Hamza down, calling him “a specially designated global terrorist” and noting that he was born right after al Qaeda was formed, so he had lived his entire life according to its murderous ideology.
With Wires