Ding Dong Osama is Dead

News breaking all over the place tonight that Osama bin Laden was killed and that his body is in US possession.

Latest reports via Fox News live right now are that he was killed over a week ago by a US missile. There are conflicting reports on whether he was killed in Afghanistan (CBS) or Pakistan (CNN). CNN reporting that it was a "CIA asset" (read: human ground operation?) that killed bin Laden. [11:24pm Eastern update - Pakistani government tells Fox News that bin Laden was killed in Pakistan...TODAY...more: one of bin Laden's sons also killed, along with two male couriers and a female human shield]

President Obama to speak any minute. Stand by.

God bless our military.

Remember 9/11 and the 2,977 innocent men, women, and children murdered by bin Laden's jihadi henchmen.

Remember the 2000 USS Cole and the 17 sailors killed by bin Laden's jihadi henchmen.

Remember the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the six killed, and hundreds injured by bin Laden's jihadi henchmen.

Remember the 1988 US Embassy Bombings in Africa, the 12 US diplomats, and hundreds of Kenyans slaughtered by bin Laden's jihadi henchmen.

Remember the 1983 Beirut bombings and the 241 US servicemen murdered by bin Laden's jihadi spiritual brethren.

AP:

"Osama bin Laden, the mastermind behind the Sept. 11 attacks against the United States, is dead, and the U.S. is in possession of his body, a person familiar with the situation said late Sunday.

President Barack Obama was expected to address the nation on the developments Sunday night.

A senior U.S. counterterrorism official said bin Laden was killed in a ground operation in Pakistan, not by a Predator drone. The official said it happened last week.

11:22pm Eastern: Still no President Obama appearance yet. CNN showed tourists outside White House spontaneously singing national anthem and chanting "USA USA!"

11:36pm ET: Obama makes the official announcement that the "United States has conducted an operation that killed."

More details on the ground operation/firefight today with predictable NYTimes spin:

President Obama said that on Sunday, a small team of U.S. operatives launched a "targeted assault" on a compound in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad where months of intelligence work had established that Mr. Bin Laden was living. Mr. Bin Laden was killed after a firefight, and the troops took custody of his body. The killing ended a 10-year manhunt in which Mr. Bin Laden repeatedly eluded his pursuers, deeply frustrating the Bush administration and counterterrorism officials.

The news of the death of the leader of Al Qaeda electrified the world — crowds gathered outside the White House, cheering, as they waited for the president to confirm the news. Mr. bin Laden was able to elude capture by hiding out in the mountains of Afghanistan and elsewhere. He initially escaped from Tora Bora in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan after an American invasion routed the Taliban, his protectors. Since then, he issued some 30 messages, in audio, video or electronic text, sometimes taunting, sometimes gloating, sometimes urging new terrorist attacks. Intelligence officials believe the messages were passed from hand to hand repeatedly to obscure any trail back to his hiding place. Even while in hiding, he remained a potent symbolic figure. And American officials believe, based on intercepted communications from second- and third-tier Qaeda operatives, that he also still helped shape Al Qaeda's strategy.

Obama: "Justice has been done."

"We must remain vigilant at home and abroad."

12:25am ET Crowd cheering, singing "God bless America" at NYC's Ground Zero.

Justice may have been done, but the Islamic war on the West is unceasing — it started centuries before bin Laden and it will continue.

Case in point…the latest from Germany on a newly-foiled al Qaeda bombing plot:

German authorities intensified their search for al Qaeda-linked terrorist suspects over the weekend after foiling what they described as an Islamist plot to detonate a large bomb in a crowded public area in the vicinity of Düsseldorf, one of the country's largest cities.

Authorities have taken three suspects into custody in connection with the case, but said they believed at least seven others remain at large. The alleged conspiracy was ordered by a senior al Qaeda figure, German officials said without offering further details.

Lan astaslem.

Keep all our servicemen, servicewomen, and U.S. personnel in your thoughts and prayers tonight. Be safe and Godspeed.

Their work is far, far from over.

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US: handling bin Laden's body in Islamic tradition.

Rebecca Grunewald: "We treat your dead bodies w/respect while you drag ours through the streets, Radical Islamists."

Via Dan Foster at NRO: Hmmm.

Latest Breaking News: Helicopter crashed in Abbottabad; reason of crash is not clarify yet. According to source, one security forces helicopter is crashed due to unknown reason forces covered the area and did not permission to coverage the media and also stop the civilians reached at the spot.

The helicopter then came down in a plot. An eyewitness said that there were two helicopters one of them is crashed.

Rescue teams and fire fighters start their deities. Fire Fighters busy to control on fire.

Twitter abuzz about a Pakistani IT consultant who unwittingly live-Tweeted the bin Laden raid without knowing it: His handle – ReallyVirtual. Check it out.

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At the NYTimes website…worth screen-capping and saving:

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Via Stars and Stripes, our men and women in uniform react:

Troops downrange gathered around televisions as details rolled out. Many celebrating; some were more circumspect.

"All I'm thinking about," said Brig. Gen. Tom Cosentino at Bagram Airfield in Afghanistan, "are the bodies we pulled out of the Pentagon and the Twin Towers."

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3:17am Eastern…Cable news and Twitter on fire with reports that Osama was buried at sea already. Yes, he's allegedly swimming with the fishes already. Official word is that burial at sea will prevent his grave from being a pilgrimage site.

Meanwhile, DNA tests won't be back for another few days.

How many of you reacted with a big "WTH?"

Posted in: War

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