Osama bin Laden’s eldest son allegedly staged his death in 2019 with assistance from al-Qaeda and the Haqqani Network, a powerful criminal organisation dubbed “the Sopranos of Afghanistan”, according to a startling new intelligence assessment.
Hamza bin Laden, 37, is believed to have spent the intervening years quietly building a network of operatives across Asia and Africa. The assessment warned that he is now preparing to target the West.
Known as the “Prince and Dauphin of Terror”, Hamza was declared dead by Donald Trump after an airstrike in 2019.
However, the report claims al-Qaeda — the terrorist organisation responsible for the 9/11 attacks, which killed 3,000 people and triggered America’s 20-year War on Terror — fabricated his death.
The alleged return of Hamza has raised fresh concerns that the militant group could once again pose a serious terrorist threat.
Britain is considered a prominent target because of its military cooperation with the United States, its colonial history in the Middle East, its links with Israel and its commercial relationships with Gulf states.
The assessment, first reported by the Mirror, warned that Western countries could face mass-casualty attacks, lone-wolf violence, kidnappings, killings, sabotage and attempts to target politicians or other senior public figures.
“The United Kingdom faces a convergent threat. Al-Qaeda retains a historic focus upon Britain as a military ally of the United States, whether under this shaky U-turn government or otherwise,” the report stated.
Hamza, 37, is believed to have secretly assembled a network of operatives across Asia and Africa and is reportedly planning attacks against the West, according to the intelligence assessment.
Hijacked United Airlines Flight 175, travelling from Boston, crashes into the World Trade Center’s south tower at 9.03am on September 11.
According to the report, al-Qaeda misled the CIA into believing that Hamza had been killed after learning that the organisation’s communications were under surveillance.
Hamza had reportedly been groomed to assume a leadership role by former al-Qaeda chief Ayman Zawahiri.
Following an airstrike backed by the CIA, Zawahiri allegedly instructed members of Hamza’s inner circle to confirm his death during telephone conversations.
The deception was reportedly supported by the Haqqani Network, a powerful and ruthless group nicknamed “the Sopranos of Afghanistan” that wields considerable influence within the Taliban.
Zawahiri, an Egyptian physician who became al-Qaeda’s leader, allegedly told Hamza’s associates to discuss his supposed death openly over the phone, creating the impression that the reports were genuine.
And so when Zawahiri was killed himself in an airstrike targeting a Kabul balcony in 2022, the bin Laden terror heir rose through the ranks and took over the reins of the ruthless network.
Hamza is understood to be lusting for revenge, and has apparently planted terror camps across Afghanistan.
He has allegedly linked up with the Iranian military, Hamas, the Islamic State and dozens of other militant groups.
The former British military HQ in Helmand, Camp Bastion, has been used as a training camp for multiple groups, including Hamas before the October 7 massacre, according to the report.
The growing threat from al-Qaeda is understood to be specifically towards the UK and America.
The report warns: ‘The overall assessment is that the strategic jihadist threat to the UK, continental Europe, the US and allied interests has entered a renewed warning phase.’
Hamza’s network has the capacity to facilitate widespread terror and disruption across the West, by tapping into al-Qaeda’s emerging network, the assessment says.
‘The resulting danger includes externally directed mass-casualty attacks, remotely enabled plots, attacks by inspired individuals, aviation and transport targeting, assaults on Jewish and Israeli interests,’ it adds.
Political assassinations are also within the realm of possibility, as is ‘hostage-taking, cyber-enabled facilitation and the exploitation of polarisation generated by the wars in Gaza and the Middle East’.
Invigorated by Hamza’s terrorist lineage, al-Qaeda, the report claims, has developed the mythology of Osama beyond his assassination by US special forces in 2011.
‘Hamza bin Laden’s value to al-Qaeda is ideological, dynastic and operational. As a son of Osama bin Laden, he offers a direct line to the movement’s founding mythology,’ the intelligence document outlines.
‘Before the reported counter-terrorism operation, Hamza had already been used to call for attacks against the US and its allies, to encourage revenge for his father’s death and to present himself as an inheritor of al-Qaeda’s global cause.’
In September 2019, when Hamza was said to be killed, no body was produced following the counter-terror operation.
‘Further intelligence and sources concluded that family telephone conversations were manipulated to reinforce intercepted reporting and that the result was Hamza’s removal from active targeting while he remained under protection,’ the report claims.
On November 14, 2022, Hamza was formally appointed as al-Qaeda’s emir, or chief.
This occurred at the now rebuilt al-Farooq camp in Kandahar, built by his father before being destroyed.
Present at the meeting were the Taliban, Haqqani, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan, and groups of African and Syrian representatives.
The intelligence assessment concludes that the UK must take the renewed al-Qaeda threat seriously.
‘The core warning is al-Qaeda should no longer be assessed as a defeated legacy organisation,’ it warns.
‘It has retained patience, senior expertise, regional affiliates and a powerful brand. Taliban-controlled Afghanistan gives it strategic depth, while conflict in Gaza, state competition involving Iran, insecurity in the Sahel and online radicalisation provide opportunities for mobilisation.
‘Hamza bin Laden’s reappearance, whether principally operational or symbolic, can unify these strands.’
