NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
    • The Great NZ Road Trip
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • Deloitte Fast 50
    • Generate wealth weekly
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / World

How the world's most precise missile killed al-Qaeda leader Zawahiri on his balcony

By Henry Bodkin
Daily Telegraph UK·
3 Aug, 2022 01:48 AM5 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save
    Share this article
US President Joe Biden said 'justice has been delivered' after confirming in a White House speech that a US drone strike killed al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. Video / AP

It was a well-worn routine, and one that ultimately led to his death.

Shortly after dawn on Sunday, Ayman al-Zawahiri, the al-Qaeda leader, was taking in the air on the third-floor balcony of his safe house in the upmarket Kabul neighbourhood of Sherpur, a short walk from the British Embassy, having completed his morning prayer.

As the sun rose over the capital, he would have been blissfully unaware of the CIA Reaper drone circling tens of thousands of feet overhead.

At 6.18am, the unmanned aircraft fired two R9X "ninja" Hellfires, a new-age hyper-accurate missile system which replaces explosives with six razor-like blades.

Moments later Zawahiri was dead, shredded, his jihad over. His family, just feet away inside the building, were unharmed.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Announcing the mission's success in a live TV address on Monday, President Joe Biden was blunt.

"Justice has been delivered," he said. "This terrorist leader is no more."

The strike against Osama bin Laden's former deputy, and one of the final masterminds of 9/11 still at large, brought to an end a manhunt that spanned a generation.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

For more than a decade the trail had gone cold. Zawahiri appeared in a video last year on the anniversary of the 2001 attacks but it offered scarce clues as to his whereabouts.

Earlier this year, however, US intelligence heard whispers that the Egyptian former doctor who had succeeded bin Laden as head of al-Qaeda in 2011 was back in Afghanistan.

In early April, top security officials were made aware that Zawahiri's wife, their daughter and grandchildren had moved into a safe house in the old diplomatic quarter and were using textbook terrorist tradecraft in an effort not to be followed.

They then briefed the president. Was it possible that, despite the Doha agreement with Donald Trump's administration, the re-established Taliban regime was again harbouring terrorists?

American spies soon became increasingly confident that Zawahiri was indeed living at the house. As in the case of bin Laden 11 years earlier, they began weaving together different threads of intelligence to build up a so-called "pattern of life" to confirm his presence.

In all those weeks, US intelligence were never once aware of the person they believed to be the al-Qaeda boss leaving the building. However, he was observed to spend substantial amounts of time on the balcony.

The echoes of Abbottabad, the sleepy Pakistani compound where bin Laden hid from surveillance but was finally killed by the Navy Seals in 2011, were marked. John Kirby, from the National Security Council, told CNN yesterday that US spies had spent "weeks, if not several months, of making sure that we had the right guy".

"Once we knew that we had an effective pattern of life and opportunities that could be taken, it was really down to stitching together how you were going to take that opportunity and with what."

The president received updates throughout May and June. By the start of July, intelligence chiefs had come up with a plan.

At a briefing in the White House situation room on July 1, William Burns, the CIA director, and others showed Biden a detailed model of the house Zawahiri was staying in.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

The president is said to have asked questions about the weather, the sturdiness of the building materials and other factors that might affect the success of a missile strike and the likelihood of civilian casualties. On July 25, Biden convened his advisers and key cabinet members for a final meeting on the latest intelligence. Not for the first time, he asked about options other than air strike.

Ayman al-Zawahiri was killed in his home. Photo / Supplied by AP
Ayman al-Zawahiri was killed in his home. Photo / Supplied by AP

When these were "systematically eliminated", the president gave the green light for a tailored missile strike on the condition that it minimise, as far as possible, civilian casualties.

The choice of missile may well have been crucial in authorising arguably the most significant strike since 2011. Made by Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, the R9X Hellfire marks a new generation of precision weapon using six blades of reinforced metal that extend moments before hitting the target.

By abandoning the explosive warhead, US military and spy chiefs hope to leave behind the routine collateral damage - the seemingly relentless killing of innocent family members, neighbours and bystanders - that became such a hallmark of the war on terror. It was used in January 2019 to take out Taliban leader Mohibullah, as well as the USS Cole bombing suspect Jamel Ahmed Mohammed Ali al-Badawi in Yemen.

In deciding whether and how best to attack Zawahiri, the White House will have been mindful of the "horrible mistake" made last year when 10 innocent people were killed in a missile strike when they were mistaken for members of Islamic State following the US withdrawal from Afghanistan.

As Kirby put it: "The president made it very clear when he made the decision that he wanted to make sure we avoided civilian casualties, and we know we did from a series of intelligence and other sources that we have available to us."

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Save
    Share this article

Latest from World

World

'Forever nap': Experts on dangers facing fugitive in potential hiding spots

World

Putin warns Western troops in Ukraine will be 'legitimate targets'

Premium
World

How a 19-year-old became Britain's youngest local govt leader


Sponsored

NZ’s convenience icon turns 35

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from World

'Forever nap': Experts on dangers facing fugitive in potential hiding spots
World

'Forever nap': Experts on dangers facing fugitive in potential hiding spots

Australian town remains shut down as residents hope for a resolution to the manhunt soon.

05 Sep 08:49 AM
Putin warns Western troops in Ukraine will be 'legitimate targets'
World

Putin warns Western troops in Ukraine will be 'legitimate targets'

05 Sep 08:02 AM
Premium
Premium
How a 19-year-old became Britain's youngest local govt leader
World

How a 19-year-old became Britain's youngest local govt leader

05 Sep 05:52 AM


NZ’s convenience icon turns 35
Sponsored

NZ’s convenience icon turns 35

02 Sep 09:23 PM
NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP