It is dangerous to be related to a terrorist, let alone a senior terror operative. Such an association can lead to one’s imminent death while participating in an attack encouraged by a family member, being vanquished by a state action, demise arising from a premature explosion, or at the hands of their kin. The latest example of death of family members due to their kin’s participation in terrorism is the passing of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s two children. They died in October 2019 when their father detonated his suicide belt as he was pursued by U.S. forces at his hideout in Barisha, Syria. Also, two of al-Baghdadi’s wives died during the raid of his compound.
Similarly, al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden’s son Saad was killed in a drone strike in Pakistan in 2009. Khalid, another son, was vanquished along with bin Laden in Pakistan during the U.S. Navy Seal raid in May 2011. In January 2016, another bin Laden child, Hamza, called to avenge his father’s death: “If you think that your sinful crime that you committed in Abbottabad has passed without punishment, then you thought wrong.” In September 2019, President Donald Trump announced that Hamza was killed in a counterterrorism mission in Afghanistan-Pakistan region during the previous two years. Anwar al-Awlaki was a senior al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula operative before he perished in a U.S. drone strike in Yemen in September 2011. Al-Awlaki’s teenage son Abdulrahman died that same month in another drone strike, either purposely or as collateral damage.