Osama bin Laden (1957–2011) was the founder and first emir of al-Qaeda, a Salafi jihadist organization he created in 1988 to wage global terrorism and establish a pan-Islamist caliphate. After helping Afghan mujahideen fight the Soviet Union in the 1980s, he was expelled from Saudi Arabia for opposing the royal family, eventually finding refuge in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan. His most infamous act was orchestrating the September 11, 2001 attacks, which killed nearly 3,000 people and directly triggered the U.S. Global War on Terrorism, leading to the invasion of Afghanistan. Forced to flee to Pakistan in 2002, he spent years hiding in a compound in Abbottabad, where he remained a symbolic figurehead while al-Qaeda continued attacks worldwide. On May 2, 2011, U.S. Navy SEALs raided the compound and killed him, with his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri succeeding him as al-Qaeda's leader.