Osama bin Laden was born exactly 69 years ago from today, on March 10, 1957, in Saudi Arabia. In the eyes of his family and friends, he was a 'quiet and shy' boy in his childhood, but he gained global attention after the 9/11 attacks in America in 2001 as the world's most wanted terrorist and the leader of the international extremist organization Al-Qaeda.
It was 1971 when a 14-year-old Saudi youth was in Oxford, UK, to take a language course. This boy belonged to one of the richest families in Saudi Arabia, which also had close ties to the Saudi royal family.
A Spanish woman who met Osama and his two other brothers said decades later about the meeting that Osama was more mature than his age, but apparently he was not very interested in politics or religion.
Osama bin Laden's father, Muhammad bin Laden, was the owner of a well-known construction company and was considered a wealthy figure in Saudi Arabia. After his father's death in a helicopter accident in 1968, Osama bin Laden and his brothers received assets of approximately $250 million.
In 2002, a BBC Two program called 'I Met Osama' featured interviews with people who had met Osama bin Laden in his childhood.
Brian Fyfield-Shailer, an English teacher at an elite school in Jeddah, said that he was shy and hesitant to speak. 'Other (Saudi) children were telling me to convert to Islam, but Osama was not one of them. He was not so noticeable in class.'
According to him, Osama had no problem learning English, but he certainly had a leaning towards religious tendencies.
According to the English teacher, many of Osama's half-brothers had studied abroad and adopted a Western lifestyle, but Osama was not one of them.
Osama received his education from the university in Jeddah, where he first encountered Islamic scholars.
Osama bin Laden was a civil engineering student at King Abdul Aziz University, where he met students and teachers who were considered to have Jihadi ideologies, which started to change his views during his student days.
Osama bin Laden's mother, Aaila Ghanem, came to the public eye for the first time in 2018. She told the newspaper 'The Guardian' that when Osama was studying at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah
According to her, 'People at the university changed him, he became a completely different person.'
Among the people Osama bin Laden met at the university was Abdullah Azzam, who was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. Abdullah was later expelled from Saudi Arabia due to his activities, but he went on to become Osama's spiritual advisor.
Osama's mother, Aaila Ghanem, recalled that Osama met 'some people who included Osama with them'
'I always told him (Osama) to stay away from them and he never told me what he was doing.'
In the 1980s, Osama bin Laden went to Afghanistan to fight against the Soviet Union. According to Osama's mother, Aaila Ghanem, he 'lost all his wealth in Afghanistan, where he went under the pretext of family business.'
Osama bin Laden was funding the Mujahideen with his personal wealth, but many Mujahideen commanders were unaware of this.
In the BBC Select documentary 'Bin Laden: The Road to 9/11', former Mujahideen fighter Abdullah Anas says that Osama bin Laden also brought some engineers from his family's construction company in Jeddah to Afghanistan.
Afghan Mujahideen commander Syed Wahid Yar says that during the 80s, '12 Arab citizens joined us, one of whom was named Osama. It's not that he stayed with us for a few days, but he spent months with us. I don't remember, but six to eight months. He was living there as an ordinary fighter.'
'We had to be gentle with the Arabs.
Syed Wahid Yar, whose pseudonym was 'Nidar', further said in the BBC documentary 'Bin Laden: The Road to 9/11' that initially the Mujahideen commanders 'did not want to take Arab youth with them for any operation.'
In the early part of his stay in Afghanistan, Osama bin Laden participated in construction work for Jihadi purposes by driving bulldozers in Afghanistan. He had learned this work in his family's construction company before going to Afghanistan.
Former Mujahideen fighter Abdullah Anas remembers that on a tour to the north, he saw Osama 'driving a bulldozer.'
When he asked, 'Osama, what are you doing?' Osama replied, 'We have to build roads for the Mujahideen. We have to build clinics in caves inside the mountains.'
Afghan Mujahideen commander Syed Wahid Yar says that the lack of roads was a big problem because the Mujahideen could not reach anywhere.
Syed Wahid Yad says that the Mujahideen thought that Osama was an ordinary fighter and 'we never thought that Osama was bearing the cost of all this himself. We thought someone else was making these arrangements and he was just helping.'
But after spending some time in Afghanistan, Osama also received training in shooting and picked up a Kalashnikov to fight.
Syed Wahid Yar says that at first he did not know anything about weapons, how to use a Kalashnikov or how to shoot a bullet. '(But) Osama considered us his teacher to get training in Jihad and fighting.'
He recalls that 'he just watched us and slowly he learned how to use weapons. When he learned, we started taking him to fight.'
The Afghan Mujahideen commander further says that 'during a battle we had to tell him to bend down or he would get shot. He couldn't control himself. He was running from one person to another. I angrily said, 'Sit down!' and he sat down.'
According to him, Osama bin Laden was thin and tall, but he had 'no fear of being shot.'
Former fighter Abdullah Anas says that over time Osama had changed from a charity giver to 'a fighter.'
Osama was influenced by the ideas of Ayman al-Zawahiri (leader of Al-Qaeda and Osama's successor) of Egypt, and when Al-Qaeda formed an army for Jihad, Osama played a central role in it.
After the Soviet war in Afghanistan, when bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia, he was unhappy with civilian life.
In 1991, Osama moved from Saudi Arabia to Sudan
Later. His Saudi citizenship was revoked and he was deported from Sudan. He could now only return to Afghanistan, from where his global Jihad plan came to light.
Finally, Osama bin Laden passed away from this mortal world in 2011 in an attack by the American army in the area of Abbottabad