Abu Ali al-Harithi

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Abu Ali al-Harithi (Arabic: أبو علي الحاريثي ) was a citizen of Yemen and a suspected al-Qaida operative who is believed to have been the mastermind behind the October 2000 USS Cole bombing. He was killed by the CIA during a covert mission in Yemen on November 3, 2002. The CIA used an RQ-1 Predator remote-controlled drone to shoot the Hellfire missile that killed al-Harithi and five other suspected al-Qaida operatives as they rode in a vehicle 100 miles east of the Yemeni capital, Sanaa.

Al-Harithi was traveling with Ahmed Hijazi, a US citizen, and Hijazi's killing is the first known case of the U.S. government intentionally killing an American citizen during the War on Terror. Unlike Afghanistan and Iraq, Yemen was not considered a battlefield or an enemy state by the United States at the time of the attack.

The George W. Bush administration, citing the authority of a presidential finding that permits worldwide covert actions against Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network, considered al-Harithi and his traveling party a justifiable military target. The late and then foreign minister of Sweden, Anna Lindh did not share that view and described the attack as "a summary execution that violates human rights". [1]