Al Qaeda confirms bin Laden’s death (UPDATES)

Al Qaeda confirmed the death of its leader, Osama bin Laden, in a statement on jihadist forums Friday, CNN reported, quoting the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors Islamist websites.

The Al Qaeda statement also threatened to take action against the U.S., and urged Pakistanis to "rise up and revolt," according to a translation SITE.

Meanwhile, data collected from the raid on the Abbottabad compound in Pakistan hosting Osama bin Laden shows that the Al Qaeda leader continued to "plot and plan" attacks and had regular communication with other Al Qaeda leaders while he lived there.

“He wasn’t just a figurehead,” an American official briefed on the documents collected from the raid told the New York Times. “He continued to plot and plan, to come up with ideas about targets and to communicate those ideas to other senior Qaeda leaders.”

U.S. forces seized computers, documents, and DVDs from the Abbottabad compound after they killed bin Laden Sunday, providing a treasure trove of information on bin Laden and Al Qaeda's leadership structure. Bin Laden had been living there for up to six years.

The documents showed that Al Qaeda had been considering attacking U.S. trains on the tenth anniversary of the September 11 attacks. However, counterterrorism experts said the intelligence revealed that the train attack plans never got beyond the initial phase of planning.

A U.S. official told the Associated Press the obtained documents show a terrorist's wish list, but do not indicate further planning.

"While it is clear that there was some level of planning for this type of operation in February 2010, we have no recent information to indicate an active ongoing plot to target transportation and no information on possible locations or specific targets," according to Thursday's joint FBI and Homeland Security bulletin obtained by AP.

The U.S. intelligence community is working to translate and analyze the documents to find information on terror attacks that might be planned and to locate other top leaders in the Al Qaeda network.

The C.I.A. has been able to go through the materials because they were not protected by complex encryption programs, the Daily Telegraph reports.

The Al Qaeda statement, meanwhile, reportedly said that bin Laden's death would serve as a "curse that chases the Americans and their agents, and goes after them inside and outside their countries." 

The statement said Al Qaeda would "continue on the path of jihad, the path walked upon by our leaders, and on top of them" bin Laden "without hesitation or reluctance.

"We will not deviate from that or change until Allah judges between us and between our enemy with truth. Indeed, He is the best of all judges. Nothing will harm us after that, until we see either victory and success and conquest and empowerment, or we die trying."

Check out GlobalPost's complete coverage on Osama bin Laden's death.