Regarding the legality of assassinating Osama bin Laden: “Michael Scheuer, head of the CIA Bin Laden unit, claims the intelligence was sometimes good enough to fire. ‘The Sunday before Christmas in [December 20] 1998, Bin Laden was staying overnight in the governor’s palace in Kandahar [Afghanistan]. We knew he was there because we saw him go into the room, and we know which wing of the palace, which room he was in,’ recalls Scheuer. ‘And the president [Bill Clinton] and his advisers decided that *Well, if we kill him, some of the shrapnel might hit a mosque that was about 300 metres away.* ‘ The operation was aborted.”
– Gordon Corera, “Dead or Alive? US Indecision over Killing Bin Laden,” BBC News, July 15, 2011