Mr. Obama also called Mr. Awlaki “the leader of external operations for Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula ” — the first time the United States has publicly used that description of him. American officials say he inspired militants around the world and helped plan a number of terrorist plots, including the December 2009 attempt to blow up a jetliner bound for Detroit . 
 
 The drone strike was the first C.I.A. strike in Yemen since 2002 — there have been others since then by the military’s Special Operations forces — and was part of an effort by the spy agency to duplicate in Yemen the covert war the it has been running in Pakistan . Friday’s operation was the first time the agency had carried out a deadly strike from a new base in the region. The agency began constructing the base this year, officials said, when it became apparent to intelligence and counterterrorism officials that the threat from Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Yemen had eclipsed that coming from its core group of operatives hiding in Pakistan. 
 
 American officials said that the missile strike also killed Samir Khan , an American citizen of Pakistani origin who was an editor of Inspire, Al Qaeda’s English-language online magazine. Mr. Khan, who grew up in Queens and North Carolina , proclaimed in the magazine last year that he was “proud to be a traitor to America,” and edited articles with titles like “Make a Bomb in the Kitchen of Your Mom.” 
 
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 United States officials said that Friday’s strike may also have killed Ibrahim Hassan al-Asiri, a Saudi bomb maker responsible for the weapon carried by Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab , the so-called underwear bomber in the jetliner plot. He is also thought to have built the printer-cartridge bombs that, 10 months later, were intended to be put on cargo planes headed to the United States. Neither of those plots were successful. 
 
 A high-ranking Yemeni security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that Mr. Awlaki was killed while traveling between Marib and Jawf Provinces in northern Yemen — areas known for having a Qaeda presence and where there is very little central government control. 
 
 A tribal sheik from Jawf Province, Abdullah al-Jumaili, said he had seen the place where Mr. Awlaki was killed. Reached by phone in Jawf, Mr. Jumaili said that the car Mr. Awlaki and two or three companions had been traveling in was nearly destroyed, and that it might be difficult to recognize bodies. But he said he had also spoken to other tribesmen in the area and was “100 percent sure” that Mr. Awlaki had been killed. 
 
 There had been an intense debate among lawyers in the months before the Obama administration decided to put Mr. Awlaki on a target list in early 2010, and officials said that Mr. Khan was never on the list. The decision to make Mr. Awlaki a priority to be sought and killed was controversial, given his American citizenship. The American Civil Liberties Union , which fought unsuccessfully in the American court system to challenge the decision to target Mr. Awlaki, condemned the killing. 
 
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 Mr. Awlaki’s death comes in the midst of a deepening political crisis in Yemen, the Arab world’s poorest country, where President Ali Abdullah Saleh has been resisting repeated calls to relinquish power. Mr. Saleh has argued that he is essential to the American efforts to battle Al Qaeda in Yemen, but American officials said there was no connection between Mr. Saleh’s abrupt return this week from Saudi Arabia , where he had been recovering from injuries sustained in an assassination attempt, and the timing of Friday’s airstrikes. 
 
 Born in New Mexico to Yemeni parents, Mr. Awlaki, 40, began preaching in mosques while a college student in the United States. During that time, as a preacher in San Diego , he met two of the Sept. 11, 2001, attackers. He returned to Yemen in 2004 and his English-language sermons became ever more stridently anti-American. 
 
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 American counterterrorism officials said his Internet lectures and sermons inspired would-be militants and led to more than a dozen terrorist investigations in the United States, Britain and Canada . Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, who is accused of killing 13 people in a shooting rampage at Fort Hood in Texas in 2009, had exchanged e-mails with Mr. Awlaki before the shootings. Faisal Shahzad, a Pakistani-American who tried to set off a car bomb in Times Square in May 2010, cited Mr. Awlaki as an inspiration. 
 
 Many ordinary Yemenis — schooled in the cynicism of Yemeni politics — believe that their government could have killed or even captured Mr. Awlaki at any time, and chose to do so only now for political reasons. 
 
 But in fact, the Yemeni security services, many trained by American Special Forces soldiers, appear to have pursued Mr. Awlaki for almost two years in a hunt that was often hindered by the shifting allegiances of Yemen’s tribes and the deep unpopularity of Mr. Saleh’s government. 
 
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 In 2009 and 2010, Mr. Awlaki seems to have been mostly in the southern heartland of his own powerful tribe, the Awaliq, where killing him would have been politically costly for the government, and capturing him nearly impossible. The area where Mr. Awlaki was finally killed, in the remote north, did not afford him the same tribal protection. There are also many tribal leaders in the far north who receive stipends from Saudi Arabia — the terrorist group’s chief target — and who would therefore have had more motive to assist in killing him. 
 
 The hunt for Mr. Awlaki has involved some close calls, including the failed American drone strike in May, and the previously unreported operation in the Yemeni village. Yemen’s elite counterterrorism commandos, backed by weapons from Yemen’s regular armed forces, formed a ring around the town as commanders began negotiating with local leaders to hand Mr. Awlaki over, said one member of the unit. 
 
 “We stayed a whole week, but the villagers were supporting him,” said the counterterrorism officer, who is not authorized to speak on the record. “The local people began firing on us, and we fired back, and while it was happening, they helped him to escape.” 
 
 Yemen’s political crisis has seriously hampered counterterrorism efforts, and may have slowed down the hunt for Mr. Awlaki. In May and June, armed jihadists overran two towns in southern Yemen, beating back the army brigades in the area and penning one of them behind the walls of its base for two months. 
 
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 The elite counterterrorism unit was not deployed until August, because of fears of civil war in the capital. Eventually, the unit regained control of the city of Zinjibar, but the counterterrorism officer, who took part in the fight, said the militant forces appeared to have expanded during Yemen’s crisis, with recruits from Somalia and several Arab countries. 
 
 Fresh information about Mr. Awlaki’s location surfaced about three weeks ago, allowing the C.I.A. to track him in earnest, waiting for an opportunity to strike with minimal risks to civilians, American officials said. 
 
 A senior American military official who monitors Yemen closely said Mr. Awlaki’s death would send an important message to the surviving leaders and foot soldiers in the Qaeda affiliate. “It’s critically important,” the senior official said. “It sets a sense of doom for the rest of them. Getting Awlaki, given his tight operational security, increases the sense of fear. It’s hard for them to attack when they’re trying to protect their own back side.” 
 
 But some Islamist figures said Mr. Awlaki’s status could be elevated to that of a martyr. Anjem Choudhry, an Islamic scholar in London , said, “The death of Sheik Anwar al-Awlaki will merely motivate the Muslim youth to struggle harder against the enemies of Islam and Muslims.” 
 
 He added, “I would say his death has made him more popular.” ||||| Anwar al-Awlaki, a U.S.-born Islamic militant cleric who became a prominent figure in al-Qaida's most active branch, using his fluent English and Internet savvy to draw recruits to carry out attacks in the United States, was killed Friday in the mountains of Yemen, American and Yemeni officials said. 
 
 FILE - In this file image taken from video and released by SITE Intelligence Group on Monday, Nov. 8, 2010, Anwar al-Awlaki speaks in a video message posted on radical websites. Yemen's Defense Ministry... (Associated Press) 
 
 File - This October 2008 file photo by Muhammad ud-Deen shows Imam Anwar al-Awlaki in Yemen. Yemen's Defense Ministry said in a statement Friday Sept. 30, 2011 the U.S.-born al-Qaida cleric Anwar al-Awlaki... (Associated Press) 
 
 The Yemeni government and Defense Ministry announced al-Awlaki's death, but gave no details. A senior U.S. official said American intelligence supports the claim that he had been killed. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters. 
 
 Yemeni security officials and local tribal leaders said the was killed in an airstrike on his convoy that they believed was carried out by the Americans. They said pilotless drones had been seen over the area in previous days. 
 
 Al-Awlaki would be the most prominent al-Qaida figure to be killed since Osama bin Laden's death in a U.S. raid in Pakistan in May. In July, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said the Yemeni-American was a priority target alongside Ayman al-Zawahri, bin Laden's successor as the terror network's leader. 
 
 The 40-year-old al-Awlaki had been in the U.S. crosshairs since his killing was approved by President Barack Obama in April 2010 _ making him the first American placed on the CIA "kill or capture" list. At least twice, airstrikes were called in on locations in Yemen where al-Awlaki was suspected of being, but he wasn't harmed. 
 
 Al-Awlaki, born in New Mexico to Yemeni parents, was believed to be key in turning al-Qaida's affiliate in Yemen into what American officials have called the most significant and immediate threat to the Untied States. The branch, led by a Yemeni militant named Nasser al-Wahishi, plotted several failed attacks on U.S. soil _ the botched Christmas 2009 attempt to blow up an American airliner heading to Detroit and a foiled 2010 attempt to main explosives to Chicago. 
 
 Known as an eloquent preacher who spread English-language sermons on the internet calling for "holy war" against the United States, al-Awlaki's role was to inspire and _ it is believed _ even directly recruit militants to carry out attacks. 
 
 U.S. officials believe he went beyond just being an inspiring spiritual leader to become involved in operational planning for al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, as the Yemen branch is called. Yemeni officials have said al-Awlaki had contacts with Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the accused would-be Christmas plane bomber, who was in Yemen in 2009. They say the believe al-Awlaki met with the 23-year-old Nigerian, along with other al-Qaida leaders, in al-Qaida strongholds in the country in the weeks before the failed bombing. 
 
 In New York, the Pakistani-American man who pleaded guilty to the May 2010 Times Square car bombing attempt told interrogators he was "inspired" by al-Awlaki after making contact over the Internet. 
 
 Al-Awlaki also exchanged up to 20 emails with U.S. Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, alleged killer of 13 people in the Nov. 5, 2009, rampage at Fort Hood. Hasan initiated the contacts, drawn by al-Awlaki's Internet sermons, and approached him for religious advice. 
 
 Al-Awlaki has said he didn't tell Hasan to carry out the shootings, but he later praised Hasan as a "hero" on his Web site for killing American soldiers who would be heading for Afghanistan or Iraq to fight Muslims. The cleric similarly said Abdulmutallab was his "student" but said he never told him to carry out the airline attack. 
 
 In a statement, the Yemeni government said al-Awlaki was "targeted and killed" 5 miles (8 kilometers) from the town of Khashef in the Province of al-Jawf. The town is located 87 miles (140 kilometers) east of the capital Sanaa. 
 
 The statement says the operation was launched on Friday around 9:55 a.m. It gave no other details. 
 
 The Yemeni Defense Ministry also reported the death, without elaborating, in a mobile phone SMS message. 
 
 Local tribal and security officials said al-Awlaki was travelling in a two-car convoy with two other al-Qaida in Yemen operatives from al-Jawf to neighboring Marib province when they were hit. They said the other two operatives were also believed dead. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the press. 
 
 Yemen, the Arab world's most impoverished nation, has become a haven for hundreds of al-Qaida militants. The United States has been deeply concerned that militants will take advantage of the country's political turmoil to strengthen their positions. In recent months, militants have seized control of several cities in Yemen's south. 
 
 A previous attack against al-Awlaki on May 5, shortly after the May raid that killed Osama bin Laden, was carried out by a combination of U.S. drones and jets. 
 
 The operation was run by the U.S. military's elite counterterrorism unit, the Joint Special Operations Command _ the same unit that got bin Laden. JSOC has worked closely with Yemeni counterterrorism forces for years, in the fight against al-Qaida. 
 
 Top U.S. counterterrorism adviser John Brennan says such cooperation with Yemen has improved since the political unrest there. Brennan said the Yemenis have been more willing to share information about the location of al-Qaida targets, as a way to fight the Yemeni branch challenging them for power. Other U.S. officials say the Yemenis have also allowed the U.S. to fly more armed drone and aircraft missions over its territory than ever previously, trying to use U.S. military power to stay in power. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss matters of intelligence. 
 
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 AP correspondent Matt Apuzzo in Washington contributed to this report.
– American-born al-Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki has been killed by an airstrike in eastern Yemen, according to Yemeni and US officials. The radical preacher, a high-ranking member of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, has been a most-wanted terror suspect for years. He is the biggest target to go down since Osama bin Laden. Tribal elders in the area say an airstrike, apparently from a US drone, hit an al-Qaeda convoy, the AP reports. Previous reports of Awlaki's death have turned out to be mistaken, but the New York Times quotes senior administration officials as confirming. Awlaki's online lectures have been connected to several terror attacks in the US and across the world, including the Fort Hood shooting, the would-be underwear bomber, and the would-be Times Square bomber of last year. He also had the distinction of being the first American placed on the CIA's "kill or capture" list. But a US official says his influence went beyond propaganda. “First and foremost, we’ve been looking at his important operational role,” the official tells the Times. “To the extent he’s no longer playing that role is all to the good.”