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Formation and structuring of Al-Qaeda
Main article: Al-Qaeda
By 1988, bin Laden had split from Maktab al-Khidamat. While Azzam acted as support for Afghan fighters, bin Laden wanted a more military role. One of the main points leading to the split and the creation of al-Qaeda was Azzam's insistence that Arab fighters be integrated among the Afghan fighting groups instead of forming a separate fighting force.[74] Notes of a meeting of bin Laden and others on August 20, 1988, indicate al-Qaeda was a formal group by that time: "Basically an organized Islamic faction, its goal is to lift the word of God, to make his religion victorious." A list of requirements for membership itemized the following: listening ability, good manners, obedience, and making a pledge (bayat) to follow one's superiors.[75]

According to Wright, the group's real name was not used in public pronouncements because "its existence was still a closely held secret".[76] His research suggests that al-Qaeda was formed at an August 11, 1988, meeting between "several senior leaders" of Egyptian Islamic Jihad, Abdullah Azzam, and bin Laden, where it was agreed to join bin Laden's money with the expertise of the Islamic Jihad organization and take up the jihadist cause elsewhere after the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan.[77] Following the Soviet Union's withdrawal from Afghanistan in February 1989, Osama bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia in 1990 as a hero of jihad, who along with his Arab legion "had brought down the mighty superpower" of the Soviet Union.[78]

The Iraqi invasion of Kuwait under Saddam Hussein on August 2, 1990, put the Saudi kingdom and the House of Saud at risk, with Iraqi forces on the Saudi border and Saddam's appeal to pan-Arabism potentially inciting internal dissent. Bin Laden met with King Fahd, and Saudi Defense Minister Sultan, telling them not to depend on non-Muslim assistance from the United States and others, offering to help defend Saudi Arabia with his mujahideen. Bin Laden's offer was rebuffed, and after the Saudi monarchy invited the deployment of U.S. troops in Saudi territory,[79] Bin Laden publicly denounced Saudi Arabia's dependence on the U.S. military. Bin Laden believed the presence of foreign troops in the "land of the two mosques" (Mecca and Medina) profaned sacred soil. Bin Laden's criticism of the Saudi monarchy led that government to attempt to silence him.

Shortly after Saudi Arabia invited U.S. troops into Saudi Arabia, bin Laden turned his attention to attacks on the West. On November 8, 1990, the FBI raided the New Jersey home of El Sayyid Nosair, an associate of al-Qaeda operative Ali Mohamed, discovering copious evidence of terrorist plots, including plans to blow up New York City skyscrapers. This marked the earliest discovery of al-Qaeda terrorist plans outside of Muslim countries.[80] Nosair was eventually convicted in connection to the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and later admitted guilt for the murder of Rabbi Meir Kahane in New York on November 5, 1990.

Bin Laden continued to speak publicly against the Saudi government for harboring American troops, for which the Saudis banished him. He went to live in exile in Sudan, in 1992, in a deal brokered by Ali Mohamed.[81]

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