Rauf escaped from custody in December 2007. He was reportedly killed by a US drone attack in Pakistan on 22 November 2008, carried out by the CIA's Special Activities Division.[4] The report was based on communications intercepted from militants in North Waziristan.[5] His family initially denied that he was killed.[6] While CIA and Pakistan intelligence officials maintained that Rauf was killed in the airstrike,[7] the news site Long War Journal believed otherwise.[7]