(Image source: The New York Times)

BY MALLORY PERRYMAN

You're watching multisource world video news analysis from Newsy.

It’s a burning question in Washington--how did Osama bin Laden manage to hide in Pakistan-- without someone in the Pakistani government knowing?

Now-- a possible clue. A cellphone belonging to Bin Laden’s trusted courier had contact numbers for a militant group linked to Pakistan’s secret police-- the Inter-Services Intelligence agency.

The New York Times broke the story after talking to several unnamed senior U.S. officials.

“The discovery indicates that Bin Laden used the group, Harakat-ul-Mujahedeen, as part of his support network inside the country...But it also raised tantalizing questions about whether the group...helped shelter and support Bin Laden on behalf of Pakistan’s spy agency, given that it had mentored Harakat and allowed it to operate in Pakistan for at least 20 years.”

Fox News’ Steve Doocy explains- it’s not a direct link from Bin Laden to the Pakistani government- but it sure is suspicious.

Steve Doocy (Fox News): “So what happened was they looked in the guys’ phone and they realized that this guy had called this group that has tied to al-Qaeda and the group also then called the ISI, the Pakistan secret police. Were they talking about bin Laden? We don’t know. Is it a smoking gun? Not according to the Times. But you start connecting the dots and it’s like hoo hoo hoo!”

The Telegraph’s Dean Nelson adds- there’s no proof that Harakat-ul-Mujahedeen militants guarded Bin Laden- or that the Pakistani secret police knew about it if they did- but...

“It raises yet more questions of the ISI's discipline and the true allegiance of some of its officials. These relationships do not appear to be sanctioned by its army chiefs, but they do uncover a second front in the war on terror in the heart of Pakistan's security forces.”

Finally- CNN’s Peter Bergen weighs in, saying it’s unlikely that the connection indicates higher-ups in the Pakistani government knew Bin Laden’s address.

Peter Bergen (CNN): “The fact that the courier was in touch with a group that has had links to the Pakistani state mean that they would have known where Bin Laden was? No. In fact, if I was Bin Laden, I’d be very careful about letting anybody know where I was. But it does bring the six degrees of separation a little bit closer.”
 

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Transcript by Newsy.