photo credit: Ben Sutherland
Osama bin Laden has released a new message to the American People and to our leaders. The audio message has yet to be verified, but reportedly contains a threat to all Americans if national policy isn’t altered in relation to Afghanistan as well as Palestine. He reportedly refers to President Obama as “powerless” to stop the war in Afghanistan and cites appointments of Bush administration military officials as evidence.
In the message, he specifically references contemporary American political debates which reveal that he is knowledgable of internal debates being waged on Capitol Hill. He speaks directly to President Obama’s strategies in the Middle East and warns that retribution will be sought if strategy isn’t altered.
Bin Laden reportedly calls Obama ‘powerless’
Bin Laden’s address to the American people comes two days after the eighth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. He typically addresses the United States in a message around the Sept. 11 anniversary.
The purpose of his address Sunday, bin Laden said in the SITE translation, is “to remind you of the causes” of Sept. 11, chiefly “your support to your Israeli allies who occupy our land of Palestine.“
Bin Laden argued against the claims that the war is necessary for U.S. security, saying current White House officials are merely following the strategy of former President George W. Bush and former Vice President Dick Cheney to “promote the previous policies of fear to market the interests of big companies.”
When Obama became president and retained many of the Bush administration’s military leaders, such as Defense Secretary Robert Gates, “reasonable people knew that Obama is a powerless man who will not be able to end the war as he promised,” bin Laden said.
“If you end the war, so to it,” bin Laden said. “But if it is otherwise, all we will do is continue the war of attrition against you on all possible axes.”
