Tuesday, September 11, 2007

Second Bin Laden Tape Released Today

By: Ilana Freedman, Editor and CEO, Gerard Group International

Live from Herzilyah, Israel where she is attending the International Institute for Counter-Terrorism at the Interdisciplinary Institute

The latest video (the second in a week) from Osama bin Laden is hot off the presses and in this video he looks considerably more robust that in the first video discussed below. According to President Bush's homeland security adviser Frances Fragos Townsend, bin Laden's importance is marginal, calling him "virtually impotent".

This uninformed opinion, from someone supposed to be an expert on the subject, misleads, because although bin Laden's two videos may be an indication that al Qaeda is still not ready to commit another major crime against humanity, he is a symbol for the world of global jihad and that is significant indeed.

The Bin Laden Video:A Warning or a Place Holder?

Ever since 9/11, any tape - video or audio - from Osama bin Laden has commanded attention. However, his latest tape, released by the Americans in advance of its scheduled distribution to selected Islamist websites, is of special interest.

It has been nearly four years since his last public appearance and there has been much speculation about whether bin Laden was ill, dying, or dead. Our own sources have indicated to us for some time that he was alive and hiding out either in Iran or in the tribal areas of Pakistan, depending on our sources. There was considerable weight given to the Iranian location, where conditions are better than in the remote and difficult regions of northwest Pakistan, and where he could receive better medical care.

At the age of 50, bin Laden is still a relatively young man, but in the latest video, he looks old and ill. His slumped shoulders, a sagging right eyelid (the product of a stroke, perhaps?), sunken cheeks, and a carefully trimmed beard, dyed black and looking unnaturally full, give the impression of a man who could not possibly have the strength to deliver a 30 minute tirade in one sitting. It would not surprise me to learn that the tape was created in fragments and patched together into a mosaic, combining voice-over segments with clips of bin Laden from former videos.

Showing bin Laden alive, if not totally well, must be a morale-booster for aspiring jihadists and should have put to rest some of the speculation about his being alive. His reference to Sarkozy's victory in the recent French elections shows that he was still alive in May 2007, and at least well enough to make this tape.

But more important than conjectures about bin Laden and the state of his mind and body, is the content of his message. It contained some thirty minutes or so of revisionist history, justifications, warnings, and an invitation to all of America to join the one true faith - Islam - in order to avoid inevitable calamity.

The tape is meant to alarm us, and although we should not allow ourselves to be terrorized, we should take it seriously. Osama bin Laden has once again fulfilled the Islamist requirement to complete the three part warning cycle. He has warned us, he has invited us to convert to Islam to avoid disaster, and he has received religious authority to kill Americans in retribution for the killing of Muslims. If he is indeed a dying man, then this may be his final statement to the world, to be followed by a major attack on Americans - one that he will live to see.

It is impossible for us to know what is behind the creation of this video, or the timing of its release. Nor do we know whether the fact that this year, September 11 falls on the day before the beginning of both Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year), and Ramadan (the Muslim holy month), has special meaning to those who would harm us.

One thing is very clear: if something is about to happen, we are not ready.

And a growing crescendo of chatter in cyberspace is enough to give us pause. One of the subjects of the chatter is the vulnerability of our children and the possibility that their schools may be the next target, a la Beslan. It is a subject we have been warning America about for a long time - since School Number One was taken over by terrorists in September 2004, and 334 people, including 186 children, were murdered in cold blood.

Yet since that tragedy, we have yet to speak to a single school superintendent here who is ready to invest even the most modest of sums to do what is necessary to appropriately secure their schools against such an attack.

Schools are only one of many possible scenarios that have been suggested in another major terrorist attack, and any of them might play out in real life to satisfy the blood lust of al Qaeda.

If America is attacked again, we will no doubt look back after the fact, as we have done before, and say, "How could we possibly have missed the signs." But as we stand today on the front end of history, we can only try to analyze what we know and wonder why we don't feel safer.

Maybe this video is just another historical placeholder, reminding us that al Qaeda has not forgotten us, and though they may not be ready to strike again, terrorizing us with the threat of an unknown attack may be considered sufficient for now.

Or maybe it is the last message in the cycle of warnings, and another national trauma lies before us. Whatever happens, it is time for America to take back its heritage of strength, and courage, and self reliance, and use it to fortify our wills and build our future. If we refuse to bow to tyranny, we have the chance to overcome it.

God Bless America.

By: Ilana Freedman, Editor and CEO, Gerard Group International

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