New Osama Bin Laden Video Tape Released (edited)

By Andrew Cochran

Some early quotes from CNN's translation: "I say to Bush, you should deliver the body to his family, and don't be too happy. Our flag hasn't fallen. Thanks to God, it has passed from one lion to another lion in Islam... You have prevented Abu Musab from entering his homeland alive. Don't stand in his way now... Our dear Muslim nation, we were deeply saddened by the passing of our loved ones, Abu Musab and his companions. But we were very happy that their souls have flooded these great battles as they were defending the Islamic law... We were very happy to find in him a symbol and role model for our future generations." And more quotes from the AP: "Our Islamic nation was surprised to find its knight, the lion of jihad (holy war), the man of determination and will, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, killed in a shameful American raid. Even if we lost one of our greatest knights and and princes, we are happy that we have found a symbol for our great Islamic nations, one that the mujahedeen will remember and praise in poetry and in stories secretly and aloud."

Evan Kohlmann on MSNBC: Tape doesn't indicate that any incidents are on the horizon - OBL is jumping on Zarqawi's coattails and using his legacy - ironic since OBL always had problems and Zarqawi is more useful to OBL dead - the tape is subtitled only in arabic, so the intended audience are those primarily supportive of Al Qaeda in Mideast (tapes intended for the West are subtitled in English and American recruits are used in producing these tapes) - OBL is saying Zarqawi's death is only a bump in the road and a sign of moving towards victory, and Al Qaeda appreciates Zarqawi's role - Zarqawi is the "rock star" and Iraq became the front line since the US arrived there - Americans have nothing to fear from this but it was intentionally put out in time for July 4th, as OBL and Al Qaeda are very media-savvy.

You can see a list of audio and videotapes from OBL here. This video is about 19 minutes long and shows a still image of OBL and moving images of Zarqawi. There have no fresh videos of OBL since October 2004.

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