Osama bin Laden described the 9/11 attacks as revenge for Israeli military actions in the Palestinian Authority and Lebanon.
The fugitive Al-Qaida leader released an audiotaped message Thursday in which he dismissed American power as “an ebbing tide” and gloated in the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
“The truth, as I said before, is that the Manhattan events were in retaliation for the killing of our kinfolk in Palestine and Lebanon by the US-Israeli alliance and that I am responsible for them,” Bin Laden said.
Previous Al-Qaeda claims have put less emphasis on denouncing Israel, which suggests that Bin Laden’s latest statement aimed to undermine rapprochement efforts between the Jewish state and Arab states following this week’s Annapolis peace conference.
