New bin Laden message set for Iraq war anniversary

Insurgent Web site: "The response is what you see and not what you hear."

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Bin Laden 224.88 (photo credit: AP)
Bin Laden 224.88
(photo credit: AP)
Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden will be issuing a new message right around the 5th anniversary of the US-led invasion of Iraq, announced an insurgent Web site with close connections to the group Wednesday. "Urgent, very soon by the will of God," read the announcement of the new message, "the response is what you see and not what you hear, by the warrior sheik, Osama bin Laden." The announcement was text only and showed no pictures of the elusive terror leader. The message would be bin Laden's first for 2008 and follows up an hour-long late-December audio missive in which he warned Iraq's Sunni Arabs against fighting al-Qaida in Iraq and vowed new attacks on Israel. Bin Laden's new message would come as the Americans and Iraqis assess five years of war and occupation in which it appears that al-Qaida's Iraqi branch is losing ground, despite still being able to carry out large-scale bombings. There is also a fiercely competitive presidential campaign taking place in the United States, and in the past, bin Laden has commented on such contests.