New Osama Tape

Al Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden has appeared in a new video speaking publicly for the first time about the attempted Christmas Day airliner bombing, praising the attempt but not taking explicit responsibility for it. ” Mr. bin Laden said that the bombing attempt was a heroic act meant to recall the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in New York and Washington. He warned that more strikes against the United States were looming because of American support for what he called Israel’s repression of the Palestinians, one of Mr. bin Laden’s recurring themes in his occasional audiotaped anti-West invectives. ‘America will never dream of security unless we will have it in reality in Palestine,’ Mr. bin Laden said. ‘God willing, our raids on you will continue as long as your support to the Israelis will continue.’ Mr. bin Laden said his statement was ‘from Osama to Obama.’ The one-minute recording, broadcast by Al Jazeera’s Arabic news channel, was the first time Mr. bin Laden, who is believed to be hiding in Pakistan near the Afghanistan border, had issued an audiotape in four months.”