A top leader of Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda network, in a purported audio tape aired on Saturday, criticized a proposal for reform in the Middle East as a U.S. ploy and said change will only come through "resistance." Al Arabiya television broadcast the brief recording which it said was from bin Laden’s deputy Ayman al-Zawahri, an Egyptian militant who Washington says played a major role in the September 2001 attacks on U.S. cities. "America has nothing to do with reform, what it really wants is to replace the current regimes with new ones," the voice on the tape said.
| If that ain't reform, what is? |
"These supposed American reforms will not bring us independence or dignity ... the real reform process starts from within us, with planting the spirit of resistance in our souls, in the souls of our children and of future generations."
| "Independence. Dignity. Those two words mean only one thing: a caliph, with a jewelled turban and dancing girls, dispensing justice from his golden throne, ruling as the representative of Gawd..." |
| With Zawahri as the Grand Vizar, standing right behind the Caliph and making sure he does everything he's told, of course... |
It was not possible to verify the authenticity of the tape, but it appeared to be recorded after Washington’s Greater Middle East Initative was leaked out in February. Bin Laden has vowed to topple most Arab leaders, which he sees as traitors and lackeys of the United States. The United States and other G8 members heavily rewrote much of the initiative during a summit last week, and rebranded it as the Partnership for Progress and a Common Future with the Region of the Broader Middle East and North Africa. Arab governments saw the original proposals as part of an intrusive and paternalistic U.S. plan to reorganize the region to suit U.S. and Israeli interests. Many Arab leaders had slammed it and shunned the G8 summit in the United States because the proposal was on the agenda. |