Osama bin Laden has accused Barack Obama of sowing the seeds of hatred in the Arab world, in a new audio tape that was broadcast today as the President started his diplomatic tour of the Middle East.
The recording was released on the Arabic television station al-Jazeera soon after Mr Obama landed in Saudi Arabia. The timing appears to be an attempt to undermine the President’s intention of reaching out to the Muslim world and invigorating the Arab-Israeli peace process.
Bin Laden is heard on the tape warning Americans that they will reap the consequences of Mr Obama's anti-Muslim policies.
"Obama and his administration have planted seeds for hatred and revenge against America," says the fugitive leader of the al-Qaeda terror movement.
He condemned America's support for the Pakistan army campaign against the Taliban in the Swat region, which has displaced 2.4 million people.
“He has followed the steps of his predecessor in antagonising Muslims... and laying the foundation for long wars. Let the American people prepare to harvest the crops of what the leaders of the White House plant in the next years and decades."
A Saudi government spokesman in Riyadh belittled the new tape, saying it was a sign of desperation.
The tape is the second to be released by al-Qaeda in the last 24 hours. Yesterday, Ayman al-Zawahri, its No 2, was heard calling on Muslims to shun the US President, saying his visit was at the invitation of the “torturers of Egypt” and the “slaves of America".
Mr Obama received a red carpet welcome from King Abdullah when Air Force One touched down in Riyadh today. A band played each country’s national anthem, the Saudi national guard was on parade and artillery fired a 21-gun salute.
Mr Obama and King Abdullah sat together in gilded chairs, sipped cardamom-flavored Arabic coffee from small cups and chatted briefly in public before retreating to hold private talks at the king’s desert stud, where some 260 Arabian steeds live in air-conditioned comfort.
Guards on horseback flanked the long driveway, carrying swords and flags of the two countries as the king and his guest arrived.
The Saudi initiative that the president and King Abdullah were to discuss calls for normalisation of relations between Arab states and Israel, withdrawal by Israel from Arab land, the creation of a Palestinian state and an “equitable” solution for Palestinian refugees.
Benjamin Netanyahu's refusal to halt the construction of illegal Israeli settlements is a stumbling block, but Mr Obama has vowed to continue to press the Israeli Prime MInister on the issue.
Tomorrow Mr Obama is due in Egypt where he will deliver a keynote speech reaching out to the world's 1.5 billion Muslims with an appeal for reconciliation.
The address at Cairo University fulfills a campaign promise of trying to repair relations soured by America's invasion of Iraq, the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal and the Bush-era stalemate in the peace process.
So far reaction in the Middle East to the Obama visit has been guardedly positive.
“King-Obama summit, key to global stability,” said Okaz, a Saudi newpaper.
Egypt’s state-owned al-Rose al-Youssef warned Mr Obama not to lecture. “Don’t be biased towards Israel, don’t interfere in countries’ internal affairs and don’t give lessons in democracy,” it said.
Yisrael Katz, the Israeli Transport Minister and a close Netanyahu ally, said: “The American president has the right to try to reconcile with the Muslim world and compete with al-Qaeda or Iran for its heart. We have to make sure that this will not harm our common interests."
Some democracy campaigners in Egypt have voiced concerns at Mr Obama’s choice of venue for his major speech, saying it rewarded an authoritarian regime with a poor human rights record.
The son of an Kenyan father with Muslim heritage, Mr Obama spent part of his childhood in Indonesia where Islam is dominant. His middle name, Hussein, was sometimes seen as a liability on the US campaign trail.
Last November al-Zawahri posted a message on the internet in which he slurred Mr Obama with a demeaning racial term for a black American who does the bidding of whites, calling him and the former secretaries of state Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice “house Negroes”.
Yesterday, al-Zawahri said Obama’s decision to go to Cairo showed that the US had not given up its alliances with dictatorial and corrupt Middle Eastern governments.
“His bloody messages were received and are still being received by Muslims, and they will not be concealed by public relations campaigns or by farcical visits or elegant words,” said al-Zawahiri.
Source: The times
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