Updated at 1:30 p.m., Thursday, September 6, 2007
Osama bin Laden video expected as 9/11 nears
Associated Press
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Analysts noted that al-Qaida tends to mark the Sept. 11 anniversary with a slew of messages, and the Department of Homeland Security said it had no credible information warning of an imminent threat to the United States.
Still, bin Laden's appearance would be significant. The al-Qaida leader has not appeared in new video footage since October 2004, and he has not put out a new audiotape in more than a year, his longest period without a message.
One difference in his appearance was immediately obvious. The announcement had a still photo from the upcoming video, showing bin Laden addressing the camera, his beard fully black. In his past videos, bin Laden's beard was almost entirely gray with dark streaks.
Rita Katz — director of the SITE Institute, a U.S. based group that monitors terror messages, said bin Laden's beard appeared to have been dyed, a popular practice among Arab leaders.
"I think it works for their (al-Qaida's) benefit that he looks young, he looks healthy," Katz said.
The announcement and photo appeared in a banner advertisement posted on an Islamic militant Web site where al-Qaida's media arm, Al-Sahab, frequently posts messages.
"Soon, God willing, a videotape from the lion sheik Osama bin Laden, God preserve him," the banner advertisement read, signed by Al-Sahab. Such announcements are usually put out one to three days before the video is posted on the Web.
IntelCenter, another U.S. group that monitors Islamic Web sites, said the video is expected within the next 72 hours, before the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, suicide hijacker attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Bin Laden's last appearance came on Oct. 29, 2004, just before the U.S. presidential elections, in which bin Laden said America could avoid another Sept. 11-style attack if it stopped threatening Muslims.
Since then, there were a number of audiotape messages from bin Laden, but the last came in July 2006, when he praised the slain al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and welcomed his successor.
During his silence, his deputy Egyptian-born Ayman al-Zawahri has been frequently issuing videos and audiotapes.
Al-Qaida has regularly produced new messages around the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. In 2006, al-Zawahri called on Muslims to attack the U.S. for jailing militant cleric Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman.
