A still of 2004 Osama bin Laden video.

On October 29, 2004, at 21:00 UTC, the Arab television network Al Jazeera broadcast excerpts from a videotape of Osama bin Laden addressing the people of the United States, in which he takes responsibility for the September 11, 2001 attacks, condemns the Bush government's response to those attacks, and presents those attacks as part of a campaign of revenge and deterrence begun after having personally seen destruction in the Lebanese Civil War in 1982. A still of 2004 Osama bin Laden video, aired on al-Jazeera on October 29, 2004. ... October 29 is the 302nd day of the year (303rd in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 63 days remaining. ... 2004 is a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... UTC also stands for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga Coordinated Universal Time or UTC, also sometimes referred to as Zulu time, the basis for civil time, differs by an integral number of seconds from atomic time and a fractional number of seconds from UT1. ... Al Jazeera logo Al Jazeera (الجزيرة), meaning The Island or The (Arabian) Peninsula (whence also Algiers) is an Arabic television channel based in Qatar. ... Osama bin Laden Usāmah bin Muhammad bin `Awad bin Lādin (born March 10, 1957) (Arabic: ), commonly known as Osama bin Laden (Arabic: ), is usually considered to be the figurehead of al-Qaeda, a Wahabi Islamist terrorist network that has been involved in attacks against civilians and military targets... The September 11, 2001 attacks were a series of coordinated attacks carried out in the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. ... The Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990) had its origin in the conflicts and political compromises of Lebanons colonial period and was exacerbated by the nations changing demographic trends, Christian and Muslim inter-religious strife, and proximity to Syria and Israel. ... 1982 is a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Content

For the full text of the video, see wikisource:Text of 2004 Osama bin Laden videotape.

The video is reported to be 18 minutes in length, although bin Laden only speaks for 14 minutes 39 seconds [1] and only short excerpts of it have been broadcast so far. However, Al Jazeera released a transcript of the complete tape on November 1, 2004. [2] November 1 is the 305th day of the year (306th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 60 days remaining. ... 2004 is a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Osama bin Laden appears wearing a turban and a white robe partially covered by a lavish golden mantle, standing in front of an almost featureless brown background and reading his comments from papers resting on a podium. He moves both of his arms (dispelling rumors that one of them is limp after having been wounded) and looks healthy as far as can be told, but a bit older and greyer than in his former tapes. His remarks, in Arabic but addressed to citizens of the United States, instruct them that "the best way to avoid another Manhattan" (a reference to the September 11, 2001 attacks), was to not threaten the security of Muslim nations such as Palestine and Lebanon. The turban (Arabic عمامة; ‘imamah, Turkish tülbent, Persian دلبنت; dulband) is a headdress, of obscure Oriental origin, consisting of a long scarf wound round the head or an inner hat. ... A Mantle is a piece of clothing, similar to a robe but open on the front side and often sleeveless. ... Arabic (العربية al-arabiyyah, or less formally arabi) is the largest member of the Semitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic language family (classification: South Central Semitic) and is closely related to Hebrew and Aramaic. ... Manhattan is an island bordering the lower Hudson River. ... September 11 is the 254th day of the year (255th in leap years). ... 2001: A Space Odyssey. ...

The tape also contains bin Laden's first public acknowledgement of al-Qaida's involvement in the attacks on the U.S., noting that he first thought about attacking the World Trade Center in 1982, after watching Israeli aircraft bomb Lebanon during the 1982 Invasion of Lebanon: Al-Qaeda (Arabic: القاعدة, the foundation or the base) is the name given to a worldwide network of militant Islamist organizations under the leadership of Osama bin Laden. ... The twin towers, photographed from the west The World Trade Center in New York City was a complex of seven buildings leased by Larry Silverstein from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey around a central plaza, near the south end of Manhattan in the downtown financial district. ... 1982 is a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar. ... The Israeli Air Force (IAF) (Hebrew: חיל האוויר Heyl haAvir) is the air force of the Israel Defense Forces. ... The 1982 Invasion of Lebanon, dubbed Operation Peace for Galilee (Shlom HaGalil in Hebrew), began June 6, 1982, when the Israel Defence Force invaded southern Lebanon purportedly in response to the Abu Nidal organizations assassination attempt against Israels ambassador to the United Kingdom, Shlomo Argov, and to halt...

While I was looking at these destroyed towers in Lebanon, it sparked in my mind that the tyrant should be punished with the same and that we should destroy towers in America, so that it tastes what we taste and would be deterred from killing our children and women.

He also admitted for the first time a direct link to the attacks, saying that they were carried out because "we are a free people who do not accept injustice, and we want to regain the freedom of our nation". Bin Laden threatened further retaliation against the U.S., noting that the conditions which provoked the 2001 attacks still existed, and compared America to "corrupt" Arab governments.

He spoke of his desire to bankrupt the U.S., saying:

[It is] easy for us to provoke and bait this administration. All that we have to do is to send two mujahidin to the furthest point east to raise a piece of cloth on which is written al-Qaida, in order to make the generals race there and cause America to suffer human, economic, and political losses ... This is in addition to our having experience in using guerrilla warfare and the war of attrition to fight tyrannical superpowers, as we, alongside the mujahidin, bled Russia for 10 years, until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat.

He dismissed as rhetoric claims by U.S. President George W. Bush that the attacks occurred because Islamic extremists "hate freedom", saying: "If Bush says we hate freedom, let him tell us why we didn't attack Sweden, for example. It is known that those who hate freedom do not have dignified souls, like those of the 19 - may God have mercy on them." Guerrilla (also called a partisan) is a term borrowed from Spanish (from guerra meaning war) used to describe small combat groups. ... The President of the United States is the head of state of the United States. ... George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is the current President of the United States and former Governor of the State of Texas. ... Many individuals were directly responsible for the September 11, 2001 attacks. ...

Bin Laden further accused U.S. President George W. Bush of misleading the American people during the following three years — "Despite entering the fourth year after September 11, Bush is still deceiving you and hiding the truth from you and therefore the reasons are still there to repeat what happened" — as well as criticizing Bush's actions on the day of the attacks: "It never occurred to us that the Commander-in-Chief of the country would leave 50,000 citizens in the two towers to face those horrors alone because he thought listening to a child discussing her goats was more important." Commander-in-Chief (in NATO-lingo often C-in-C or CINC pronounced sink) is the commander of all the military forces within a particular region or of all the military forces of a state. ... The twin towers, photographed from the west The World Trade Center in New York City was a complex of seven buildings leased by Larry Silverstein from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey around a central plaza, near the south end of Manhattan in the downtown financial district. ... George W. Bush reading The Pet Goat. The Pet Goat (popularly known as My Pet Goat) is a childrens story contained in the book Reading Mastery II: Storybook 1, by Siegfried Engelmann and Elaine C. Bruner (ISBN 0026863553). ...

The release of the tape was reportedly timed to occur just four days before the 2004 U.S. presidential election and bin Laden mentions both of the major contenders, telling Americans: "Your security is not in the hands of Kerry or Bush or al-Qaida. Your security is in your own hands and each state which does not harm our security will remain safe." Presidential election results map. ...

Immediate reactions

President George W. Bush delivered a short statement to the media in front of Air Force One at Toledo, Ohio Express Airport, hours after the tape was broadcast.

President George W. Bush said: President George W. Bush delivers at statement to the media in front of Air Force One at Toledo, Ohio Express Airport, Friday, Oct. ... President George W. Bush delivers at statement to the media in front of Air Force One at Toledo, Ohio Express Airport, Friday, Oct. ... Air Force One is the air traffic control call sign of any U.S. Air Force aircraft carrying the President of the United States. ... George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is the current President of the United States and former Governor of the State of Texas. ...

Let me make this very clear: Americans will not be intimidated or influenced by an enemy of our country. I'm sure Senator Kerry agrees with this. I also want to say to the American people that we're at war with these terrorists and I am confident that we will prevail.

Presidential candidate Senator John Kerry said: John Forbes Kerry (born December 11, 1943) is the junior United States Senator from Massachusetts. ...

Let me make it clear, crystal clear: As Americans, we are absolutely united in our determination to hunt down and destroy Osama bin Laden and the terrorists. They are barbarians, and I will stop at absolutely nothing to hunt down, capture or kill the terrorists wherever they are, whatever it takes. Period.

Intelligence response

Although Al Jazeera, when broadcasting the footage on its evening newscast, did not disclose the source of the video, sources within the United States intelligence community have confirmed that the speaker, who appears behind a lectern, is indeed bin Laden. By mentioning 2004 U.S. presidential candidate John Kerry by name, the tape would seem to prove that bin Laden was still alive at least mid-way through 2004.

According to the Agence France-Presse, U.S. diplomats in Qatar were given a copy of a videotape of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden before it aired on Al-Jazeera television and unsuccessfully sought to prevent the Arabic-language network from broadcasting it. [3] The United States State Department requested that the government of Qatar (where Al Jazeera is located) discourage the station from airing the videotape, according to a senior State Department official. Agence France-Presse (abbreviated AFP) is the oldest news agency in the world. ... The United States Department of State, often referred to as the State Department, is the Cabinet-level foreign affairs agency of the United States government, equivalent to foreign ministries in other countries. ...

Although the tape is being analyzed by American intelligence to determine if it contains any coded messages to operatives, White House spokesman Scott McClellan commented that there were no plans to raise the U.S. terrorism alert level, as no specific threats were made in the tape. Scott McClellan (born 1968) is the current White House Press Secretary for President George W. Bush. ... In the United States, the Homeland Security Advisory System is a color-coded terrorism threat advisory scale. ...

See also

• Osama bin Laden's Declaration of War
• Osama bin Laden Fatwa
• October surprise

October Surprise is the allegation (as well as the title of a book on the subject by Gary Sick) that representatives of the 1980 Ronald Reagan presidential campaign arranged the Iran-Contra deal well in advance of the 1980 election in which Ronald Reagan defeated Jimmy Carter. ...

Sources

• The video from Al Jazeera in ASF format
• Text of 2004 Osama bin Laden videotape on Wikisource
• Complete text of 2004 Osama bin Laden videotape on Al Jazeera
• Michael, Maggie. Bin Laden, in statement to U.S. people, says he ordered Sept. 11 attacks. The Associated Press. October 29, 2004.
• Excerpts from the BBC. October 29, 2004.