Osama bin Laden’s ‘Letter to America’ gains widespread attention amid Israel-Hamas conflict

| Updated: 17 November, 2023 8:10 pm IST

As Israel conducts widespread airstrikes across the Gaza Strip and occasionally along the West Bank in Palestine, Osama Bin Laden’s ‘Letter to America’ went viral on TikTok.

The ex-leader of Al-Qaeda and the orchestrator behind the 9/11 terrorist strikes that resulted in the loss of 2,977 lives (excluding the 19 hijackers) wrote a letter 21 years ago. Osama Bin Laden penned this missive in the aftermath of the attacks, explaining the motives behind his terrorist group’s assault on the United States of America.

Many TikTok videos have surfaced in support of the terrorist and the former number one most wanted on Interpol’s list. “We’ve been lied to our entire lives, I remember watching people cheer when Osama was found and killed,” wrote a 25-year-old user. “I was a child, and it confused me. It still confuses me today. The world deserves better than what this country has done to them.”

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Many others have also taken to numerous social media platforms where they have urged others to devote some time to read the letter and ponder upon it. However, some walked the proverbial extra mile and attempted to generate sympathy, while being convinced by the reasons provided by the terror mastermind.

Lynette Adkins, another TikToker, said: “I need everyone to stop what they’re doing right now and go read — it’s literally two pages — go read ‘A Letter to America…come back here and let me know what you think. Because I feel like I’m going through like an existential crisis right now, and a lot of people are. So, I just need someone else to be feeling this too.”

Bin Laden’s letter, originally titled ‘Letter to America,’ made its debut in The Guardian in 2002. The 4,000-word missive was initially published on an Islamist Saudi Arabian website used by al-Qaeda for information dissemination. Subsequently, the letter made its journey to the UK, where it underwent translation. The news organisation then sourced it from the UK’s Islamist circles.

As for the first question: Why are we fighting and opposing you? The answer is very simple: Because you attacked us and continue to attack us – You attacked us in Palestine,” the letter read.

Currently, the letter has been taken down by The Guardian from their website after it went viral.