Purported Bin Laden Tape Offers ‘Truce’

In an audio recording broadcast on Arab satellite TV channels today, a man identifying himself as Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden offered a “truce” to European countries that “do not attack Muslims.”

The message said the truce would last three months and could be extended but said there would be no truce with the U.S.

This truce, the message said, was to deny “the warmongers” further opportunities and because polls have shown that “most of the European peoples want reconciliation” with the Islamic world. There was no immediate way to confirm that the voice was Bin Laden’s.

The man also vowed revenge for Israel’s killing of Sheik Ahmed Yassin, leader of the Palestinian militant group Hamas. “We vow before God to take revenge for him from America.”

The message said that U.S. policy ignores the “real problem,” which is “the occupation of all of Palestine.”

The message denounced the Iraq war, saying it was making “billions” for companies, naming the U.S. firm Halliburton.

The tape said the March 11 bombings in Madrid that killed 191 were payment for Spain’s actions in Iraq and Afghanistan -- two nations where Madrid has sent troops -- and in “Palestine.”