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PARIS: The sixth anniversary of the September 11 attacks has
provided an opportunity to al-Qaeda to show off once again its
mastery of the Internet as a tool for international propaganda,
terrorism experts said Friday.
Thursday’s broadcast of a new
message from Osama Bin Laden, the third in just a few days, is
evidence of an orchestrated campaign of pronouncements on the web,
deliberately spaced out in order to maximize their impact, they
said. “They just have to provide the inspiration, the directions,
the fuel for global jihad,” said Magnus Ranstorp, a specialist
at Sweden’s National Defense College.
“They just need to send a few
sparks all over the world to see where it will catch fire. And
it’s entirely in line with their strategy of regime change.”
Regime change was exactly what
Bin Laden intended when he called for “holy war” against
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, said Anne Giudicelli, who
heads the French risk analysis center Terrorisc.
“They search out the weak point
and then press on it. Musharraf is weakened at the moment because of
his domestic troubles. But [the broadcast] also has to be seen in
the context of American politics: the weakening of US President
George W. Bush because of Iraq.
What al-Qaeda wants to do is
drive the nail in as deep as possible, searching out the
fault-lines.
--AFP
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