26th September, 2012
DUBAI(AFP) – Al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri resurfaced for the second time in a month on Wednesday in an online video on the life of his late predecessor Osama bin Laden who he said was blind in one eye.
In the almost hour-long video, the third in a series entitled “Days with the Imam,” Zawahiri narrates stories about bin Laden who was killed by elite US Navy SEALS in May 2011 at his compound in the town of Abbottabad, Pakistan.
Dressed in a white thawb cloak and turban, Zawahiri revealed “for those who do not know” that Saudi-born bin Laden was left blind in the right eye after an accident in his youth.
He also said bin Laden was a former member of the Saudi branch of the Muslim Brotherhood before being evicted for insisting on jihad against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan in the 1980s.
Bin Laden travelled to Pakistan to deliver cash aid to the jihadists in Peshawar but defied orders from the Brotherhood and joined the armed struggle, Zawahiri said.
Zawahiri’s latest video posted on a jihadist forum appeared to be around two months old as he offered greetings to Muslims for the start of the fasting month of Ramadan which ended on August 20.