CIA-released journal reveals bin Laden’s view of uprisings

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — A journal made public by the CIA and apparently handwritten by one of Osama bin Laden’s daughters offers a glimpse into how the late al-Qaida leader viewed the world around him and reveals his deep interest in the 2011 Arab Spring revolutions that were unfolding in the months before a U.S. raid killed him.

He talks about Libya becoming a pathway for jihadis to Europe; of his time as a young teen visiting William Shakespeare’s home in Britain; of how quickly turmoil had gripped the Middle East.

The 228-page journal meanders between discussions, thoughts and reflections bin Laden shared with his family about how to exploit the uprisings, what to make of the rapid changes unfolding in the Arab world and when alQaida should speak out.

“This chaos and the absence of leadership in the revolutions is the best environment to spread alQaida’s thoughts and ideas,” bin Laden is quoted as telling his family in the document.

Bin Laden’s wife, referred to as Um Hamza, assures him that a tape he released seven years earlier calling out the rulers of the region as unfit could be one of the major forces behind the Arab Spring protests roiling the region.

The Associated Press examined a copy of the journal uploaded by the Long War Journal to its website.

The CIA released it Wednesday as part of a trove of material recovered during the May 2011 raid that killed bin Laden, then took down the files, saying they were “temporarily unavailable pending resolution of a technical issue.” A daughter of Osama bin Laden is thought to have jotted his thoughts before the U.S. raid that killed him in 2011.

The journal appears to cover conversations between bin Laden and his daughters, Miriam and Somiya, his wife and his sons, Khaled and Hamza — the latter of whom would go on to become a potential successor to lead the group his father founded.

The journal is titled, “Special diaries for Abu Abdullah: Sheikh Abdullah’s points of view — A session with the family,” which refers to bin Laden by his traditional Arabic name.

The conversations took place between February and April 2011, with the journal entries dated according to the Islamic calendar.

During that time, uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt had ousted longtime autocratic rulers, touching off protests in Libya, Yemen, Bahrain and Syria.

The Middle East was on the cusp of unstoppable change, chaos and turmoil.

Bin Laden appears concerned by the speed of some of the region’s revolts, believing that a gradual approach would help avoid the backlash of a counterrevolution as regime figures sought to hold onto power at all cost.

“I am upset by the timing of the revolutions. We told them to slow down,” bin Laden is quoted as saying, though it’s not entirely clear to which countries he is referring.

Yemen is a primary focus of the journal entries.

Al-Qaida’s branch there is among its most active in the world and the journal suggests al-Qaida was plotting an assassination attempt against Yemen’s embattled ruler at the time, Ali Abdullah Saleh.

There is little indication that the writer had much information about what was happening in the region beyond what was reported in the media.

This could indicate that bin Laden had become isolated in his final months hiding out in Abbottabad, Pakistan, where U.S. forces would find and kill him a little over a month later in 2011.

Or it could also be that bin Laden was shielding his relatives from al-Qaida intelligence.

Bin Laden imagines that Saudi Arabia would soon feel the “tsunami” of change sweeping the region. The late al-Qaida chief held Saudi citizenship until the early 1990s, before he was stripped of his nationality by the government.

He talks about wanting to deliver a message to Saudi youth and Saudi rulers: “The flood is coming and it will lead to a change so there is no need for violence.”