CIA releases 470,000 more files from bin Laden raid
— Never-before-seen video of Osama bin Laden’s son and potential successor was released Wednesday by the CIA in a trove of material recovered during the May 2011 raid that killed the al-Qaida leader at his compound in Pakistan.
The video offers the first public look at Hamza bin Laden as an adult. Until now, the public has only seen childhood pictures of him.
In recent years, al-Qaida has released audio messages from Hamza bin Laden. And to mark a recent anniversary of 9/11, al-Qaida superimposed a childhood photo of him over a photo of the World Trade Center. He is expected to rise to prominence in the jihadist movement and is being closely watched as the rival Islamic State organization suffers setbacks in the Middle East.
One hourlong video shows Hamza bin Laden, sporting a trimmed mustache but no beard, at his wedding. He is sitting on a carpet with other men. A man chanting Koranic verses can be heard in the background. Sporting a traditional white headdress, he verbally accepts his marriage to his bride “on the book of God and the example of the prophet. Peace be upon him.”
“Takbeer!” the others shout, marking his marriage with a kind of religious hooray.
It was the fourth trove of documents, images and computer files recovered during the raid of bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan. Earlier materials were released in May 2015, March 2016 and in January of this year.
The CIA said the nearly 470,000 additional files offer insights into the inner workings of the terrorist organization responsible for 9/11 and detail its clashes with the Islamic State group, a spin-off of al-Qaida’s operation in Iraq. They also shed light on hardships that al-Qaida faced at the time of bin Laden’s death.