Osama bin Laden’s letter to America has gone viral amid the Israel-Hamas war

Some social media users suggested that the Al Qaeda founder’s documentary offered an alternative view of America’s involvement in the conflict in the Middle East, which the White House criticized.

The issue gained further prominence when users began sharing a link to a copy of The Guardian’s letter, written a year after the September 11, 2001 attacks that killed more than 3,000 people. The Guardian has removed the 21-year-old letter from its website.

In the letter, bin Laden addressed the American people and asked for answers to these questions:

1. “Why are we fighting and opposing you?”
2. “Why do we call you, and what do we want from you?”

According to NBC News, the letter contained anti-Semitic language. The letter sparked debate on social media about the validity and morality of bin Laden’s letter, with some expressing sympathy, while others condemned or ridiculed it.

People discussing the letter said it made them reevaluate their views about the US wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. He also said he was not praising or defending bin Laden’s plot to carry out the 9/11 attacks. Critics of TikTok argued that this was evidence that the app, owned by Chinese tech giant ByteDance, was covertly promoting the phenomenon to an audience of American youth.

Bin Laden’s letter also criticized US support for Israel, and the US accused of aiding the oppression of the Palestinian people. According to the Washington Post, the former Al Qaeda chief also criticized US interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Chechnya and Lebanon.

Bin Laden was killed in a US special operation in Pakistan in 2011. The White House criticized the message’s sharing, saying, “No one should associate themselves with Osama bin Laden’s despicable words to disrespect the 2,977 American families who are still grieving their loved ones.”

Former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley is among politicians who have criticized the letter and called for social media reforms. “When you look at social media, I’ve said before that we have to ban TikTok and if you don’t know why, today is another example,” 2024 GOP presidential primary candidate Nikki Haley told Fox News.

TikTok spokesman Ben Rathe said videos containing bin Laden’s letter violated the platform’s guidelines.

He said, “The content promoting this letter clearly violates our rules on supporting any form of terrorism. We are proactively and aggressively removing this content and investigating “How did it get on our platform? This video has few views on TikTok. And reports of it trending on our platform are false. It’s not just on TikTok, but across multiple platforms and media.”