AMERICA BETRAYED - Brain & Mind

America Betrayedoff with huge cash payments. Bin Laden freely distributed bundlesof notes to officials.” Indeed, it was not uncommon for bin Ladento hand out $50,000 and even $100,000 at a time. “He had themoney in his pocket,” Mr. Khaksar told the Washington Post. “Anytime he wanted, he would just pull it out and give it to them.”Osama was not trusted, however, by Mohammed Khaksar,or Mohammed Omar. Both were suspicious of his motives.In May 1998, when a Pakistan journalist arranged an interviewwith bin Laden, Mullah Omar became enraged. AlthoughOsama’s money was welcome, he was not trusted. In May of 1998,Mullah Omar issued a statement that bin Laden was not in Afghanistan“to conduct political or military activities.”Mohammed Khaksar, former Taliban deputy interior minister,told the Associated Press (32), that he feared Osama andPakistan’s powerful intelligence agency were trying to hijack theIslamic movement. He believed that the goals of bin laden andPakistan had little to do with the spread of Islam, but that they hadanother agenda altogether. “Their promises were all lies. From thebeginning, I was against [Osama] coming to Afghanistan. I felt ourcountry would be destroyed.”Osama was dishing out more than cold cash, but propaganda.Osama preached about the need to create a pure Islamic state. Hepublicly castigated the United States for basing its troops in theholy lands of Arabia and criticized the royal family as “corrupt”and “hypocrites.” In 1996 and again in 1998, Bin Laden, issuedhis “Ladenese Epistle: Declaration of War,” in which he publiclydeclared war on the U.S. and urged his Muslim brothers to “killAmericans.” However, except for his brief public outburst againstthe Saudi royal family, in 1996—which we presume was designedto help establish his cover— thereafter he described them as theinjured party who were “helpless” against American aggression.“For over seven years the United States has been occupyingthe lands of Islam in the holiest of places, the Arabian Peninsula,plundering its riches, dictating to its rulers, humiliating its people,terrorizing its neighbors and turning its bases in the Peninsula intoa spearhead through which to fight the neighboring Muslimpeoples.”“If some people have in the past argued about the fact of the394