2/20/2006

“Osama bin Laden vowed never to be taken alive in an audiotape broadcast on a militant website [on February 20, 2006]. ‘I have sworn to only live free. Even if I find bitter the taste of death, I don’t want to die humiliated or deceived,’ Bin Laden said in the 11-minute recording. ‘The jihad is continuing with strength, for Allah be all the credit, despite all the barbarity, the repressive steps taken by the American army and its agents, to the extent that there is no longer any mentionable difference between this criminality and the criminality of Saddam.’ Bin Laden said the Iraq conflict had ‘become a point of attraction and recruitment of qualified forces.’ ”

 – Rowenna Davis, “Bin Laden: The War in His Words,” The Guardian, May 2, 2011