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'Osama's handshake was limp, like shaking a wet fish' |
The handshake by world's most dreaded
terrorist Osama bin Laden has been described as limp, and like shaking a wet fish
by a producer of CNN who met the terror mastermind. CNN producer Peter Bergen,
who wrote The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al-Qaeda's Leader, met
the most dreaded terrorist in March 1997 when he went to film his first television
interview. Bergen narrates about the extra security around bin Laden and how they
were taken to his hideout at night changing vehicles blindfolded. The interview
took place near the Tora Bora region of eastern Afghanistan where Bergen and his
crew were electronically swept for tracking devices, and had to pass through three
groups of guards armed with sub-machineguns. "Bin Laden made no effort at small
talk, wanting to get the interview done as soon as possible. Peter Jouvenal, our
British cameraman, remembers that bin Laden's handshake was limp, like shaking
a wet fish," The Times quoted him, as saying. "I don't recall shaking his hand
but I do remember that he took frequent sips from a cup of tea, giving him an
air that was more feline than fierce, and his blistering diatribe against the
US for its policies in the Middle East was delivered in a barely audible whisper.
After an hour he was gone, as suddenly as he had arrived," he adds. He also narrates
Abdel Bari Atwan, a London-based Palestinian journalist who interviewed him in
Afghanistan in 1996, as saying that Bin Laden, it seems, had prepared for life
as a fugitive for years, adopting a monk-like detachment from material comforts.
Zaynab Khadr, whose family lived with the al-Qaeda leader in Afghanistan during
the late 1990s, was quoted by the author as saying that he did not even allow
his children to drink cold water because he wanted them to be prepared for the
day when there's no cold water. He quotes Bin Laden as once instructing his followers:
"You should learn to sacrifice everything from modern life like electricity, air-conditioning,
refrigerators, gasoline. If you are living the luxury life, it's very hard to
go to the mountains to fight." In a tape posted to Islamist websites in February
2006, he says bin Laden confirmed his willingness to be martyred: "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." |
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