CIA releases vast Bin Laden archive seized in compound

Osama bin Laden (AP Photo/Mazhar Ali Khan, File)

WASHINGTON: The CIA on Wednesday released a vast archive of intimate Al-Qaeda documents, including Osama Bin-Laden鈥檚 handwritten diary, seized in the deadly 2011 raid on his Pakistani compound.
The huge trove includes images of diary pages left by the Saudi-born global extremist leader and a wedding video that includes the first public images of his son Hamza as an adult.
Controversially, scholars from a Washington think-tank who were given access to the now de-classified trove say the documents also shed new light on Al-Qaeda鈥檚 murky relationship with Iran.
鈥淭oday鈥檚 release ... provides the opportunity for the American people to gain further insights into the plans and workings of this terrorist organization,鈥� said CIA director Mike Pompeo.
The CIA put online 470,000 additional files seized in May 2011 when US Navy SEALs burst into the Abbottabad compound and shot dead the leader of Al-Qaeda鈥檚 global extremist network.
According to Thomas Joscelyn and Bill Roggio, scholars from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies who were allowed to see the trove before it was made public, it provides new insights.

鈥淭hese documents will go a long way to help fill in some of the blanks we still have about Al-Qaeda鈥檚 leadership,鈥� Roggio said.
The inclusion of Hamza Bin Laden鈥檚 wedding video, for example, gives the world public the first image of Bin Laden鈥檚 favorite son as an adult 鈥� an image apparently shot in Iran.
Previous document releases, including letters revealed by AFP in May 2015, show that Bin Laden was grooming Hamza to succeed him as leader of Al-Qaeda鈥檚 global jihadist campaign.
But plans for him to come to Bin Laden鈥檚 Abbottabad hideout seem to have been abandoned after the deadly US raid, and the young man 鈥� now aged 27 or 28 鈥� is presumed to be in Iran.
According to Joscelyn and Roggio, writing in the FDD鈥檚 Long War Journal, one of the newly released documents is a 19-page study of Al-Qaeda鈥檚 links to Iran written by a Bin Laden lieutenant.
Last month, at a seminar hosted by the same FDD that had an advance look at the files, Pompeo had promised to release Abbottabad documents that would show Iran-Al Qaeda ties.
鈥淭here have been relationships, there are connections. There have been times the Iranians have worked alongside Al-Qaeda,鈥� the US spy chief argued.
鈥淭here have been connections where, at the very least, they have cut deals so as not to come after each other.鈥�
This raised alarm bells among critics of President Donald Trump鈥檚 new strategy to counter Iranian influence, wary that hawks like Pompeo may be making a case for war.
The full extent and true nature of this relationship is unclear and a matter of dispute among scholars and policy-makers.
On the one hand, Tehran and its largely Shiite proxy forces in the Middle East often fight against Sunni movements aligned with Al-Qaeda鈥檚 deeply sectarian ideology.
The Iranian backed Hezbollah, for example, is locked in conflict against Al-Qaeda linked Syrian rebels.
But the very fact that Hamza and other senior figures appear to be able to live under Iranian protection or custody supports claims that Tehran and Bin Laden had a working relationship.
One document, Joscelyn and Roggio write, recounts how Iran offered training, money and arms to some of Al-Qaeda鈥檚 鈥淪audi brothers鈥� on condition they attack US interests in the Gulf.
But the files also show Tehran and Al-Qaeda sometimes had stark disagreements, and Bin Laden once wrote to Iranian leader the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to demand his relatives be released.
鈥淥ther files show that Al-Qaeda kidnapped an Iranian diplomat in order to force an exchange,鈥� Joscelyn writes.
鈥淥sama bin Laden鈥檚 correspondence shows that he and his lieutenants were also concerned that the Iranians would track Hamza or other family members after they were released.鈥�

In addition, Roggio and Joscelyn say, 鈥淏in Laden himself considered plans to counter Iran鈥檚 influence throughout the Middle East, which he viewed as pernicious.鈥�
Nevertheless, they argue, analysis of the intelligence points to Al-Qaeda having been able to maintain a 鈥渃ore facilitation pipeline鈥� on Iranian soil.
Some in Washington are skeptical about the motives behind the release, coming after what the intelligence community had previously said was the last dump from the Bin Laden files.
Ned Price, a former CIA official who was seconded as a national security adviser to former president Barack Obama, said the new documents 鈥渄on鈥檛 tell us anything we didn鈥檛 already know.鈥�
Instead, he argued on Twitter, Pompeo may have released the files to bolster the case against Iran as a sponsor of terror, pushing the United States closer to open conflict with Tehran.
鈥淭hese moves suggest he鈥檚 reverting to the Bush administration鈥檚 playbook: Emphasize terrorist ties as a rationale for regime change,鈥� Price warned.