India on Bin Laden's Radar for Years

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July 14, 2006 10:50 AM

While there have been no claims of responsibility for the Mumbai bombings earlier this week, India has been on Osama bin Laden's radar since Sept. 11, 2001.

By calling for jihad against India, bin Laden has aligned himself with militant Islamic groups that seek independence for the disputed Kashmir region from India.

In his latest audio message broadcast by Al Jazeera on April 23, 2006, bin Laden refers to a "Crusader-Zionist-Hindu War against Muslims." 

He calls President Bush "the leader of the Crusaders' campaign" and blasts Bush for getting involved in Pakistan's affairs in the region, saying Bush ordered "his converted agent," referring to Pakistan Pres. Pervez Musharraf, to shut down the Kashmir Mujahedeen camps, "thus affirming the Zionist-Hindu war against Muslims."

Bin Laden also calls on all Muslims around the world to give "all types of material support" to establish jihad in Kashmir. He says Muslims will commit a sin if they "do not provide adequate material support for jihad."

In fact, a number of the Kashmiri separatist groups do have explicit links with bin Laden's terrorist network.

"It was a coordinated, multiple, synchronized mass casualty atrocity," says Sajjan Gohel of the Asia Pacific Foundation. "These are often the hallmarks of a powerful transnational group…a group that's affiliated with the ideology and ideas of Osama bin Laden."