New Bin Laden Tape Something of a Puzzle

Five minutes of audio devoted to the Mohammed cartoons and the papist Crusade, a subject he already droned on about two years ago. There’s some ambiguity from the news reports as to whether he refers specifically to the republication of the cartoons this year or to their publication generally, which could come from an older tape. Too bad; if he’s going to revisit old jihadist grievances, I’d sure like to hear more of his take on global warming.

Note that the tape is directed not at the U.S. but at the EU and conspicuously doesn’t mention Geert Wilders’s film, which is of a piece with the cartoons and has been in the news for at least a month. Any theories as to why he’d release a tape on the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war that not only doesn’t mention Iraq but isn’t even geared at the Great Satan? Any possible explanation — perhaps in light of some of his other recent tapes — why he might not be in the mood to chatter about Iraq’s imminent transformation into a Wahhabist paradise?