Why did osama bin ladin do 911?

Answer 1

Osama bin Laden declared a holy war against the United States in 1998 that called for the killing of Americans.

In 2002 in his "Letter to America," Bin Laden stated that al-Qaeda's motives for their attacks included: Western support for attacking Muslims in Somalia, supporting Russian atrocities against Muslims in Chechnya, supporting the Indian oppression against Muslims in Kashmir, the Jewish aggression against Muslims in Lebanon, the presence of US troops in Saudi Arabia, US support of Israel, and sanctions against Iraq.

Answer 2

Osama Bin Laden and his hate for the US:To start off, probably the biggest reason he didn't like to U.S. is because we are the most powerful nation. Being power hungry, obviously, that's an automatic reason. However, there have been many things- militaristically, politically, socially, and economically - that he disliked America for. For example, when the U.S. made a military base in Saudi Arabia, Osama bin Laden thought that was the greatest possible desecration of the holy land, and was even asked to leave the country after threatening and speaking out against the royal family.

He also disliked the U.S. for backing Israel. Although Arab Brotherhood isn't completely corruption-free, someone going against any Arab country for Jews, was completely unacceptable in his eyes. Also keep in mind that Osama bin Laden was very fundamentalist. In the 1970s, the West (mostly including the U.S.) was economically influential. Being a fundamentalist, he hated capitalist influence.

Among other reasons, bin Laden supposedly hated the United States for other reasons, such as acts of imposition on other Arab countries for their oil. Whether or not he actually hated the U.S. for those reasons is arguable. However, he did use these reasons to rally support in neighboring countries, which contain people who DO care. For this reason, the man was scarily brilliant, similar to that of Hitler.

Bin Laden, in his 1996 fatwa (declaration) entitled "Declaration of War against the Americans Occupying the Land of the Two Holy Places," identified several grievances that he has about Saudi Arabia, the birthplace and holy land of Islam. (and I quote directly from the fatwa):

"(1) The intimidation and harassment suffered by the leaders of the society, the scholars, heads of tribes, merchants, academic teachers and other eminent individuals;

(2) The situation of the law within the country and the arbitrary declaration of what is Halal and Haram (lawful and unlawful) regardless of the Shari'ah as instituted by Allah;

(3) The state of the press and the media which became a tool of truth-hiding and misinformation; the media carried out the plan of the enemy of idolising cult of certain personalities and spreading scandals among the believers to repel the people away from their religion, as Allah, the Exalted said: {surely- as for- those who love that scandal should circulate between the believers, they shall have a grievous chastisement in this world and in the here after} (An-Noor, 24:19).

(4) Abuse and confiscation of human rights;

(5) The financial and the economical situation of the country and the frightening future in the view of the enormous amount of debts and interest owed by the government; this is at the time when the wealth of the Ummah being wasted to satisfy personal desires of certain individuals!! while imposing more custom duties and taxes on the nation. (the prophet said about the woman who committed adultery: "She repented in such a way sufficient to bring forgiveness to a custom collector!!").

(6) The miserable situation of the social services and infra-structure especially the water service and supply , the basic requirement of life.,

(7) The state of the ill-trained and ill-prepared army and the impotence of its commander in chief despite the incredible amount of money that has been spent on the army. The gulf war clearly exposed the situation.,

(8) Shari'a law was suspended and man made law was used instead.,

(9) And as far as the foreign policy is concerned the report exposed not only how this policy has disregarded the Islamic issues and ignored the Muslims, but also how help and support were provided to the enemy against the Muslims; the cases of Gaza-Ariha and the communist in the south of Yemen are still fresh in the memory, and more can be said."

Bin Laden wanted to overthrow the Saudi monarchy (and other Middle East governments) and establish an "Islamic state" according to Shari'a law (Islamic Hole Law), to "unite all Muslims and to establish a government which follows the rule of the Caliphs[Muslim religious leaders who once governed the Ottoman Empire]." We might add that his vision called for an extremely strict version of Islam, but perhaps not as strict as the version being implemented in some Middle Eastern governments today. (Middle Eastern governments today are extremely repressive, have horrible human rights records, and are monarchical.)

However the US and other Western nations are supporting such regimes (in addition to killing Muslims through sanctions, wars, covert operations, bombing, and such) such as Saudi Arabia that bin Laden wanted to overthrow. Thus, according to bin Laden, Muslims must fight against such "oppressors" by killing Americans (and other people), including innocent people. According to this line of thought, if the US and other Western governments could get out of the Middle East, then repressive and "un-Islamic" regimes could be overthrown, and the only way to get Western governments out of the Middle East is to attack the citizens of those countries.

This is one of the main reasons bin Ladan hateed the US and other Western governments. However, the other reason is because of the Muslims that Western governments have killed. He explained this is his 1998 fatwa.

In his 1998 fatwa entitled, Jihad Against Jews and Crusaders bin Laden identified three grievances (and I quote) against the US:

First, for over seven years the United States has been occupying the lands of Islam in the holiest of places, the Arabian Peninsula, plundering its riches, dictating to its rulers, humiliating its people, terrorizing its neighbors, and turning its bases in the Peninsula into a spearhead through which to fight the neighboring Muslim peoples. (1)

If some people have in the past argued about the fact of the occupation, all the people of the Peninsula have now acknowledged it. The best proof of this is the Americans' continuing aggression against the Iraqi people using the Peninsula as a staging post, even though all its rulers are against their territories being used to that end, but they are helpless.

Second, despite the great devastation inflicted on the Iraqi people by the crusader-Zionist alliance, and despite the huge number of those killed, which has exceeded 1 million... despite all this, the Americans are once against trying to repeat the horrific massacres, as though they are not content with the protracted blockade imposed after the ferocious war or the fragmentation and devastation. (2)

So here they come to annihilate what is left of this people and to humiliate their Muslim neighbors.

Third, if the Americans' aims behind these wars are religious and economic, the aim is also to serve the Jews' petty state and divert attention from its occupation of Jerusalem and murder of Muslims there. The best proof of this is their eagerness to destroy Iraq, the strongest neighboring Arab state, and their endeavor to fragment all the states of the region such as Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Sudan into paper statelets and through their disunion and weakness to guarantee Israel's survival and the continuation of the brutal crusade occupation of the Peninsula. (3)

Some extra notes:

(1) Here he was talking about US troops in Saudi Arabia (the holy land of Islam), and about the gigantic amount of oil drilled their that is sold to the US, which he considered wasteful and an exploitation of the resources.

(2) Here he was talking about the 1990-2003 UN sanctions on Iraq, which was sponsored by the US and the UK. It might be recalled that the sanctions were partly responsible for killing an estimated 1 million innocent Iraqis, half of them being children. (Estimates go as high as 1.5 deaths , and as low as 170,000 deaths among children.) In fact Denis Halliday, United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in Baghdad at the time, resigned from the UN in protest of the sanctions, saying: "I don't want to administer a programme that satisfies the definition of genocide.

(3) Finally, he was talking about Israel which he says is occupying neighboring Muslim land and oppressing the Palestinian people.

Answer 3

Answer 1

Not for certain. It is the habit of the Super powers to act upon this saying, 'Give the dog a bad name and kill him." This is what America is following. No true Muslim can be a terrorist as No True Christian or True Jew can be a terrorist because they worship the same Almighty God (Allah in Arabic).

Islam means peace. Terrorism is not associated with any religion. Terrorists are found because there is INJUSTICE around us. There is lack of tolerance. We have divided ourselves on the basis of caste, color, creed, geographical bounds etc. Terrorists are the product of re-action of cruelty, suppression, maltreatment, insult, and disgrace done to their nation, relatives or to them. They want revenge. Had there been the rule of Justice, there would have been no terrorists. When we suppress a nation, tribe or people, occupy their lands and destroy their houses and belongings, may be they have no alternative but to avenge themselves on the oppressors and sometimes on even innocent people. History shows Freedom Fighters termed as 'Terrorist' by the oppressors/invaders but heroes by their own nation. The Americans who fought against the British to win their freedom were called terrorists. The Irish people fighting against UK are still called terrorists. The Negroes were once called terrorists by the white people who occupied their lands and kept them in slavery for many decades. So, it is mostly from which angle you see things and by which yardstick you measure others. No religious group can claim to be 'clean' and 'just' in this regard.

Would you say that the actions against Muslims in Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Burma, Palestine, Israel, ... are not terrorist acts!!!!

Answer 2

Osama bin Laden certainly was a terrorist (see Part 1 of this Answer), but it is unclear what this question is asking:

Part 1) Definitional, Q: Why is Osama bin Laden considered a terrorist? -- This is rather straightforward. A terrorist is determined by having the following definition with six distinct parts: (1) a person who (2) uses violence (3) against civilian populations (4) in order to provoke fear among that civilian population (5) in order to instigate for political change in the country where the civilians were attacked (6) in line with the preferences of the person who used the violence. Bin Laden fits squarely in the definition, since he is (1) a person who (2) used violent acts such as World Trade Center Attacks in 1993 and 2001 (3) against civilian populations - in those cases, the civilian population of the USA, (4) in order to provoke fear (5) so that Americans would rethink their position on Middle East politics (6) and change the US Foreign policy to be more along the lines of what bin Laden was advocating. This is why he is clearly a terrorist. Conversely, Answer 1 confuses the term "insurrectionist" or "rebel" with a "terrorist". An "insurrectionist" or "rebel" does not have (3) or (4) in the definition. Which is why, we never hear American Revolution stories of Colonial soldiers bombing innocent people's homes with the intent of spreading fear of Colonial acts as pressure to abandon the United Kingdom. In the case of Ireland, those were terror attacks, and are rightly called so. Whether bin Laden is a "true Muslim" is something Muslims need to decide for themselves, but regardless of where they come down on that, bin Laden will still be a terrorist.

Part 2) Motivations, Q: What inspired/caused Osama bin Laden to be a terrorist? -- It is much more difficult to know any person's true motivations, but bin Laden did leave us many recordings and speeches which can be used to discern his intent and motivations. These generally fall into two major categories: (a) Islamic Theological Views and (b) Grievances of the Islamic World.

2a) Islamic Theological Views: It must be noted that this section deals with how bin Laden understood Islamic theology and what is said here is not necessarily what Islam (as a religion/ideology/philosophy) holds extrinsic to bin Laden. According to bin Laden, Islam is the natural mode of existence and all governments around the world should only be Islamic governments. The existence today of governments that are Islamic and governments that are not Islamic is unnatural and against the Divine Will and should be realigned to be Islamic. The march of Islam should always move forwards so that more and more territory is under the control of Islamic countries, bringing the world more into its natural state of Divine Guidance. Any government that is not Islamic, therefore should be overthrown, especially a government that is not Islamic, but used to control lands controlled by an Islamic States (such as Israel, Spain, and Portugal). In order to compel governments that are not Islamic to become Islamic, violence and force can be used if simple diplomacy is insufficient.

2b) Grievances of the Islamic World: Osama bin Laden felt that there were a number of events in past US and European foreign policy that were injurious to Muslims as individuals or Islam as a religion. US and European support for the Jewish State of Israel was one such grievance, as was ending the Indonesian occupation of East Timor and the repression of the East Timorese Christians. He was also grieved by the fact that the US was more than willing to fund his Mujahedin in Afghanistan as long as they fought against the Soviets, but stopped funding them as soon as the Soviets withdrew. He faulted the US and UK for Operation Ajax in Iran in 1953 and for funding both sides of the Iran-Iraq War with impunity. He also was angered that the US supported most Arab regimes which he thought were "not Islamic enough". While some of those grievances (and others) are certainly worth entertaining as issues that Western countries should deal with and perhaps apologize for, they are certainly not sufficient cause to engage in terrorist activities.

Answer 4

You have it all wrong, Bin Laden didn't decide to attack America in September 9 years ago (9/11/01), or any other terrorist group, it was a inside job by the U.S. government to go into Iraq for oil, when the media claimed we were going there because "terrorists hit the world trade center" This is the real answer. Don't believe me? Fine. Keep being ignorant.

Answer 5

By doing the bombing, Bin Laden hoped to achieve greatness as a religious leader among his people, by striking so boldly at such a powerful enemy. Fundamentalism saw the influence of the US as a corruption, and this action would force the division of people into with or against them, much like a battle of good vs evil.

His actions were also motivated by revenge against the US for their influence in particular areas which harmed the financial interests of the region.

These include the cancellation of the Afghanistan oil pipeline by Unocal.

Answer 6

He believed that if he killed Americans that he would go to heaven and get 70 virgins.

More accurately, he was striking against the largest western power, trying to bring them to their knees in what he believed was a holy war or Jihad.

Answer 7

There are a number of reasons, but for the most part, he seems to have hated "the west," and regarded America as a source of decadence, materialism and secularism. He believed by striking at New York City and Washington DC, he would be destroying symbols of America's success and contributing to his ultimate goal of imposing his particular vision of the world: one where every country is converted to Islam. It should be noted that Bin Laden's view is NOT shared by most Muslims-- they may not agree with everything about America, but they have no wish to destroy it. Bin Laden was by all accounts an extremist. He was even angry with Saudi Arabia, a country that practices the strict form of Islam he claimed he preferred.

Answer 8

Osama bin Laden has never attacked the White House.