June 30, 2009
Osama in America: The Final Answer

The question of whether Osama bin Laden has ever visited the United States, a subject on which I have expended an unhealthy amount of energy in the course of various journalistic and biographical research, has now seemingly been settled. Osama was here for two weeks in 1979, it seems, and he visited Indiana and Los Angeles, among other places. He had a favorable encounter with an American medical doctor; he also reportedly met in Los Angeles with his spiritual mentor of the time, the Palestinian radical Abdullah Azzam. All this is according to a forthcoming book by Osama?s first wife, Najwa Bin Laden, and his son Omar Bin Laden, to be published in the autumn by St. Martin?s Press.

First, some context for the book?s disclosures:

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