October 23, 2002

7:39 AM

Bin Laden Unmasked?Robert Fisk [ducks] reviews a '215 page treasure trove' written by an Al Jazeera journalist and published in Beirut. It contains a 'wealth of information' about the elusive billionaire and his followers. He communicates over the Internet - no surprise there - but the book gives some clues as to the site used: al-Nidaa, 'The Calling'. Can you find it? The words of Mullah Omar are apparently distributed on site called the 'Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan', wild goose chase? You decide.
posted by grahamwell (5 comments total)

This place maybe? Wired says this site was al qaeda, but no mas.
posted by shoos at 8:24 AM on October 23, 2002

nidaa.com takes you to this picture of flowers... encrypted messages anyone?
posted by talos at 8:29 AM on October 23, 2002

Am I the only one to find the phrase "[question]? You decide" annoying?

No one can decide. One can only form an opinion, so...

"... wild goose chase? Make up your own opinion."
posted by titboy at 9:45 AM on October 23, 2002

titboy: What do you mean, "No one can decide"? Ever? About anything? And "Make up your own opinion" doesn't sound right to me; are you sure that's what you want to say?

Or, what the Bible says about motes and beams in eyes...
posted by languagehat at 12:41 PM on October 23, 2002

Alneda.com ('The Calling') is the domain name that American Jon David hijacked (along, now, with alneda.org). The site itself -- recall the root DNS server thread -- may still be out there, somewhere. From what I can tell, it moved hosts twice, then failed to resurface.

'The Islamic Emirate(s) of Afghanistan' was the official name given to the country by the Taliban, not the name of the website. It existed long before 9/11, so it's no hoax. It hadn't been updated in months even at that point, though.
posted by dhartung at 3:10 PM on October 23, 2002