TikTok has begun “aggressively removing” videos about a decades-old letter from Osama bin Laden in which he criticizes the United States and its support for Israel as the reason for the attacks on September 11, 2001.
Videos linking to the 2002 letter, which was also published on the website of The Guardian, have been increasingly distributed on various social platforms in recent days. On Wednesday, the letter was the second most viewed page on the site, prompting the British newspaper to remove the letter from the site – twenty-one years after publication. to delete. In a statement, the newspaper said the letter was shared widely on social media “without full context.”
But the letter’s removal sparked a new wave of videos about the letter on TikTok — including the conspiracy theory that the publicly available document was deliberately hidden from users. As of Thursday, the hashtag #lettertoamerica had amassed more than 10 million views before TikTok searches for it blocked.
For some creators, much of bin Laden’s justification — American support for Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories — resonates with what’s happening now in the Gaza Strip.
Letter to America
The letter, entitled ‘Letter to America‘ was published a year after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Bin Laden defended the attacks in New York and Washington and wrote that Americans had become “slaves” of Jews, who, according to him, controlled the country’s economy and media, among other things. The common thread in the letter is the bond between the United States and Israel and the oppression of the Palestinians.
He also wrote that American taxpayers are financing the attacks on the Middle East. “The American people pay the taxes that finance the planes that bomb us in Afghanistan, the tanks that attack and destroy our homes in Palestine, the armies that occupy our lands in the Arabian Gulf, and the fleets that ensure the blockade of Iraq.”
In the videos many TikTok users say they see the letter as “raising awareness” of America’s role in global issues. A popular video shows a woman brushing her hair with the caption: “When you read Osama bin Laden’s letter to America and you realize you’ve been lied to your whole life.”
Anti-Semitism
Some TikTok users who shared the letter on their platform later posted another video saying they did not support terrorism or violence. The letter is now also widely shared on X, formerly Twitter, and Instagram.
The White House said in a statement Thursday that “there has never been any justification for spreading the disgusting, malicious and anti-Semitic lies that the leader of al-Qaeda published shortly after carrying out the worst terrorist attack in American history.”
“No one should ever insult the 2,977 American families who still mourn their loved ones by associating themselves with the despicable words of Osama bin Laden.”