Omar Osama bin Laden bears a striking resemblance to his notorious father -- except for the dreadlocks that dangle halfway down his back. Then there's the black leather biker jacket.
The 26-year-old does not renounce his father, al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, but in an interview with The Associated Press, he said there is better way to defend Islam than militancy: Omar wants to be an "ambassador for peace" between Muslims and the West.
Omar -- one of bin Laden's 19 children -- raised a tabloid storm last year when he married a 52-year-old British woman, Jane Felix-Browne, who took the name Zaina Alsabah. Now the couple say they want to be advocates, planning a 3,000-mile horse race across North Africa to draw attention to the cause of peace.
"It's about changing the ideas of the Western mind. A lot of people think Arabs -- especially the bin Ladens, especially the sons of Osama -- are all terrorists. This is not the truth," Omar told the AP last week at a cafe in a Cairo shopping mall.
Of course, many may have a hard time getting their mind around the idea of "bin Laden: peacenik."
"Omar thinks he can be a negotiator," said Alsabah, who is trying to bring her husband to Britain. "He's one of the only people who can do this in the world."
Omar lived with the al-Qaida leader in Sudan, then moved with him to Afghanistan in 1996.
Friday, January 18, 2008
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