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How Osama Rejected His Family's Values

Author examines bin Laden's roots, Saudi clan's ties to US

By Kevin Spak,  Newser Staff

Posted Apr 1, 2008 1:20 PM CDT

(Newser) – Osama is the most famous of the bin Ladens, but he’s also the clan's black sheep. In his new book, The bin Ladens, Steve Coll explores the sprawling family, which is so different from its most famous scion that Osama’s war takes on a Freudian dimension. The book "possesses the novelistic energy of a rags-to-riches family epic," Michiko Kakutani raves in today's Times. 

Osama’s father was a self-made millionaire, building a decidedly Western-friendly transnational corporation from the ground up. Coll uses his story to illuminate the transformative effect of oil wealth on Saudi Arabia and US-Saudi relations. There are “millions” of bin Ladens, one FBI analyst explains, and “99.999999 percent of them are of the non-evil variety.”

Omar Osama bin Laden and his British wife Jane Felix-Brown, now known as Zaina Alsabah, are seen during an interview with the Associated Press in Cairo, Egypt, Friday, Jan. 11, 2008.
Omar Osama bin Laden and his British wife Jane Felix-Brown, now known as Zaina Alsabah, are seen during an interview with the Associated Press in Cairo, Egypt, Friday, Jan. 11, 2008.   (AP Photo)
Steve Coll's new book gives a fascinating portrait of the sprawling international family Osama hails from.
Steve Coll's new book gives a fascinating portrait of the sprawling international family Osama hails from.
Osama bin Laden speaks to a selected group of reporters in the mountains of Helmand province in southern Afghanistan in this Dec. 24, 1998 file photo.
Osama bin Laden speaks to a selected group of reporters in the mountains of Helmand province in southern Afghanistan in this Dec. 24, 1998 file photo.   (AP Photo/Rahimullah Yousafzai, File)
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