A masked man claiming to speak for Al Qaeda has produced a 16-minute Internet video "newscast" praising Iraqi insurgents and Palestinians.
Monday's broadcast was first reported by the Italian Adnkonos news agency from Dubai, which said that the program was called "Voice of the Caliphate".
The newsreader, wearing a black ski mask and ammunition belt, said that the program would appear weekly. The man sat with a copy of the Koran beside him and a rifle affixed to a tripod was pointed at the camera, the Washington Post reported.
The opening segment recounted Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, which the narrator proclaimed as a "great victory". The man went on to repeat of a pledge on September 14 by Abu Mussab Al Zarqawi, the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq, to wage all-out war on Iraq's Shia Muslims.
The telecast concluded speaking of the August 29 strike of Hurricane Katrina on the United States.
"The whole Muslim world was filled with joy," the anchorman said, adding that US President George W. Bush was "completely humiliated by his obvious incapacity to face the wrath of God, who battered New Orleans, city of homosexuals".
Masked man debuts Internet 'Al Qaeda newscast'
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