Didn't happen?

Two news items that should pique your curiosity:

1) From CNN:

Pakistani Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz on Sunday ridiculed as "bizarre" a U.S. report that senior al Qaeda leaders were killed in a CIA attack on a home along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

"There is no evidence, as of half an hour ago, that there were any other people there," Aziz said on CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer."

2) From the Durham Herald-Sun:

A Duke University professor who has edited the statements of Osama bin Laden is sticking by his opinion that the al-Qaida leader is dead or incapacitated.

...Soon after the CIA's identification of the [Bin Laden] tape this week, Lawrence received a few anonymous e-mail messages gloating that his assessment had been incorrect.

At first, he thought so, too. Then, he said, he looked more closely at the tape's message and context -- and began to doubt its authenticity.

...Unlike most of bin Laden's pronouncements in [Bruce] Lawrence's book, "Messages to the World," it doesn't contain allusions to the Quran and Islamic history. It doesn't cast Western policy in the Middle East as a product of a "Zionist-Crusader alliance," as bin Laden has nearly unfailingly done in the past, he said.

Rather than the florid, poetic style of most of bin Laden's statements, this one is bluntly prosaic.

Moreover, he said, it would be uncharacteristic for bin Laden to buttress his arguments by appealing to a book by a U.S. author. The tape commends "Rogue State," William Blum's 2000 indictment of U.S. foreign policy.

Furthermore, the timing of the release -- soon after a U.S. missile strike against al-Qaida leaders in Pakistan -- seems suspicious, Lawrence said.

"Isn't it almost too circumstantial that a bin Laden tape that has been around for at least a month, that it now surfaces in the immediate aftermath of a failed strike on his second-in-command?" he asked, referring to Ayman al-Zawahri.

I'm not suggesting these excerpts are the last word on their respective subjects. What I am suggesting is the need for skepticism and, above all, verifiable evidence. Until that's presented, take all claims with extreme caution.

I'm more skeptical about the attack on Damadola than I am about the Bin Laden tape, to be honest. I will concede, however, that Lawrence raises important points. On close inspection, last week's tape does sound much different than past Bin Laden missives, even to the ears of this non-expert.