Bin Laden video praises al-Zarqawi

Osama bin Laden has praised al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as the “lion of holy war” in a new video posted on the internet today.

The 19-minute message shows an old still photo of bin Laden in a split-screen next to images of al-Zarqawi taken from a previous video. A voice resembling bin Laden’s narrates a tribute to the Jordanian-born militant, who was killed in a June 7 air strike north east of Baghdad.