This isn't going to be a long diary... I just came across a video posted on another site. At just after six minutes into the video, Benazir Bhutto says that OBL was killed by Omar Sheikh... The video is from November of this year.

Now, there's lots of evidence to suggest that Osama bin Laden is dead -- this isn't new, and has been suggested by Karzai, the FBI, Musharaff, by Mossad, by the NYT and by other organizations. Bush himself famously suggested that Osama bin Laden no longer worried him.  His funeral was reported in the Muslim Press. (h/t to WRH)

It's been clear for some time that US Grand Strategy in the Middle East is collapsing. The failure of the current policy due to duplicity, corruption and outright incompetence on the part of US-led operations has threatened our long-term strategic objectives in that region, and strategic planners have been scrambling for some time to try to regroup and formulate an alternate policy for the Middle East.

The chaos in Iraq and Afghanistan have removed two checks on Iranian influence in the region, and so there's been worry among Sunni states -- and the West -- of a "Shi'a revival". Moreover, Israel's conflict with Hizbollah in Southern Lebanon last year really shook up the neo-cons in the administration. The emergence of Hizbollah as a populist movement in Lebanon is seen by the US as an arm of Iranian influence and a threat to US-Israeli hegemony over the region, and as such the neo-cons mean to nip this in the bud to the extent that they can.