An Islamist website has accused the United States of releasing a fake tape of an ageing Osama bin Laden watching images of himself on television, and posted a video on YouTube it says offers proof.

Shoumoukh al-Islam, the main website that broadcasts Al-Qaeda videos, posted a video comparing an earlier picture of bin Laden and the aired picture.

It said the video was a "response to the tape aired by Arab and foreign media on Osama bin Laden watching himself" on television.

"Caution, caution from America the liar," read a caption on the almost 10-minute-long video with pictures showing the differences between the ear and eyes of the bin Laden in the early photo and those of the older bin Laden.

The video was posted on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0aiBXTPTkE.

US officials have released five videos of bin Laden seized in the raid that killed him, including an extraordinary one in which the Al-Qaeda chief is seen holding a remote and sitting huddled under a blanket, watching images of himself on television in a spare-looking room.

In that video, bin Laden has a grey beard, but in other videos that were apparently meant for distribution as propaganda his beard appears to have been dyed black.

More than 20 US Navy SEALs swooped on bin Laden's hideout in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and shot him dead in a May 2 raid.

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