However he laments 'great catastrophe' that many Muslims don't agree with him.
Al-Qaida has released a posthumous audio recording by Osama bin Laden in which the Islamist group's ex-leader praises the revolutions sweeping the Arab world.
In the audio, the former al-Qaida leader, who was killed in a U.S. raid on May 2 in Pakistan, expressed joy at the victory of uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia amid the so-called Arab Spring, Reuters reported.
In the audio, bin Laden talks about how the movement started in the Maghreb region of North Africa.
"The sun of the revolution has risen from the Maghreb. The light of the revolution came from Tunisia. It has given the nation tranquility and made the faces of the people happy," he says.
Tunisia's president was overthrown in January, and this was then followed by Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak's departure after mass protests centered on Cairo's Tahrir Square.
"Tunisia was the first but swiftly the knights of Egypt have taken a spark from the free people of Tunisia to Tahrir Square," said bin Laden, adding: "It has made the rulers worried."
He celebrated the reasons behind the uprising, saying it "wasn't one about food and clothes, but a revolution of glory and defiance; revolution of sacrifice and giving."
'Big ignorance'
Bin Laden urged people to "continue the march and don't fear the hardships."
"Sons of my Muslim Ummah (community): You are before a dangerous crossroads and a great, rare and historic opportunity to raise the Ummah and be liberated from enslavement to the wishes of the rulers and the man-made laws and the Western domination," he added.
"It is of great sin and big ignorance that this opportunity gets lost, which the Ummah has been waiting for faraway decades. So take advantage of it and destroy the idols and statues and establish justice and faith," he said.
However he also lamented "the great catastrophe" that "lack of awareness exists in many of the Ummah's sons, which results from the wrong culture the rulers have been broadcasting for long decades."
Terrorism analyst Evan Kohlmann, speaking on msnbc's "The Rachel Maddow Show," said that the audio was real.
"There is no doubt whatsoever this is authentic, this is real, this is bin Laden, this is his last message," he said.
Kohlmann said it was not clear why al-Qaida had chosen to release the 12-minute recording now, although he noted the release came in advance of a speech that President Barack Obama was scheduled to give Thursday about the Mideast.
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"If you look at this recording, at the way it was packaged forensically, the last touches on this were put on within the last 24 hours," he said.
"Which means they probably were aware of the fact that President Obama is planning this major speech coming tomorrow, perhaps the idea was to try to preempt that with a final message from bin Laden instead," Kohlmann added.
This article contains reporting from Reuters and msnbc.com staff.
Source: MSNBC
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