CAIRO, September 21 (News Agencies) - Egypt's media slammed the U.S. ambassador in Cairo on Saturday after he apparently called for the press to vet commentary on the September 11 attacks, news agencies reported.

The spat, highlighting anti-U.S. feeling in the region, erupted when ambassador David Welch attacked a rash of recent press commentary which questioned whether Osama bin Laden’s al Qaeda group, including an Egyptian, was behind the attacks, said news agencies.

"This can harm Egypt's media in the eyes of the world. I hope newspaper editors take that into account when they review articles before publication," Welch wrote in the main state-owned daily al-Ahram on Friday.

"A responsible media must publish the truth not lies, and people should know the difference," he added in the article printed in Arabic, news agencies reported.

A statement issued on Saturday by newspaper columnists, writers and cartoonists from state-owned and opposition papers said Welch should "go back to his country," accusing the U.S. media as "only seeing the region through Israeli eyes."

"He talks as if he's addressing slaves or citizens of some banana republic...Whether he was the ambassador of America or Micronesia, it's odd that he should tell Egyptian journalists how to think and write," it said.

"He made an unprecedented call for imposing new restrictions on articles and columns in the Egyptian press," the statement said.