9-11 20 Years Later

 

Today marks an especially painful anniversary of the 9-11 attacks that took place 20 years ago.  Afghanistan, the country from which 9-11 was launched, is now back in the hands of the Taliban, the same barbarians who protected Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda. No doubt they are marking the day in some manner to humiliate the US and our feckless administration, led by Joe Biden and his equally feckless spokesholes like Jen Psaki at the White House and Ned Price at the State Department.

Since 9-11, Islamic terrorism has continued notwithstanding our stop and go war on terror. Our leaders, to say nothing of the European leaders, can not bring themselves to say publicly what most people know- that we were attacked on 9-11 by Islam. Since that dark day 20 years ago, that same Islam has carried out over 20,000 terrorist attacks around the world. After a stabbing spree carried out just days ago by a jihadist in New Zealand, that country's feckless prime minister fretted that the principal victims would be Muslims. She was right to condemn the murderous attack at two mosques a few years ago that killed dozens of innocent Muslims in Christchurch, but her more recent statements showed a callous disregard for the latest victims.

Today's commemorations in the US seem to be taking on a more somber tone than in recent years. Is there something magical about the number 20 or just that it is an evenly-rounded number? If so, I don't get it, but if it will wake some people up from their slumber-especially our younger folks, who barely remember the event or not at all- that is something in itself.

But then there is the Anti-Defamation League's liberal chief, Jonathan Greenblatt, who just days ago marked the anniversary by offering a public apology for the fact that his organization had once opposed the proposed construction of the so-called "Ground Zero Mosque", which would have been built in the shadows of Ground Zero. 

If you are a new reader to this site, do not get the wrong impression. My opposition to the ADL is grounded in their refusal to get involved in fighting anti-Semitism at the University of California at Irvine, where I taught from 1998-2016, and where I have been heavily involved in confronting anti-Semitism on that campus-with zero help from the ADL, which rarely is willing to talk about anti-Semitism when it comes from Muslims. Their outrage is generally reserved for Jew-hating white supremacists. I, on the other hand, prefer to condemn all forms of anti-Semitism.

Nor should the reader infer that I hold all Muslims on the planet for 9-11, terrorism, or anti-Semitism. I do not even though I believe anti-Semitism and violence are deeply rooted in Islamic teaching.

I get the fact that Greenblatt is a man of the left. (He was not the head of the ADL in 2010 when they opposed the Ground Zero mosque project.) But this is not a time when we need to be apologizing to anybody.