The View From Here: May 2014

By Fareed Khan

It was a solemn day in New York City yesterday (May 15, 2014). This day marked the official opening of the 9/11 museum which commemorates the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. The museum is the principal institution concerned with exploring the implications of the events of the September 11th terrorist attacks and documenting the impact of those events. But for the majority of American it is seen as the national memorial to the 2,977 people who were victims of 9/11. The museum opening received wide media coverage , as is appropriate for the opening of a memorial for such a tragic event.

But while it was solemn day for those in New York City the opening of the museum should also be marked as a tragic day for the millions of people who were half a world away, had no direct involvement in the attacks of September 11th, and yet are victims of 9/11 just as much as the people who died on that sunny Tuesday morning. I refer to the people of Iraq and Afghanistan who became victims of violence perpetrated by the United States and its allies as it lashed out in response to the events of September 11th.

The tragedy of yesterday's museum opening is manifested in the fact that while the deaths of the 9/11 victims are being remembered in the U.S. by the opening of a memorial that cost over $700 million to build, totally forgotten is the reality of the many hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi and Afghani men, women and children who died as a direct result of America's "war on terror", a war which was justified in the name of those who were killed on 9/11.

These are innocent victims who have no national memorials and are only remembered in the hearts and minds of their family members. Their deaths and life changing injuries are not and will not be an occasion for mass media events, museums or memorials. There will be no heartfelt speeches about them by political leaders. And the public will not see their photograph on a commemorative wall or hear the voices of their family members describing their tragic last moments of life. And there will be few in the United States or other western countries that will remember their faces let alone mourn for them.

It is conservatively estimated that the American-led efforts to combat terrorism has directly resulted in the deaths of over 500,000 people in Iraq alone, created approximately 4.5 million refugees in the countires where the U.S. has launched military actions, and has cost the American government more than $6 trillion. And this cumulative body count does not include those who have died due to the suffering caused by the destruction of civilian infrastructure (i.e. hospitals, water/sewage treatment facilities, power generation plants, etc.).

The solemnity of the New York City event was punctuated by the fact that it was attended by President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle. Also in attendance was a who's who of political heavy weights, including former president Bill Clinton and former secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, current New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, former mayors Michael Bloomberg and Rudy Giuliani, and former New York governor George Pataki. In addition to the political celebrities in attendance were many family members of 9/11 victims as well as some of those who survived the collapse of the twin towers.

In his remarks during the opening ceremonies President Obama said that the "sacred place of healing and hope" will ensure that "generations yet unborn will never forget" the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil.

It is unlikely that what happened on 9/11 will ever forgotten given how the events of that day were seared into the memories of millions of people in the United States and hundreds of millions around the world by the media, by the volumes of academic research that has been devoted to this single act of terrorism over the 12 years since the event, and because of the geopolitical actions undertaken by the U.S. government in the aftermath of the attacks.

Yes, yesterday was a solemn day in New York City, and the September 11th attacks and their victims should be remembered. But we in the West also need to remember the hundreds of thousands if not millions of people who have been killed and maimed (directly and indirectly) because of the so-called ‟war on terror”.

We need to remember the face of Ali Ismail Abbas, a 12 year old Iraqi boy, who lost his limbs as well as his parents and extended family when his family home was ‟accidentally” bombed by U.S. forces in 2004.

We need to remember the scores of people killed in a wedding party (including women and children) in southern Afghanistan in 2002 when the celebration in their village was bombed because military analysts incorrectly thought it was a gathering of Taliban insurgents.

And we need to acknowledge the physical and psychological trauma suffered by hundreds of thousands of families in Iraq, Afghanistan and other countries who mourn their dead outside of the media spotlight, without multi-million dollar memorials commemorating their dead, and out of the minds of vast majority of people in the west who don't give a second thought to the innocent victims that have died and suffered, victims who are not memorialized in a museum in New York City. Only if we do that can we legitimately claim the right to our belief that we are a compassionate, caring and civilized society.

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Friday, May 16, 2014

9-11 Museum Opening Ceremonies Silent on the Hundreds of Thousands Killed by America's "War On Terror"