After calling on the Americans to show unity as the country marked the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks, United States President Joe Biden made stops at all the three sites. The attacks had killed nearly 3,000 people on the dreadful day. &nbsp;

Biden, as well as ex-presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, along with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived at Ground Zero in New York City to attend the memorial. First lady Jill Biden and former First Lady Michelle Obama are also present, as is Senate Majority Leader and New York Senator Chuck Schumer&nbsp;and New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy.

Watch:&nbsp;Pentagon illuminates tower of light on 20th anniversary of 9/11 terror attacks

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Joe Biden will be joined at Ground Zero in New York by former president Barack Obama, whom he served for two terms as vice-president. &nbsp;

Speaking in a six-minute recording at the White House that was shared on the official Twitter handle on Friday, Biden said, “To me, that’s the central lesson of September 11. It’s that at our most vulnerable, in the push and pull of all that makes us human, in the battle for the soul of America, unity is our greatest strength.” &nbsp;

Also Read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/sister-of-deceased-fireman-and-911-victim-fight-for-justice-in-guantanamo-412278" hreflang="en">Sister of deceased fireman and 9/11 victim fight for justice in Guantanamo</a>

Under tight security, a solemn ceremony to mark the anniversary of the attacks has got under way in New York on Saturday.&nbsp;A marching band launched the beginning of the service at Ground Zero.

Small memorial ceremonies are being held across the US, and millions are expected to tune in to coverage that will blanket the TV networks throughout the day. &nbsp;

There will be six moments of silence during the ceremony, marking the moment each tower was struck and the time each fell, as well as the moment when the Pentagon was attacked, and the time that Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania after passengers stopped it from reaching its likely intended target of the US Capitol. &nbsp;

(With inputs from agencies)&nbsp;

After calling on the Americans to show unity as the country marked the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks, United States President Joe Biden made stops at all the three sites.

After calling on the Americans to show unity as the country marked the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks, United States President Joe Biden made stops at all the three sites. The attacks had killed nearly 3,000 people on the dreadful day. Biden, as well as ex-presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton, along with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton arrived at Ground Zero in New York City to attend the memorial. First lady Jill Biden and former First Lady Michelle Obama are also present, as is Senate Majority Leader and New York Senator Chuck Schumer and New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy. Watch: Pentagon illuminates tower of light on 20th anniversary of 9/11 terror attacks × Joe Biden will be joined at Ground Zero in New York by former president Barack Obama, whom he served for two terms as vice-president. Speaking in a six-minute recording at the White House that was shared on the official Twitter handle on Friday, Biden said, “To me, that’s the central lesson of September 11. It’s that at our most vulnerable, in the push and pull of all that makes us human, in the battle for the soul of America, unity is our greatest strength.” Also Read: Sister of deceased fireman and 9/11 victim fight for justice in Guantanamo Under tight security, a solemn ceremony to mark the anniversary of the attacks has got under way in New York on Saturday. A marching band launched the beginning of the service at Ground Zero. Small memorial ceremonies are being held across the US, and millions are expected to tune in to coverage that will blanket the TV networks throughout the day. There will be six moments of silence during the ceremony, marking the moment each tower was struck and the time each fell, as well as the moment when the Pentagon was attacked, and the time that Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania after passengers stopped it from reaching its likely intended target of the US Capitol. (With inputs from agencies)

9/11 anniversary: President Biden makes stops at all three attack sites

US President Joe Biden says that the 20th anniversary of 9/11 terror attacks have brought back painful memories. Meanwhile, at the three memorial sites, families and friends have gathered to pay tributes to the 3000 people who were killed on that fateful day.

US marks 20 years of 9/11 attack; family and friends unite to pay respect

It is going to be 20 years since the world suffered a devastating loss in the US on September 11 as a terrorist-controlled aircraft struck the famous World Trade Center. Now, two decades later, the fear caused by those horrifying attacks still continues to haunt several people living in the US, a study claims.

How 9/11 Permanently Altered Lives of Americans

When Americans honor the nearly 3,000 killed in the September 11, 2001 Al-Qaeda attacks on the 20th anniversary on Saturday, a grim shadow will lurk in the background, that of attacks mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who has yet to be tried and convicted for the heinous crime.&nbsp;

Mohammed, who boasted to interrogators of designing and managing the 9/11 plot&nbsp;sits in a cell in a high-security camp on the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.&nbsp;

He has been here for 15 years, as the attempt to hold him accountable in a US military war court plods on in fits and starts, stuck on whether his being tortured by the CIA renders his boastful confessions inadmissible.

He remains, after the now-dead Osama Bin Laden, the most reviled figure tied to the 9/11 attacks.&nbsp;

Ali Soufan, a former FBI agent who investigated the attacks, calls Mohammed a "wild-eyed killer" whose "demented" plotting set him apart from others in Al-Qaeda.

Imagination and managerial skills

Most people know him by the photograph taken of his capture, his thick body clothed in a nightshirt, wearing a thick moustache and disheveled hair.&nbsp;

Appearing in the Guantanamo military courtroom for the first time in over 18 months this week, Mohammed was thinner, with a long, greying red-dyed beard, wearing more traditional Pakistani dress.

He walked in easily, chatting with a fellow defendant in the death-penalty case, and knelt on a small carpet between the tables for prayers.&nbsp;

The official 9/11 Commission report and a Senate report about the CIA's torture program describe the 56-year-old "KSM" as a capable and bloodthirsty lieutenant of bin Laden.

A Pakistani citizen, he was raised in Kuwait. He learned English well enough to study mechanical engineering at a US university.&nbsp;

By the time he graduated in 1986, he was already a Muslim hard-liner.&nbsp;

Working for the Qatar government in the early 1990s, Mohammed appears to have been inspired to action by a nephew, Ramzi Yousef, who undertook the bombing of New York's World Trade Center in 1993. After that, the two joined hands with a plan to blow up US-bound jetliners flying from the Philippines.&nbsp;

Yousef was arrested in Pakistan after the first attempt failed, while Mohammed lay low in Qatar before relocating to Pakistan in 1996 to evade a US search.

It was then that he first proposed the 9/11 attacks to bin Laden.&nbsp;

"Highly educated and equally comfortable in a government office or a terrorist safehouse, KSM applied his imagination, technical aptitude, and managerial skills to hatching and planning an extraordinary array of terrorist schemes," the 9/11 Commission report said.

Waterboarding

After the attacks, Mohammed was captured in Rawalpindi, Pakistan in March 2003 and taken by the CIA to a black site in Poland for interrogation.&nbsp;

Over four weeks, he was subjected to waterboarding 183 times, as well as to sleep deprivation, repeated slamming against a wall, "rectal rehydration," and other harsh techniques.

The Senate report described him as deeply resistant, frustrating interrogators with lies and fabrications, while giving up relatively general information.&nbsp;

But following his transfer to Guantanamo in September 2006, he proudly confessed to the military court and compared himself to George Washington, fighting to escape oppression.

"I was responsible for the 9/11 operation, from A to Z," he said.

He also claimed responsibility for 30 other operations, including Al-Qaeda-linked bombings in Bali and Kenya, and said he personally murdered the kidnapped US journalist Daniel Pearl, who was beheaded in Pakistan in 2002.

The 9/11 report called his plotting "theater, a spectacle of destruction with KSM as the self-cast star -- the superterrorist."

But the length of the proceedings may have worn him down.&nbsp;

In 2017, Mohammed's lawyers were in discussions to plead guilty in exchange for a life sentence. That deal never developed, reportedly because of opposition high in the government. &nbsp;

'Legendary figure'

In the court this week, Mohammed appeared confident and unapologetic, animatedly talking to his attorneys, defying the judge's requirement to wear a mask, and waving to two journalists in the glassed-in viewing gallery at the back of the court.

Attorneys say he almost certainly knows of the Taliban recapturing control of Afghanistan, hailed as a great victory by Al-Qaeda.

"He is definitely considered as a legendary figure and one of the masterminds behind 9/11," Tore Hamming, a Danish specialist on militant Islam, told AFP.

"That said, it is not like KSM is often discussed, but occasionally he features in written and visual productions," he added.

When Americans honor the nearly 3,000 killed in the September 11, 2001 Al-Qaeda attacks on the 20th anniversary on Saturday, a grim shadow will lurk in the background, that of attacks mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who has yet to be tried and convicted for the heinous crime.

When Americans honor the nearly 3,000 killed in the September 11, 2001 Al-Qaeda attacks on the 20th anniversary on Saturday, a grim shadow will lurk in the background, that of attacks mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who has yet to be tried and convicted for the heinous crime. Mohammed, who boasted to interrogators of designing and managing the 9/11 plot sits in a cell in a high-security camp on the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He has been here for 15 years, as the attempt to hold him accountable in a US military war court plods on in fits and starts, stuck on whether his being tortured by the CIA renders his boastful confessions inadmissible. He remains, after the now-dead Osama Bin Laden, the most reviled figure tied to the 9/11 attacks. Ali Soufan, a former FBI agent who investigated the attacks, calls Mohammed a "wild-eyed killer" whose "demented" plotting set him apart from others in Al-Qaeda. Imagination and managerial skills Most people know him by the photograph taken of his capture, his thick body clothed in a nightshirt, wearing a thick moustache and disheveled hair. Appearing in the Guantanamo military courtroom for the first time in over 18 months this week, Mohammed was thinner, with a long, greying red-dyed beard, wearing more traditional Pakistani dress. He walked in easily, chatting with a fellow defendant in the death-penalty case, and knelt on a small carpet between the tables for prayers. The official 9/11 Commission report and a Senate report about the CIA's torture program describe the 56-year-old "KSM" as a capable and bloodthirsty lieutenant of bin Laden. A Pakistani citizen, he was raised in Kuwait. He learned English well enough to study mechanical engineering at a US university. By the time he graduated in 1986, he was already a Muslim hard-liner. Working for the Qatar government in the early 1990s, Mohammed appears to have been inspired to action by a nephew, Ramzi Yousef, who undertook the bombing of New York's World Trade Center in 1993. After that, the two joined hands with a plan to blow up US-bound jetliners flying from the Philippines. Yousef was arrested in Pakistan after the first attempt failed, while Mohammed lay low in Qatar before relocating to Pakistan in 1996 to evade a US search. It was then that he first proposed the 9/11 attacks to bin Laden. "Highly educated and equally comfortable in a government office or a terrorist safehouse, KSM applied his imagination, technical aptitude, and managerial skills to hatching and planning an extraordinary array of terrorist schemes," the 9/11 Commission report said. Waterboarding After the attacks, Mohammed was captured in Rawalpindi, Pakistan in March 2003 and taken by the CIA to a black site in Poland for interrogation. Over four weeks, he was subjected to waterboarding 183 times, as well as to sleep deprivation, repeated slamming against a wall, "rectal rehydration," and other harsh techniques. The Senate report described him as deeply resistant, frustrating interrogators with lies and fabrications, while giving up relatively general information. But following his transfer to Guantanamo in September 2006, he proudly confessed to the military court and compared himself to George Washington, fighting to escape oppression. "I was responsible for the 9/11 operation, from A to Z," he said. He also claimed responsibility for 30 other operations, including Al-Qaeda-linked bombings in Bali and Kenya, and said he personally murdered the kidnapped US journalist Daniel Pearl, who was beheaded in Pakistan in 2002. The 9/11 report called his plotting "theater, a spectacle of destruction with KSM as the self-cast star -- the superterrorist." But the length of the proceedings may have worn him down. In 2017, Mohammed's lawyers were in discussions to plead guilty in exchange for a life sentence. That deal never developed, reportedly because of opposition high in the government. 'Legendary figure' In the court this week, Mohammed appeared confident and unapologetic, animatedly talking to his attorneys, defying the judge's requirement to wear a mask, and waving to two journalists in the glassed-in viewing gallery at the back of the court. Attorneys say he almost certainly knows of the Taliban recapturing control of Afghanistan, hailed as a great victory by Al-Qaeda. "He is definitely considered as a legendary figure and one of the masterminds behind 9/11," Tore Hamming, a Danish specialist on militant Islam, told AFP. "That said, it is not like KSM is often discussed, but occasionally he features in written and visual productions," he added.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed: the defiant 'mass murderer' of 9/11

When hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Centre in the United States, Afghans were still reeling from their own Al-Qaeda tragedy.&nbsp;

Militants from the group had two days earlier assassinated Ahmad Shah Massoud -- the resistance icon who repelled both the Soviet military and the Taliban from his native Panjshir Valley.

As Afghans grappled with his death, events were unfolding in the United States that were to dramatically change the course of their country's future.&nbsp;

But for some, the significance of the incident passed them by.

"That evening I listened to the news... there was talk of an attack in America," Abdul Rahman, a retired government employee who was in his twenties at the time, told AFP.

"I didn't care because there was always talk of attacks and war on the radio," he said.&nbsp;

In the coming days, however, as Afghans learnt that Al-Qaeda militants hiding in their own backyard had masterminded the attacks -- and their Taliban rulers were blamed for sheltering the group -- many realised their world was about to be transformed.

"I did not think America would attack Afghanistan in revenge," said Abdul Rahman. "I thought America was very far away."

Abdul Samad, a librarian in Kandahar, remembers seeing crowds gather around a newspaper stand, the pages covered with images of the twin towers attack.

"It was almost two days after the incident," he told AFP.

It was, however, the beginning of an "unacceptable occupation".

"They had sought an excuse to come to Afghanistan. It was an excuse to occupy this land."

When the Taliban refused to give up Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the US moved in -- overthrowing the hardline regime which had held power since 1996 in a matter of weeks.&nbsp;

But Qiyamuddin, a locksmith from Kandahar, said any hope he had of the American-led invasion healing decades of war and conflict in Afghanistan quickly evaporated.&nbsp;

"They made a mess by coming here,” he told AFP.

As the war dragged on and the Taliban resurfaced, foreign troops were accused of disrespecting Afghan religion and traditions -- and civilian casualties mounted.&nbsp;

"People were optimistic and (Afghan) refugees from other countries like Pakistan and Iran came back," said Qiyamuddin.&nbsp;

"They were unaware we were going to face more troubles."

Noorullah, a teacher, remembers watching news of the attack on a TV hidden in the basement of a relative's house -- the Taliban had banned the medium as un-Islamic.&nbsp;

"It looked horrible. They were repeatedly showing the towers on fire," he said

A brief period of peace followed after the Taliban were ejected, but it would not last.

"When the Taliban were gone, people were happy, they could at least breathe freedom," he said.

But as time passed, he "started to believe the US had come to a wrong place. It was a trap for them".&nbsp;

"And 20 years later... I was right," he told AFP.

"The Taliban are back. The same people, faces and attitude are back."

When hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Centre in the United States, Afghans were still reeling from their own Al-Qaeda tragedy. Militants from the group had two days earlier assassinated Ahmad Shah Massoud -- the resistance icon who repelled both the Soviet military and the Taliban from his native Panjshir Valley.

When hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Centre in the United States, Afghans were still reeling from their own Al-Qaeda tragedy. Militants from the group had two days earlier assassinated Ahmad Shah Massoud -- the resistance icon who repelled both the Soviet military and the Taliban from his native Panjshir Valley. As Afghans grappled with his death, events were unfolding in the United States that were to dramatically change the course of their country's future. But for some, the significance of the incident passed them by. "That evening I listened to the news... there was talk of an attack in America," Abdul Rahman, a retired government employee who was in his twenties at the time, told AFP. "I didn't care because there was always talk of attacks and war on the radio," he said. In the coming days, however, as Afghans learnt that Al-Qaeda militants hiding in their own backyard had masterminded the attacks -- and their Taliban rulers were blamed for sheltering the group -- many realised their world was about to be transformed. "I did not think America would attack Afghanistan in revenge," said Abdul Rahman. "I thought America was very far away." Abdul Samad, a librarian in Kandahar, remembers seeing crowds gather around a newspaper stand, the pages covered with images of the twin towers attack. "It was almost two days after the incident," he told AFP. It was, however, the beginning of an "unacceptable occupation". "They had sought an excuse to come to Afghanistan. It was an excuse to occupy this land." When the Taliban refused to give up Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the US moved in -- overthrowing the hardline regime which had held power since 1996 in a matter of weeks. But Qiyamuddin, a locksmith from Kandahar, said any hope he had of the American-led invasion healing decades of war and conflict in Afghanistan quickly evaporated. "They made a mess by coming here,” he told AFP. As the war dragged on and the Taliban resurfaced, foreign troops were accused of disrespecting Afghan religion and traditions -- and civilian casualties mounted. "People were optimistic and (Afghan) refugees from other countries like Pakistan and Iran came back," said Qiyamuddin. "They were unaware we were going to face more troubles." Noorullah, a teacher, remembers watching news of the attack on a TV hidden in the basement of a relative's house -- the Taliban had banned the medium as un-Islamic. "It looked horrible. They were repeatedly showing the towers on fire," he said A brief period of peace followed after the Taliban were ejected, but it would not last. "When the Taliban were gone, people were happy, they could at least breathe freedom," he said. But as time passed, he "started to believe the US had come to a wrong place. It was a trap for them". "And 20 years later... I was right," he told AFP. "The Taliban are back. The same people, faces and attitude are back."

'America was very far away': How Afghans remember 9/11

In this report, meet with a pair of some of the most extraordinary and often overlooked first responders of the 9/11 attacks. Those who helped retrieve wallets, identity cards, and other personal belongings.

The 9/11 Responders: Arborists recall the events 20 years later

The new military judge presiding over the September 11 attacks trial in Guantanamo Bay has said he would not force it toward an end -- but that he wanted to see "action" after nine years of hearings.

Air Force Colonel Matthew McCall told the military commissions court at the US navy base in Cuba, that he would not stop lawyers defending 9/11 "architect" Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others from making their case that the men were denied due process because they were tortured by the CIA.

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/photos/911-attacks-bush-administrations-big-guns-where-they-are-now-411644">In Pics:&nbsp;9/11 attacks-&nbsp;Bush administration's big guns &amp; where they are now</a>

Speaking just three days before the 20th anniversary of the Al-Qaeda attacks, he said he wanted to get moving through the long-running pretrial phase that has already gone through seven judges.

"This case has been going on a really long time," he told the attorneys, defendants, and family members of the 9/11 victims at the courtroom.

"I feel no pressure to get this case to trial," he said&nbsp;amid defense concerns of political interference.

Nevertheless, he said, "I would like to see action," to move things ahead.

The second day of hearings after an 18-month break due to the COVID-19 pandemic focused on a review of the judge's own potential biases.

Gary Sowards, one of Mohammed's attorneys, pressed McCall on his personal reaction to the September 11, 2001 attacks, his experience reviewing detainees in Iraq, and his view of the issues surrounding the high-security trial of the five.

"This is a political trial," said Sowards, saying the government has used its power to mask the CIA's torture of the five men at secret "black sites" before they arrived at Guantanamo in 2006.

"The effects of torture are always in the room," he said.

"Their big trump card is national security and state secrets," he said of the military prosecutors.

Mohammed and alleged co-conspirators Ammar al-Baluchi, Walid bin Attash, Ramzi bin al-Shibh and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, who were all in the courtroom for the second day, are accused of terrorism and mass murder of 2,976 people in the attacks.

McCall insisted he was open-minded in the case, which could result in the death penalty for defendants if convicted.

He said as a military attorney he had worked in Iraq in the 2000s reviewing cases of detainees before they were placed into the Iraqi justice system.

Most were guilty of nothing serious and deserved release, he said.

But he said he was not responsible for some who the Iraqis put to death, and others who remained in detention despite no evidence against them.

He called the death penalty "a valid option" in the 9/11 case.

He added that, given the number of death row inmates who have been shown to be innocent in the United States, a sentence of execution demands a "higher standard" of proof.

McCall said the rest of the first week of the trial resumption will involve closed conferences with attorneys on both sides, and head into substantive issues next week.

The defense has readied scores of motions to obtain classified evidence supporting their arguments that the prosecution's case is tainted by the lasting effects of torture. 
&nbsp;

The new military judge presiding over the September 11 attacks trial in Guantanamo Bay has said he would not force it toward an end -- but that he wanted to see "action" after nine years of hearings.

The new military judge presiding over the September 11 attacks trial in Guantanamo Bay has said he would not force it toward an end -- but that he wanted to see "action" after nine years of hearings. Air Force Colonel Matthew McCall told the military commissions court at the US navy base in Cuba, that he would not stop lawyers defending 9/11 "architect" Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others from making their case that the men were denied due process because they were tortured by the CIA. In Pics: 9/11 attacks- Bush administration's big guns & where they are now Speaking just three days before the 20th anniversary of the Al-Qaeda attacks, he said he wanted to get moving through the long-running pretrial phase that has already gone through seven judges. "This case has been going on a really long time," he told the attorneys, defendants, and family members of the 9/11 victims at the courtroom. "I feel no pressure to get this case to trial," he said amid defense concerns of political interference. Nevertheless, he said, "I would like to see action," to move things ahead. The second day of hearings after an 18-month break due to the COVID-19 pandemic focused on a review of the judge's own potential biases. Gary Sowards, one of Mohammed's attorneys, pressed McCall on his personal reaction to the September 11, 2001 attacks, his experience reviewing detainees in Iraq, and his view of the issues surrounding the high-security trial of the five. "This is a political trial," said Sowards, saying the government has used its power to mask the CIA's torture of the five men at secret "black sites" before they arrived at Guantanamo in 2006. "The effects of torture are always in the room," he said. "Their big trump card is national security and state secrets," he said of the military prosecutors. Mohammed and alleged co-conspirators Ammar al-Baluchi, Walid bin Attash, Ramzi bin al-Shibh and Mustafa al-Hawsawi, who were all in the courtroom for the second day, are accused of terrorism and mass murder of 2,976 people in the attacks. McCall insisted he was open-minded in the case, which could result in the death penalty for defendants if convicted. He said as a military attorney he had worked in Iraq in the 2000s reviewing cases of detainees before they were placed into the Iraqi justice system. Most were guilty of nothing serious and deserved release, he said. But he said he was not responsible for some who the Iraqis put to death, and others who remained in detention despite no evidence against them. He called the death penalty "a valid option" in the 9/11 case. He added that, given the number of death row inmates who have been shown to be innocent in the United States, a sentence of execution demands a "higher standard" of proof. McCall said the rest of the first week of the trial resumption will involve closed conferences with attorneys on both sides, and head into substantive issues next week. The defense has readied scores of motions to obtain classified evidence supporting their arguments that the prosecution's case is tainted by the lasting effects of torture.

Military judge presiding over 9/11 trial feels 'no pressure'

This Sept. 11, a diminished president will preside over a diminished nation.

We are a country that could not keep a demagogue from the White House; could not stop an insurrectionist mob from storming the Capitol; could not win (or at least avoid losing) a war against a morally and technologically retrograde enemy; cannot conquer a disease for which there are safe and effective vaccines; and cannot bring itself to trust the government, the news media, the scientific establishment, the police or any other institution meant to operate for the common good.

A civilisation “is born stoic and dies epicurean,” wrote historian Will Durant about the Babylonians. Our civilisation was born optimistic and enlightened, at least by the standards of the day. Now it feels as if it’s fading into paranoid senility.

Joe Biden was supposed to be the man of the hour: a calming presence exuding decency, moderation and trust. As a candidate, he sold himself as a transitional president, a fatherly figure in the mold of George H.W. Bush who would restore dignity and prudence to the Oval Office after the mendacity and chaos that came before. It’s why I voted for him, as did so many others who once tipped red.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/illnesses-associated-with-911-have-caused-more-deaths-than-the-attack-report-411514" hreflang="en">Illnesses associated with 9/11 have caused more deaths than the attack: Report</a>

Instead, Biden has become the emblem of the hour: headstrong but shaky, ambitious but inept. He seems to be the last person in America to realise that, whatever the theoretical merits of the decision to withdraw our remaining troops from Afghanistan, the military and intelligence assumptions on which it was built were deeply flawed, the manner in which it was executed was a national humiliation and a moral betrayal, and the timing was catastrophic.

We find ourselves commemorating the first great jihadi victory over America, in 2001, right after delivering the second great jihadi victory over America, in 2021. The Sept. 11 memorial at the World Trade Center — water cascading into one void, and then trickling, out of sight, into another — has never felt more fitting.

Now Biden proposes to follow this up with his $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill, which The Times’ Jonathan Weisman describes as “the most significant expansion of the nation’s safety net since the war on poverty in the 1960s.”

When Lyndon Johnson launched his War on Poverty, its associated legislation — from food stamps to Medicare — passed with bipartisan majorities in a lopsidedly Democratic Congress. Biden has similar ambitions without the same political means. This is not going to turn out well.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/photos/911-attacks-bush-administrations-big-guns-where-they-are-now-411644" hreflang="en">9/11 attacks: Bush administration's big guns &amp; where they are now</a>

Last week, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., published an essay in The Wall Street Journal in which he said, “I, for one, won’t support a $3.5 trillion bill, or anywhere near that level of additional spending, without greater clarity about why Congress chooses to ignore the serious effects inflation and debt have on existing government programs.”

Is the White House paying any more attention to Manchin’s message than it did to classified intelligence briefs over the summer warning of the prospect of a swift Taliban victory?

Maybe Biden supposes that the legislation, if passed, will prove increasingly popular over time, like Obamacare. That’s the optimistic scenario. Alternatively, he could suffer a legislative calamity like Hillary Clinton’s health care reform in 1994, which would have ended Bill Clinton’s presidency save for his sharp swing to the center, including ending “welfare as we know it” two years later.

Even the Obamacare/optimistic precedent was followed by a Democratic rout in 2010, when the party lost 63 House seats. If history repeats itself at the 2022 midterms, I doubt that even Joe Biden’s closest aides think he has the stamina to fight his way back in 2024. Has Kamala Harris shown the political talent to pick up the pieces?

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/videos/us-president-joe-biden-tours-hurricane-hit-areas-in-america-411607">WATCH |</a>

<div class="videoWrapper trancodeVideo"><iframe allowfullscreen="" autoplay="1" class="includeVideo" frameborder="0" height="350" src="https://www.wionews.com/videos/us-president-joe-biden-tours-hurricane-hit-areas-in-america-411607/embed" style="width:100%;max-width:560px;" width="560"></iframe></div>

Perhaps what will save the Democrats is that Biden’s weakness will tempt Donald Trump to seek (and almost certainly gain) the Republican nomination. But then there’s the chance he’d win the election.

There’s a way back from this cliff’s edge. It begins with Biden finding a way to acknowledge publicly the gravity of his administration’s blunders. The most shameful aspect of the Afghanistan withdrawal was the incompetence of the State Department when it came to expediting visas for thousands of people eligible to come to the United States. Accountability could start with Antony Blinken’s resignation.

The president might also seize the “strategic pause” Manchin has proposed and push House Democrats to pass the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill without holding it hostage to the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill. Infrastructure is far more popular with middle-of-the-road voters than the Great Society reprise that was never supposed to be a part of the Biden brand.

My sense is that Biden will do neither. The last few months have told us something worrying about this president: He’s proud, inflexible, and thinks he’s much smarter than he really is. That’s bad news for the administration. It’s worse news for a country that desperately needs to avoid another failed presidency.

This Sept. 11, a diminished president will preside over a diminished nation. We are a country that could not keep a demagogue from the White House; could not stop an insurrectionist mob from storming the Capitol; could not win (or at least avoid losing) a war against a morally and technologically retrograde enemy; cannot conquer a disease for which there are safe and effective vaccines; and cannot bring itself to trust the government, the news media, the scientific establishment, the police or any other institution meant to operate for the common good.

This Sept. 11, a diminished president will preside over a diminished nation. We are a country that could not keep a demagogue from the White House; could not stop an insurrectionist mob from storming the Capitol; could not win (or at least avoid losing) a war against a morally and technologically retrograde enemy; cannot conquer a disease for which there are safe and effective vaccines; and cannot bring itself to trust the government, the news media, the scientific establishment, the police or any other institution meant to operate for the common good. A civilisation “is born stoic and dies epicurean,” wrote historian Will Durant about the Babylonians. Our civilisation was born optimistic and enlightened, at least by the standards of the day. Now it feels as if it’s fading into paranoid senility. Joe Biden was supposed to be the man of the hour: a calming presence exuding decency, moderation and trust. As a candidate, he sold himself as a transitional president, a fatherly figure in the mold of George H.W. Bush who would restore dignity and prudence to the Oval Office after the mendacity and chaos that came before. It’s why I voted for him, as did so many others who once tipped red. Also read | Illnesses associated with 9/11 have caused more deaths than the attack: Report Instead, Biden has become the emblem of the hour: headstrong but shaky, ambitious but inept. He seems to be the last person in America to realise that, whatever the theoretical merits of the decision to withdraw our remaining troops from Afghanistan, the military and intelligence assumptions on which it was built were deeply flawed, the manner in which it was executed was a national humiliation and a moral betrayal, and the timing was catastrophic. We find ourselves commemorating the first great jihadi victory over America, in 2001, right after delivering the second great jihadi victory over America, in 2021. The Sept. 11 memorial at the World Trade Center — water cascading into one void, and then trickling, out of sight, into another — has never felt more fitting. Now Biden proposes to follow this up with his $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill, which The Times’ Jonathan Weisman describes as “the most significant expansion of the nation’s safety net since the war on poverty in the 1960s.” When Lyndon Johnson launched his War on Poverty, its associated legislation — from food stamps to Medicare — passed with bipartisan majorities in a lopsidedly Democratic Congress. Biden has similar ambitions without the same political means. This is not going to turn out well. Also read | 9/11 attacks: Bush administration's big guns & where they are now Last week, Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., published an essay in The Wall Street Journal in which he said, “I, for one, won’t support a $3.5 trillion bill, or anywhere near that level of additional spending, without greater clarity about why Congress chooses to ignore the serious effects inflation and debt have on existing government programs.” Is the White House paying any more attention to Manchin’s message than it did to classified intelligence briefs over the summer warning of the prospect of a swift Taliban victory? Maybe Biden supposes that the legislation, if passed, will prove increasingly popular over time, like Obamacare. That’s the optimistic scenario. Alternatively, he could suffer a legislative calamity like Hillary Clinton’s health care reform in 1994, which would have ended Bill Clinton’s presidency save for his sharp swing to the center, including ending “welfare as we know it” two years later. Even the Obamacare/optimistic precedent was followed by a Democratic rout in 2010, when the party lost 63 House seats. If history repeats itself at the 2022 midterms, I doubt that even Joe Biden’s closest aides think he has the stamina to fight his way back in 2024. Has Kamala Harris shown the political talent to pick up the pieces? WATCH | Perhaps what will save the Democrats is that Biden’s weakness will tempt Donald Trump to seek (and almost certainly gain) the Republican nomination. But then there’s the chance he’d win the election. There’s a way back from this cliff’s edge. It begins with Biden finding a way to acknowledge publicly the gravity of his administration’s blunders. The most shameful aspect of the Afghanistan withdrawal was the incompetence of the State Department when it came to expediting visas for thousands of people eligible to come to the United States. Accountability could start with Antony Blinken’s resignation. The president might also seize the “strategic pause” Manchin has proposed and push House Democrats to pass the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill without holding it hostage to the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill. Infrastructure is far more popular with middle-of-the-road voters than the Great Society reprise that was never supposed to be a part of the Biden brand. My sense is that Biden will do neither. The last few months have told us something worrying about this president: He’s proud, inflexible, and thinks he’s much smarter than he really is. That’s bad news for the administration. It’s worse news for a country that desperately needs to avoid another failed presidency.

Can Biden save his presidency?

The remains of two more victims of 9/11 have been identified, thanks to advanced DNA technology, New York officials announced Tuesday, just days before the 20th anniversary of the attacks.

The office of the city's chief medical examiner said it had formally identified the 1,646th and 1,647th victim of the al-Qaeda attacks on New York's Twin Towers which killed 2,753 people.

They are the first identifications of victims from the collapse of the World Trade Center since October 2019.

"Twenty years ago, we made a promise to the families of World Trade Center victims to do whatever it takes for as long as it takes to identify their loved ones, and with these two new identifications, we continue to fulfill that sacred obligation," chief medical examiner Barbara Sampson said in a statement.

"No matter how much time passes since September 11, 2001, we will never forget, and we pledge to use all the tools at our disposal to make sure all those who were lost can be reunited with their families," she added.

The 1,646th victim was identified as Dorothy Morgan, of Hempstead, Long Island. Her identity was confirmed through DNA testing of remains recovered in 2001, the examiner's office said.

The other identification was a man whose name is being withheld at the request of his family. His identification was confirmed through DNA testing of remains recovered in 2001, 2002 and 2006, the statement added.

The medical examiner described the painstaking push to identify every victim as "the largest and most complex forensic investigation in the history of the United States."

The office said new identifications 20 years after the tragedy were being made possible by advances in DNA science.

Its laboratory uses advanced testing to match DNA fragments from victims with samples provided by relatives.

The medical examiner's office said its recent adoption of next-generation DNA sequencing technology meant further identifications were likely.

Some 1,106 victims, or 40 percent of those who died, remain unidentified.

The remains of two more victims of 9/11 have been identified, thanks to advanced DNA technology, New York officials announced Tuesday, just days before the 20th anniversary of the attacks.

The remains of two more victims of 9/11 have been identified, thanks to advanced DNA technology, New York officials announced Tuesday, just days before the 20th anniversary of the attacks. The office of the city's chief medical examiner said it had formally identified the 1,646th and 1,647th victim of the al-Qaeda attacks on New York's Twin Towers which killed 2,753 people. They are the first identifications of victims from the collapse of the World Trade Center since October 2019. "Twenty years ago, we made a promise to the families of World Trade Center victims to do whatever it takes for as long as it takes to identify their loved ones, and with these two new identifications, we continue to fulfill that sacred obligation," chief medical examiner Barbara Sampson said in a statement. "No matter how much time passes since September 11, 2001, we will never forget, and we pledge to use all the tools at our disposal to make sure all those who were lost can be reunited with their families," she added. The 1,646th victim was identified as Dorothy Morgan, of Hempstead, Long Island. Her identity was confirmed through DNA testing of remains recovered in 2001, the examiner's office said. The other identification was a man whose name is being withheld at the request of his family. His identification was confirmed through DNA testing of remains recovered in 2001, 2002 and 2006, the statement added. The medical examiner described the painstaking push to identify every victim as "the largest and most complex forensic investigation in the history of the United States." The office said new identifications 20 years after the tragedy were being made possible by advances in DNA science. Its laboratory uses advanced testing to match DNA fragments from victims with samples provided by relatives. The medical examiner's office said its recent adoption of next-generation DNA sequencing technology meant further identifications were likely. Some 1,106 victims, or 40 percent of those who died, remain unidentified.

Two more victims of 9/11 attacks identified

At least 22,000 civilians— and potentially over 40,000 civilians—have been killed by US-led drone and airstrikes across West Asia and Africa since the 9/11 terror attacks, according to an analysis done by UK-based monitoring group, Airwars.

Basing its findings on the declaration made by the US that it launched at least 91,340 strikes across seven major conflict zones, including Yemen, Somalia, Pakistan and Libya, the London-based group sought to find the number of civilian casualties linked to the ‘forever wars’, spanning two decades of conflict which formally ended on August 31 with the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan.

Based on that total, Airwars concluded “US actions likely killed at least 22,679 civilians, with that number potentially as high as 48,308”.

According to research compiled by Airwars, the deadliest year in the past two decades for civilian victims of US airstrikes was 2003 when a minimum of 5,529 civilians were reported to have been killed, almost all during the invasion of Iraq that year.

Also read |<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/is-911-a-day-or-is-it-an-era-411151">&nbsp;Is 9/11 a day, or is it an Era?</a>

The next deadliest year was 2017 when at least 4,931 civilians were likely killed, the vast majority in coalition&nbsp;bombing of Iraq and Syria.

Since taking the office, Joe Biden—the fourth to manage the “forever wars” after his predecessors George W Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump—promised to reduce US reliance on airstrikes amid a formal review of the government's drone policy.&nbsp;

“The threat from terrorism continues, but it’s changed. Our strategy needs to change too,” Biden said, vowing action against the Daesh branch in Afghanistan (Daesh-K) after the group claimed responsibility for the August 26 attack at Kabul airport that killed over 160 Afghan civilians and 13 US service members.

The US military has not provided the official estimates of civilian deaths nor have they published such findings. Airwaves cited&nbsp;its data from sources like the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, The Iraq Body Count NGO and The Nation.

(With&nbsp;inputs from agencies)

At least 22,000 civilians— and potentially over 40,000 civilians—have been killed by US-led drone and airstrikes across West Asia and Africa since the 9/11 terror attacks, according to an analysis done by UK-based monitoring group, Airwars.

At least 22,000 civilians— and potentially over 40,000 civilians—have been killed by US-led drone and airstrikes across West Asia and Africa since the 9/11 terror attacks, according to an analysis done by UK-based monitoring group, Airwars. Basing its findings on the declaration made by the US that it launched at least 91,340 strikes across seven major conflict zones, including Yemen, Somalia, Pakistan and Libya, the London-based group sought to find the number of civilian casualties linked to the ‘forever wars’, spanning two decades of conflict which formally ended on August 31 with the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. Based on that total, Airwars concluded “US actions likely killed at least 22,679 civilians, with that number potentially as high as 48,308”. According to research compiled by Airwars, the deadliest year in the past two decades for civilian victims of US airstrikes was 2003 when a minimum of 5,529 civilians were reported to have been killed, almost all during the invasion of Iraq that year. Also read | Is 9/11 a day, or is it an Era? The next deadliest year was 2017 when at least 4,931 civilians were likely killed, the vast majority in coalition bombing of Iraq and Syria. Since taking the office, Joe Biden—the fourth to manage the “forever wars” after his predecessors George W Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump—promised to reduce US reliance on airstrikes amid a formal review of the government's drone policy. “The threat from terrorism continues, but it’s changed. Our strategy needs to change too,” Biden said, vowing action against the Daesh branch in Afghanistan (Daesh-K) after the group claimed responsibility for the August 26 attack at Kabul airport that killed over 160 Afghan civilians and 13 US service members. The US military has not provided the official estimates of civilian deaths nor have they published such findings. Airwaves cited its data from sources like the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, The Iraq Body Count NGO and The Nation. (With inputs from agencies)

US airstrikes potentially killed over 40,000 civilians since 9/11, says report

Lucelly Gil is one of the forgotten victims of 9/11: an immigrant cleaner who spent months clearing up rubble from the World Trade Center and developed cancer apparently from the toxic dust, but who remains unrecognized. 
At 7:00 am on September 15, 2001, the Colombian entered the immense ash cloud left by the collapse of the Twin Towers in New York. She would collect debris there for up to 12 hours a day, every day, for six months.

Twenty years later, the 65-year-old is still a undocumented migrant and lives with the consequences of that herculean effort: she is a breast cancer survivor, a common illness for women who worked at the site, has lost movement in one arm and suffers depression.

For eight months after the attacks, tens of thousands of people -- many of them immigrants -- cleaned Ground Zero and nearby damaged buildings.

They removed 1.8 million tons of rubble from the area and were paid between $7.50 and $10 an hour, just above the minimum wage at the time.

They didn't know it then but the exposure to asbestos and other toxic materials brought the risk of cancer, asbestosis and a host of respiratory illnesses, as well as post-traumatic stress, anxiety and depression.

"I don't like to remember Ground Zero anniversaries," Gil said tearfully at a recent session of the 9/11 Latino cleaners support group Fronteras de Esperanza, or Borders of Hope, which still meets two decades on.

She remembers that after working so many hours, sometimes finding human remains, she would go home and thought she was still cleaning.

"I almost freaked out," Gil recalled.

'Injustice'

Gil, like all the cleaners spoken to by AFP, cannot work because of illnesses believed to be derived from the 9/11 operation. They dream of becoming legal residents so they can receive benefits and live without the threat of deportation.

In 2017, a then-Democratic representative from New York even introduced a bill regarding this but it was never debated in Congress.

"That the people who cleaned do not have papers is an injustice because they lost the most precious thing, which is health," Rubiela Arias, another cleaner, told AFP in the modest room she rents in Queens with the help of her son.

The now 57-year-old Colombian has been fighting for years for the Hispanic cleaners to be legally recognized.

She herself was at the site and has since suffered from various respiratory and stomach illnesses, as well as post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental ailments.

More than 2,000 cleaners, rescuers and police officers died from illnesses linked to 9/11, according to the federal victims' compensation fund.

Many undocumented cleaners, including some who were ill, have been deported in recent years, according to social worker Rosa Bramble, who has led Fronteras de Esperanza on a voluntary basis since 2010 from her office in Queens.

Others returned to their countries to die, because they were sick and could not work to support themselves. 
"Here they couldn't pay rent," said Bramble, a professor at Columbia University and who is of Venezuelan origin.

Most of the 9/11 cleaners have full medical coverage through the World Trade Center's federal health program, but many have not received compensation for their illnesses.

That is the experience of Franklin, a 50-year-old undocumented Peruvian cleaner with various respiratory ailments who decided to return from New York to Lima in 2019 to say goodbye to his ill mother, whom he had not seen for two decades.

Financial hardships

When he tried to return to the United States to take up the medical treatment guaranteed by the WTC health program in which he had been accepted -- and to claim financial compensation -- the US embassy in Lima denied him a visa.

In June he twice tried to cross the border between Mexico and the United States illegally with the help of traffickers, but was deported to Mexico both times.

"I practically gave my life to clean Ground Zero and I don't think it is fair that they are repaying me this way," he told AFP by phone from Juarez city where the traffickers kept him before his third attempt, which was successful.

Some workers who sued New York City and the companies that employed them were able to get compensation. Additionally, in 2011, Congress approved maximum payments of $250,000 for a cancer linked to 9/11. 
Gil received $40,000 in 2018, but without being able to work, the money quickly ran out.

"We as Latinos were discriminated against in relation to the other workers on 9/11," she said. 
Rosa Duque, a 56-year-old Guatemalan cleaner who has difficulty breathing, says the cleaners are "in oblivion" and must be given permanent residency.

"When we volunteered to go to work they didn't ask, 'Are you a citizen?' 'Are you a resident?'" she said.

Lucelly Gil is one of the forgotten victims of 9/11: an immigrant cleaner who spent months clearing up rubble from the World Trade Center and developed cancer apparently from the toxic dust, but who remains unrecognized.

Lucelly Gil is one of the forgotten victims of 9/11: an immigrant cleaner who spent months clearing up rubble from the World Trade Center and developed cancer apparently from the toxic dust, but who remains unrecognized. At 7:00 am on September 15, 2001, the Colombian entered the immense ash cloud left by the collapse of the Twin Towers in New York. She would collect debris there for up to 12 hours a day, every day, for six months. Twenty years later, the 65-year-old is still a undocumented migrant and lives with the consequences of that herculean effort: she is a breast cancer survivor, a common illness for women who worked at the site, has lost movement in one arm and suffers depression. For eight months after the attacks, tens of thousands of people -- many of them immigrants -- cleaned Ground Zero and nearby damaged buildings. They removed 1.8 million tons of rubble from the area and were paid between $7.50 and $10 an hour, just above the minimum wage at the time. They didn't know it then but the exposure to asbestos and other toxic materials brought the risk of cancer, asbestosis and a host of respiratory illnesses, as well as post-traumatic stress, anxiety and depression. "I don't like to remember Ground Zero anniversaries," Gil said tearfully at a recent session of the 9/11 Latino cleaners support group Fronteras de Esperanza, or Borders of Hope, which still meets two decades on. She remembers that after working so many hours, sometimes finding human remains, she would go home and thought she was still cleaning. "I almost freaked out," Gil recalled. 'Injustice' Gil, like all the cleaners spoken to by AFP, cannot work because of illnesses believed to be derived from the 9/11 operation. They dream of becoming legal residents so they can receive benefits and live without the threat of deportation. In 2017, a then-Democratic representative from New York even introduced a bill regarding this but it was never debated in Congress. "That the people who cleaned do not have papers is an injustice because they lost the most precious thing, which is health," Rubiela Arias, another cleaner, told AFP in the modest room she rents in Queens with the help of her son. The now 57-year-old Colombian has been fighting for years for the Hispanic cleaners to be legally recognized. She herself was at the site and has since suffered from various respiratory and stomach illnesses, as well as post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental ailments. More than 2,000 cleaners, rescuers and police officers died from illnesses linked to 9/11, according to the federal victims' compensation fund. Many undocumented cleaners, including some who were ill, have been deported in recent years, according to social worker Rosa Bramble, who has led Fronteras de Esperanza on a voluntary basis since 2010 from her office in Queens. Others returned to their countries to die, because they were sick and could not work to support themselves. "Here they couldn't pay rent," said Bramble, a professor at Columbia University and who is of Venezuelan origin. Most of the 9/11 cleaners have full medical coverage through the World Trade Center's federal health program, but many have not received compensation for their illnesses. That is the experience of Franklin, a 50-year-old undocumented Peruvian cleaner with various respiratory ailments who decided to return from New York to Lima in 2019 to say goodbye to his ill mother, whom he had not seen for two decades. Financial hardships When he tried to return to the United States to take up the medical treatment guaranteed by the WTC health program in which he had been accepted -- and to claim financial compensation -- the US embassy in Lima denied him a visa. In June he twice tried to cross the border between Mexico and the United States illegally with the help of traffickers, but was deported to Mexico both times. "I practically gave my life to clean Ground Zero and I don't think it is fair that they are repaying me this way," he told AFP by phone from Juarez city where the traffickers kept him before his third attempt, which was successful. Some workers who sued New York City and the companies that employed them were able to get compensation. Additionally, in 2011, Congress approved maximum payments of $250,000 for a cancer linked to 9/11. Gil received $40,000 in 2018, but without being able to work, the money quickly ran out. "We as Latinos were discriminated against in relation to the other workers on 9/11," she said. Rosa Duque, a 56-year-old Guatemalan cleaner who has difficulty breathing, says the cleaners are "in oblivion" and must be given permanent residency. "When we volunteered to go to work they didn't ask, 'Are you a citizen?' 'Are you a resident?'" she said.

9/11: Ground Zero's forgotten migrant cleaners demand recognition

United States former president Donald Trump would spend the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks by hosting a boxing commentary in Florida.

He will be joined by his son Donald Trump Jr&nbsp;at the Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood to call the entire four-fight telecast between Evander Holyfield and Vitor Belfort.

“I love great fighters and great fights,” the Trump Sr, a former boxing promoter, said in a statement.

“I look forward to seeing both this Saturday night and sharing my thoughts ringside. You won't want to miss this special event,” he added.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/two-decades-after-911-muslim-americans-still-fighting-bias-411376">Two decades after 9/11, Muslim Americans still fighting bias</a>

The event has been termed as “the most anticipated heavyweight fight of the year”, with the father-son duo calling the entire telecast.

Trump’ controversial term came to an end in January after Joe Biden won the mandate. Since leaving the office, he has not made any public appearances.

He was also permanently suspended from Twitter after his claims of an “election fraud” was called out for spreading fake news.

75-year-old Trump is a veteran of the fighting game, having hosted many boxing matches in the 1980s and '90s at his casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey.

Prior to his single-term presidency, Trump styled himself as a business adviser to Mike Tyson and promoted a handful of the world’s biggest fights and names in the late 1980s and early 90s.

(With inputs from agencies)

United States former president Donald Trump would spend the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks by hosting a boxing commentary in Florida. He will be joined by his son Donald Trump Jr at the Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood to call the entire four-fight telecast between Evander Holyfield and Vitor Belfort.

United States former president Donald Trump would spend the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks by hosting a boxing commentary in Florida. He will be joined by his son Donald Trump Jr at the Hard Rock Casino in Hollywood to call the entire four-fight telecast between Evander Holyfield and Vitor Belfort. “I love great fighters and great fights,” the Trump Sr, a former boxing promoter, said in a statement. “I look forward to seeing both this Saturday night and sharing my thoughts ringside. You won't want to miss this special event,” he added. Also read | Two decades after 9/11, Muslim Americans still fighting bias The event has been termed as “the most anticipated heavyweight fight of the year”, with the father-son duo calling the entire telecast. Trump’ controversial term came to an end in January after Joe Biden won the mandate. Since leaving the office, he has not made any public appearances. He was also permanently suspended from Twitter after his claims of an “election fraud” was called out for spreading fake news. 75-year-old Trump is a veteran of the fighting game, having hosted many boxing matches in the 1980s and '90s at his casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Prior to his single-term presidency, Trump styled himself as a business adviser to Mike Tyson and promoted a handful of the world’s biggest fights and names in the late 1980s and early 90s. (With inputs from agencies)

Donald Trump to offer commentary on boxing match on 20th anniversary of 9/11 attacks

The prosecution of alleged September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others restarts Tuesday, just days before the 20th anniversary of the attacks, stirring new hopes for justice and retribution.

Mohammed and his co-defendants, who have been locked up at the "War on Terror" prison at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba for nearly 15 years, will appear in the military tribunal here for the first time since early 2019.&nbsp;

But after a 17-month halt due to the coronavirus pandemic, the proceedings appear likely to continue where they left off, mired in the defense's efforts to disqualify most of the government's evidence as tainted by the torture the defendants underwent in CIA custody.

On Sunday, the new military judge, Air Force Colonel Matthew McCall &nbsp;-- the case's eighth -- signaled a slow start, deciding that an initial hearing focused on his own qualifications will take place on Tuesday. Lawyers for both sides are allowed in a war crimes tribunal to question a new judge for possible bias.

Also Read | <a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/freedom-tower-the-skyscraper-symbolising-new-yorks-resilience-411055">'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience</a>

The rest of the week will mostly involve meetings with the military prosecutors and defense teams.

With scores of motions lined up to demand evidence that military prosecutors refuse to hand over, defense attorneys said the pretrial phase could easily last another year, placing far over the horizon any hope for a jury trial and verdict.

Asked if the case could ever reach that point, one defense attorney, James Connell, replied, "I don't know."

Lasting impact of torture

Attorneys say the five defendants -- Mohammed, Ammar al-Baluchi, Walid bin Attash, Ramzi bin al-Shibh and Mustafa al-Hawsawi -- are all weak and suffer the lasting effects of severe torture endured in secretive CIA "black" sites between 2002 and 2006.

Added to that, the attorneys say, is the cumulative impact of 15 years in harsh, isolated conditions since arriving.&nbsp;

They will appear in an ultra-secure military commissions courtroom surrounded by fences of razor wire, each with his own defense team.&nbsp;

Also Read | <a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/how-911-changed-air-travel-more-security-less-privacy-411141">How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy</a>

In the audience will be family members of some of the 2,976 people they are accused of murdering two decades ago, as well as a large contingent of reporters to mark the confluence with the somber anniversary on Saturday.

The five face the death penalty on charges of murder and terrorism in the war crimes tribunal.

They are represented by attorneys assigned by the military, as well as pro-bono lawyers from the private sector and non-governmental organizations.

Open and shut?

Since the case started, prosecutors have regarded it as open-and-shut, even without the tainted information reaped from the brutal CIA interrogations.

Instead, prosecutors maintain that the defendants all provided solid evidence of conspiring in the 9/11 attacks during so-called "clean-team" interrogations conducted by the FBI in 2007, after the five arrived at Guantanamo.

But defense attorneys argue that the 2007 interrogations were hardly "clean" because the FBI also took part in the CIA's torture program, and their interrogations carried a similar menace.

The defendants, still feeling the impact of torture at that time, spoke to the FBI under the real fear that it would start again, the defense contends.

"Make no mistake, covering up torture is the reason that these men were brought to Guantanamo" instead of the US federal justice system, said Connell, who represents Baluchi.

"The cover-up of torture is also the reason that we are all gathered at Guantanamo for the 42nd hearing in the 9/11 military commission," he said.

Delays

To prove their case, the defense is demanding huge amounts of classified materials that the government is resisting turning over, on everything from the original torture program to conditions at Guantanamo to health assessments.&nbsp;

Defense lawyers also want to interview dozens more witnesses, after 12 already appeared before the court, including two men who oversaw the CIA program.

The demands have delayed the trial, but the defense blames the government for actively hiding materials relevant to the case.

Alka Pradhan, another defense attorney, noted that it took the government six years to admit that the FBI took part in the CIA's torture program.

"This case wears you down," she said.&nbsp;

"They are withholding things that are normal procedure in court."

The prosecution of alleged September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others restarts Tuesday, just days before the 20th anniversary of the attacks, stirring new hopes for justice and retribution.

The prosecution of alleged September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others restarts Tuesday, just days before the 20th anniversary of the attacks, stirring new hopes for justice and retribution. Mohammed and his co-defendants, who have been locked up at the "War on Terror" prison at the US naval base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba for nearly 15 years, will appear in the military tribunal here for the first time since early 2019. But after a 17-month halt due to the coronavirus pandemic, the proceedings appear likely to continue where they left off, mired in the defense's efforts to disqualify most of the government's evidence as tainted by the torture the defendants underwent in CIA custody. On Sunday, the new military judge, Air Force Colonel Matthew McCall -- the case's eighth -- signaled a slow start, deciding that an initial hearing focused on his own qualifications will take place on Tuesday. Lawyers for both sides are allowed in a war crimes tribunal to question a new judge for possible bias. Also Read | 'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience The rest of the week will mostly involve meetings with the military prosecutors and defense teams. With scores of motions lined up to demand evidence that military prosecutors refuse to hand over, defense attorneys said the pretrial phase could easily last another year, placing far over the horizon any hope for a jury trial and verdict. Asked if the case could ever reach that point, one defense attorney, James Connell, replied, "I don't know." Lasting impact of torture Attorneys say the five defendants -- Mohammed, Ammar al-Baluchi, Walid bin Attash, Ramzi bin al-Shibh and Mustafa al-Hawsawi -- are all weak and suffer the lasting effects of severe torture endured in secretive CIA "black" sites between 2002 and 2006. Added to that, the attorneys say, is the cumulative impact of 15 years in harsh, isolated conditions since arriving. They will appear in an ultra-secure military commissions courtroom surrounded by fences of razor wire, each with his own defense team. Also Read | How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy In the audience will be family members of some of the 2,976 people they are accused of murdering two decades ago, as well as a large contingent of reporters to mark the confluence with the somber anniversary on Saturday. The five face the death penalty on charges of murder and terrorism in the war crimes tribunal. They are represented by attorneys assigned by the military, as well as pro-bono lawyers from the private sector and non-governmental organizations. Open and shut? Since the case started, prosecutors have regarded it as open-and-shut, even without the tainted information reaped from the brutal CIA interrogations. Instead, prosecutors maintain that the defendants all provided solid evidence of conspiring in the 9/11 attacks during so-called "clean-team" interrogations conducted by the FBI in 2007, after the five arrived at Guantanamo. But defense attorneys argue that the 2007 interrogations were hardly "clean" because the FBI also took part in the CIA's torture program, and their interrogations carried a similar menace. The defendants, still feeling the impact of torture at that time, spoke to the FBI under the real fear that it would start again, the defense contends. "Make no mistake, covering up torture is the reason that these men were brought to Guantanamo" instead of the US federal justice system, said Connell, who represents Baluchi. "The cover-up of torture is also the reason that we are all gathered at Guantanamo for the 42nd hearing in the 9/11 military commission," he said. Delays To prove their case, the defense is demanding huge amounts of classified materials that the government is resisting turning over, on everything from the original torture program to conditions at Guantanamo to health assessments. Defense lawyers also want to interview dozens more witnesses, after 12 already appeared before the court, including two men who oversaw the CIA program. The demands have delayed the trial, but the defense blames the government for actively hiding materials relevant to the case. Alka Pradhan, another defense attorney, noted that it took the government six years to admit that the FBI took part in the CIA's torture program. "This case wears you down," she said. "They are withholding things that are normal procedure in court."

Trial of accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed restarts, days before attack's 20th anniversary

A car passed, the driver's window rolled down and the man spat an epithet at two little girls wearing their hijabs: "Terrorist!"

It was 2001, mere weeks after the twin towers at the World Trade Center fell, and 10-year-old Shahana Hanif and her younger sister were walking to the local mosque from their Brooklyn home.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/trial-of-accused-911-mastermind-khalid-sheikh-mohammed-restarts-days-before-attacks-20th-anniversary-411259">Trial of accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed restarts, days before attack's 20th anniversary</a>

Unsure, afraid, the girls ran.

As the 20th anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks approaches, Hanif can still recall the shock of the moment, her confusion over how anyone could look at her, a child, and see a threat.

"It's not a nice, kind word. It means violence, it means dangerous. It is meant to shock whoever ... Is on the receiving end of it,"&nbsp;she says.

But the incident also spurred a determination to speak out for herself and others that has helped get her to where she is today: a community organizer strongly favoured to win a seat on the New York City Council in the upcoming municipal election.

Like Hanif, other young American Muslims have grown up under the shadow of 9/11. Many have faced hostility and surveillance, mistrust and suspicion, questions about their Muslim faith and doubts over their Americanness.

They've also found ways forward, ways to fight back against bias, to organize, to craft nuanced personal narratives about their identities. In the process, they've built bridges, challenged stereotypes and carved out new spaces for themselves.

There is "this sense of being Muslim as a kind of important identity marker, regardless of your relationship with Islam as a faith,"&nbsp;says Eman Abdelhadi, a sociologist at The University of Chicago who studies Muslim communities.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/the-dogs-of-911-their-failed-searches-for-life-helped-sustain-it-411164">The dogs of 9/11: Their failed searches for life helped sustain it</a>

"That's been one of the main effects in people's lives,&nbsp;it has shaped the ways the community has developed."

&nbsp;A poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research conducted ahead of the 9/11 anniversary found that 53 per cent of Americans have unfavourable views toward Islam, compared with 42 per cent&nbsp;who have favourable ones. This stands in contrast to Americans' opinions about Christianity and Judaism, for which most respondents expressed favourable views.

Mistrust and suspicion of Muslims didn't start with 9/11, but the attacks dramatically intensified those animosities. 
Accustomed to being ignored or targeted by low-level harassment, the country's wide-ranging and diverse Muslim communities were foisted into the spotlight, says Youssef Chouhoud, a political scientist at Christopher Newport University in Virginia.

"Your sense of who you were was becoming more formed, not just Muslim but American Muslim,"&nbsp;he says.

"What distinguished you as an American Muslim? Could you be fully both, or did you have to choose? There was a lot of grappling with what that meant."&nbsp;In Hanif's case, there was no blueprint to navigate the complexities of that time.

"Fifth-grader me wasn't naive or too young to know Muslims are in danger,"&nbsp;she later wrote in an essay about the aftermath of 9/11. "...Flashing an American flag from our first-floor windows didn't make me more American. Born in Brooklyn didn't make me more American."

A young Hanif gathered neighbourhood friends, and an older cousin helped them write a letter to then-President George W. Bush asking for protection.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/is-911-a-day-or-is-it-an-era-411151">Is 9/11 a day, or is it an Era?</a>

"We knew," she says, "that we would become like warriors of this community." But being warriors often carries a price, with wounds that linger.

Ishaq Pathan, 26, recalls the time a boy told him he seemed angry and wondered if he was going to blow up their Connecticut school.&nbsp;He remembers the helplessness he felt when he was taken aside at an airport for additional questioning upon returning to the United States after a college semester in Morocco.

The agent looked through his belongings, including the laptop where he kept a private journal and started reading it. 
"I remember being like, Hey, do you have to read that?"&nbsp;Pathan says. The agent 'just looks at me like, You know, I can read anything on your computer. I'm entitled to anything here.' And at that point, I remember having tears in my eyes. I was completely and utterly powerless."&nbsp;Pathan couldn't accept it.

"You go to school with other people of different backgrounds and you realize ... What the promise of the United States is,"&nbsp;he says. "And when you see it not living up to that promise, then I think it instils in us a sense of wanting to help and fix that."&nbsp;He now works as the San Francisco Bay Area director for the nonprofit Islamic Networks Group, where he hopes to help a younger generation grow confident in their Muslim identity.

Pathan recently chatted with a group of boys about their summer activities. At times, the boys ate watermelon or played on a trampoline. At other moments, the talk turned serious: What would they do if a student pretended to blow himself up while yelling "Allahu akbar,"&nbsp;or "God is great"? What can they do about stereotypical depictions of Muslims on TV?

"I had always viewed 9/11 as probably one of the most pivotal moments of my life and of the lives of Americans across the board,"&nbsp;Pathan says.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/how-911-changed-air-travel-more-security-less-privacy-411141">How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy</a>

"The aftermath of it ... Is what pushed me to do what I do today."

That aftermath has also helped motivate Shukri Olow to do what she is doing;&nbsp;run for office. Born in Somalia, Olow fled the civil war with her family and lived in refugee camps in Kenya for years before coming to the United States when she was 10.

She found a home in a vibrant public housing complex in the city of Kent, south of Seattle. There, residents from different countries communicated across language and cultural barriers, borrowing salt from each other or watching one another's kids. Olow felt she flourished in that environment.

Then 9/11 happened. She recalls feeling confused when a teacher asked her, "What are your people doing?"&nbsp;But she also remembers others who said that "this isn't our fault... And we need to make sure that you're safe."

In a 2017 Pew Research Center survey of US&nbsp;Muslims, nearly half of respondents said they experienced at least one instance of religious discrimination within the year before; yet 49 per cent said someone expressed support for them because of their religion in the previous year.

Overwhelmingly, the study found respondents proud to be both Muslim and American. For some, including Olow, there were occasional identity crises growing up. 
'Who am I?',&nbsp;which I think is what many young people kind of go through in life in general,"&nbsp;she says. "But for those of us who live at the intersection of anti-Blackness and Islamophobia ... It was really hard."

But her experiences from that time also helped form her identity. She is now seeking a seat on the King County Council.

"There are many young people who have multiple identities who have felt that they don't belong here, that they are not welcomed here,"&nbsp;she says. "I was one of those young people. And so, I try to do what I can to make sure that more of us know that this is our nation, too."

After 9/11, some American Muslims chose to dispel misconceptions about their faith by building personal connections. They shared coffee or broke bread with strangers as they fielded myriad questions:&nbsp;from how Islam views women and Jesus to how to combat extremism.

Mansoor Shams has travelled across the US&nbsp;With a sign that reads: "I'm Muslim and a US&nbsp;Marine, ask anything."&nbsp;It's part of the 39-year-old's efforts to teach others about his faith and counter hate through dialogue.

Shams, who served in the Marines from 2000 to 2004, was called names like "Taliban,"&nbsp;"terrorist"&nbsp;and "Osama bin Laden"&nbsp;by some of his fellow Marines after 9/11.

One of his most memorable interactions, he says, was at Liberty University in Virginia, where he spoke in 2019 to students of the Christian institution. Some, he says, still call him with questions about Islam.

"There's this mutual love and respect,"&nbsp;he says.&nbsp;

Shams wishes his current work wasn't needed but feels a responsibility to share a counternarrative he says many Americans don't know.

A car passed, the driver's window rolled down and the man spat an epithet at two little girls wearing their hijabs: "Terrorist!" It was 2001, mere weeks after the twin towers at the World Trade Center fell, and 10-year-old Shahana Hanif and her younger sister were walking to the local mosque from their Brooklyn home.

A car passed, the driver's window rolled down and the man spat an epithet at two little girls wearing their hijabs: "Terrorist!" It was 2001, mere weeks after the twin towers at the World Trade Center fell, and 10-year-old Shahana Hanif and her younger sister were walking to the local mosque from their Brooklyn home. Also read | Trial of accused 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed restarts, days before attack's 20th anniversary Unsure, afraid, the girls ran. As the 20th anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks approaches, Hanif can still recall the shock of the moment, her confusion over how anyone could look at her, a child, and see a threat. "It's not a nice, kind word. It means violence, it means dangerous. It is meant to shock whoever ... Is on the receiving end of it," she says. But the incident also spurred a determination to speak out for herself and others that has helped get her to where she is today: a community organizer strongly favoured to win a seat on the New York City Council in the upcoming municipal election. Like Hanif, other young American Muslims have grown up under the shadow of 9/11. Many have faced hostility and surveillance, mistrust and suspicion, questions about their Muslim faith and doubts over their Americanness. They've also found ways forward, ways to fight back against bias, to organize, to craft nuanced personal narratives about their identities. In the process, they've built bridges, challenged stereotypes and carved out new spaces for themselves. There is "this sense of being Muslim as a kind of important identity marker, regardless of your relationship with Islam as a faith," says Eman Abdelhadi, a sociologist at The University of Chicago who studies Muslim communities. Also read | The dogs of 9/11: Their failed searches for life helped sustain it "That's been one of the main effects in people's lives, it has shaped the ways the community has developed." A poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research conducted ahead of the 9/11 anniversary found that 53 per cent of Americans have unfavourable views toward Islam, compared with 42 per cent who have favourable ones. This stands in contrast to Americans' opinions about Christianity and Judaism, for which most respondents expressed favourable views. Mistrust and suspicion of Muslims didn't start with 9/11, but the attacks dramatically intensified those animosities. Accustomed to being ignored or targeted by low-level harassment, the country's wide-ranging and diverse Muslim communities were foisted into the spotlight, says Youssef Chouhoud, a political scientist at Christopher Newport University in Virginia. "Your sense of who you were was becoming more formed, not just Muslim but American Muslim," he says. "What distinguished you as an American Muslim? Could you be fully both, or did you have to choose? There was a lot of grappling with what that meant." In Hanif's case, there was no blueprint to navigate the complexities of that time. "Fifth-grader me wasn't naive or too young to know Muslims are in danger," she later wrote in an essay about the aftermath of 9/11. "...Flashing an American flag from our first-floor windows didn't make me more American. Born in Brooklyn didn't make me more American." A young Hanif gathered neighbourhood friends, and an older cousin helped them write a letter to then-President George W. Bush asking for protection. Also read | Is 9/11 a day, or is it an Era? "We knew," she says, "that we would become like warriors of this community." But being warriors often carries a price, with wounds that linger. Ishaq Pathan, 26, recalls the time a boy told him he seemed angry and wondered if he was going to blow up their Connecticut school. He remembers the helplessness he felt when he was taken aside at an airport for additional questioning upon returning to the United States after a college semester in Morocco. The agent looked through his belongings, including the laptop where he kept a private journal and started reading it. "I remember being like, Hey, do you have to read that?" Pathan says. The agent 'just looks at me like, You know, I can read anything on your computer. I'm entitled to anything here.' And at that point, I remember having tears in my eyes. I was completely and utterly powerless." Pathan couldn't accept it. "You go to school with other people of different backgrounds and you realize ... What the promise of the United States is," he says. "And when you see it not living up to that promise, then I think it instils in us a sense of wanting to help and fix that." He now works as the San Francisco Bay Area director for the nonprofit Islamic Networks Group, where he hopes to help a younger generation grow confident in their Muslim identity. Pathan recently chatted with a group of boys about their summer activities. At times, the boys ate watermelon or played on a trampoline. At other moments, the talk turned serious: What would they do if a student pretended to blow himself up while yelling "Allahu akbar," or "God is great"? What can they do about stereotypical depictions of Muslims on TV? "I had always viewed 9/11 as probably one of the most pivotal moments of my life and of the lives of Americans across the board," Pathan says. Also read | How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy "The aftermath of it ... Is what pushed me to do what I do today." That aftermath has also helped motivate Shukri Olow to do what she is doing; run for office. Born in Somalia, Olow fled the civil war with her family and lived in refugee camps in Kenya for years before coming to the United States when she was 10. She found a home in a vibrant public housing complex in the city of Kent, south of Seattle. There, residents from different countries communicated across language and cultural barriers, borrowing salt from each other or watching one another's kids. Olow felt she flourished in that environment. Then 9/11 happened. She recalls feeling confused when a teacher asked her, "What are your people doing?" But she also remembers others who said that "this isn't our fault... And we need to make sure that you're safe." In a 2017 Pew Research Center survey of US Muslims, nearly half of respondents said they experienced at least one instance of religious discrimination within the year before; yet 49 per cent said someone expressed support for them because of their religion in the previous year. Overwhelmingly, the study found respondents proud to be both Muslim and American. For some, including Olow, there were occasional identity crises growing up. 'Who am I?', which I think is what many young people kind of go through in life in general," she says. "But for those of us who live at the intersection of anti-Blackness and Islamophobia ... It was really hard." But her experiences from that time also helped form her identity. She is now seeking a seat on the King County Council. "There are many young people who have multiple identities who have felt that they don't belong here, that they are not welcomed here," she says. "I was one of those young people. And so, I try to do what I can to make sure that more of us know that this is our nation, too." After 9/11, some American Muslims chose to dispel misconceptions about their faith by building personal connections. They shared coffee or broke bread with strangers as they fielded myriad questions: from how Islam views women and Jesus to how to combat extremism. Mansoor Shams has travelled across the US With a sign that reads: "I'm Muslim and a US Marine, ask anything." It's part of the 39-year-old's efforts to teach others about his faith and counter hate through dialogue. Shams, who served in the Marines from 2000 to 2004, was called names like "Taliban," "terrorist" and "Osama bin Laden" by some of his fellow Marines after 9/11. One of his most memorable interactions, he says, was at Liberty University in Virginia, where he spoke in 2019 to students of the Christian institution. Some, he says, still call him with questions about Islam. "There's this mutual love and respect," he says. Shams wishes his current work wasn't needed but feels a responsibility to share a counternarrative he says many Americans don't know.

Two decades after 9/11, Muslim Americans still fighting bias

Just days before the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the trial into the terror attack still remains in the pretrial phase. The prosecution of the alleged mastermind and four others restarts Tuesday, stirring new hopes for justice and retribution.

Pretrial hearings for alleged 9/11 terrorist attack plotters restarts

For more than two weeks after the twin towers collapsed on 9/11, hundreds of search and rescue dogs hunted for signs of life in the smouldering ruins.

Ricky, a 17-inch-tall rat terrier, was able to squeeze into tight spaces. Trakr, a German shepherd from Canada, combed the wreckage for two days — then collapsed from smoke inhalation, exhaustion and burns. Riley, a 4-year-old golden retriever, searched deep into the debris fields and helped locate the bodies of several firefighters.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/is-911-a-day-or-is-it-an-era-411151">Is 9/11 a day, or is it an Era?</a>

“We went there expecting to find hundreds of people trapped,” said Chris Selfridge, 54, of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, who was Riley’s handler. “But we didn’t find anybody alive.”

Though there were not many survivors to find amid the destruction, the devotion of the dogs to their work became an inspiring sight to emergency medical workers and to others who witnessed the urgent rescue effort. Now, as the 20th anniversary of the attacks approaches, those efforts are being memorialized in an exhibition opening Wednesday at the American Kennel Club’s Museum of the Dog.

Titled “9/11 Remembered: Search &amp; Rescue Dogs,” the exhibition also looks beyond the parameters of 9/11 to recognize dogs who worked at other disasters as well, not just in the United States, but around the world. The show will also include several pieces from the DOGNY project, an art initiative that features life-size sculptures of German shepherds. Roughly 100 of them were placed around New York after the attacks.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/how-911-changed-air-travel-more-security-less-privacy-411141">How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy</a>

“I hope this can be a little more uplifting,” Alan Fausel, the museum’s executive director, said. “We also showcase some of the brighter sides and positive outcomes: Rex of White Way rescued a whole train of people stuck in the Sierra Nevadas in the ’50s, and we’ll talk about St. Bernards such as Barry, a very famous St. Bernard in the St. Bernard hospice in Switzerland who rescued avalanche victims.”

The display follows up on an ongoing temporary exhibition at the 9/11 Memorial &amp; Museum in lower Manhattan, “K-9 Courage,” which opened in January 2020, but was hardly seen because of the <a href="https://www.wionews.com/topics/coronavirus">pandemic</a>. That exhibit, which runs into spring 2022, features photographer Charlotte Dumas’ portraits of 15 of the dogs who aided in recovery efforts at ground zero, taken for the 10-year anniversary in 2011, alongside photos of them working in the wreckage.

“You look into their eyes in their old age and can, with the help of the documentary photographs, imagine what their eyes had seen,” Alice M. Greenwald, the chief executive and president of the museum, said. “But you also know that they’ve lived lives of service and surely, there is satisfaction in that — for dogs and human beings, alike.”

Some 2,753 people were killed when the terrorist group al-Qaida hijacked two planes and crashed them into the World Trade Center’s towers, causing them both to collapse in the span of 102 minutes.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/freedom-tower-the-skyscraper-symbolising-new-yorks-resilience-411055">'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience</a>

As an acrid dust cloud enveloped lower Manhattan and a nation mourned, hundreds of search and rescue teams from around the country descended on ground zero to join the search for survivors, with the first dogs, from the NYPD’s K-9 urban search and rescue team, arriving at the South Tower just 15 minutes after its collapse.

The teams worked 12-hour days for an average of 10 days straight.

The New York Police Department has reported that though survivors were found in the rubble, none of those was the direct result of a dog’s discovery. Several people, though, have credited Trackr, a retired police dog, with having played a role in one rescue. His handler, a Canadian policeman who drove down from Nova Scotia, was suspended from his job for leaving without permission when his department saw him on television aiding the rescue efforts. (Jane Goodall later presented him with a humanitarian service award).

Dr. Cynthia Otto, the director of the Penn Vet Working Dog Center in Philadelphia who looked after the dogs at ground zero, said the that, for the most part,&nbsp;the dogs’ injuries were only “very minor” — cuts and scrapes on their paw pads, legs and bellies, mainly, as well as fatigue and heat exhaustion. The bigger challenge, she said, was the frustration of searching for hours and not finding anyone. When the dogs began to get discouraged and lose their motivation to search, handlers had to stage “mock finds” so the dogs could feel successful.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/twenty-years-on-pandemic-gives-911-conspiracists-fresh-impetus-411061">Twenty years on, pandemic gives 9/11 conspiracists fresh impetus</a>

“When they train, they don’t search for hours without finding anybody,” she said in a recent phone conversation. “You need to remind the dogs every so often that they do get to win.”

Bretagne (pronounced Brittany), a golden retriever who was then 2 years old, arrived the week after the attacks and spent 10 days searching for survivors. She slept in a kennel at the Javits Center alongside her handler, Denise Corliss, an electrical engineer from Texas who had traveled to the city with Texas Task Force 1, one of the 28 teams that form the FEMA National Urban Search and Rescue System.

Corliss, 56, said Bretagne, who died in 2016, was the last known living service dog to have been employed by FEMA at ground zero. She brought comfort to rescuers and firefighters, who would approach the dog and pet her. Soon, they’d open up to Corliss, sharing personal stories of the missing friends and colleagues they were searching for.

“A gentleman came up and started petting Bretagne and said, ‘You know, I don’t really like dogs,’” she said. “Which was a surprising statement considering he was kneeling down to pet her. I said ‘Oh?’ And he goes, ‘Yeah, my best friend loved dogs; he had a golden retriever himself. My best friend is somewhere out there,’ and he pointed to the pile. It was a tie back to his missing friend.”

And that, Fausel said, is what the Museum of the Dog hopes to capture in its new exhibition.

“The search and rescue dogs didn’t rescue any people from the pile,” he said. “But I think they somewhat rescued the people who were searching.”

For more than two weeks after the twin towers collapsed on 9/11, hundreds of search and rescue dogs hunted for signs of life in the smouldering ruins. Ricky, a 17-inch-tall rat terrier, was able to squeeze into tight spaces.

For more than two weeks after the twin towers collapsed on 9/11, hundreds of search and rescue dogs hunted for signs of life in the smouldering ruins. Ricky, a 17-inch-tall rat terrier, was able to squeeze into tight spaces. Trakr, a German shepherd from Canada, combed the wreckage for two days — then collapsed from smoke inhalation, exhaustion and burns. Riley, a 4-year-old golden retriever, searched deep into the debris fields and helped locate the bodies of several firefighters. Also read | Is 9/11 a day, or is it an Era? “We went there expecting to find hundreds of people trapped,” said Chris Selfridge, 54, of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, who was Riley’s handler. “But we didn’t find anybody alive.” Though there were not many survivors to find amid the destruction, the devotion of the dogs to their work became an inspiring sight to emergency medical workers and to others who witnessed the urgent rescue effort. Now, as the 20th anniversary of the attacks approaches, those efforts are being memorialized in an exhibition opening Wednesday at the American Kennel Club’s Museum of the Dog. Titled “9/11 Remembered: Search & Rescue Dogs,” the exhibition also looks beyond the parameters of 9/11 to recognize dogs who worked at other disasters as well, not just in the United States, but around the world. The show will also include several pieces from the DOGNY project, an art initiative that features life-size sculptures of German shepherds. Roughly 100 of them were placed around New York after the attacks. Also read | How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy “I hope this can be a little more uplifting,” Alan Fausel, the museum’s executive director, said. “We also showcase some of the brighter sides and positive outcomes: Rex of White Way rescued a whole train of people stuck in the Sierra Nevadas in the ’50s, and we’ll talk about St. Bernards such as Barry, a very famous St. Bernard in the St. Bernard hospice in Switzerland who rescued avalanche victims.” The display follows up on an ongoing temporary exhibition at the 9/11 Memorial & Museum in lower Manhattan, “K-9 Courage,” which opened in January 2020, but was hardly seen because of the pandemic. That exhibit, which runs into spring 2022, features photographer Charlotte Dumas’ portraits of 15 of the dogs who aided in recovery efforts at ground zero, taken for the 10-year anniversary in 2011, alongside photos of them working in the wreckage. “You look into their eyes in their old age and can, with the help of the documentary photographs, imagine what their eyes had seen,” Alice M. Greenwald, the chief executive and president of the museum, said. “But you also know that they’ve lived lives of service and surely, there is satisfaction in that — for dogs and human beings, alike.” Some 2,753 people were killed when the terrorist group al-Qaida hijacked two planes and crashed them into the World Trade Center’s towers, causing them both to collapse in the span of 102 minutes. Also read | 'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience As an acrid dust cloud enveloped lower Manhattan and a nation mourned, hundreds of search and rescue teams from around the country descended on ground zero to join the search for survivors, with the first dogs, from the NYPD’s K-9 urban search and rescue team, arriving at the South Tower just 15 minutes after its collapse. The teams worked 12-hour days for an average of 10 days straight. The New York Police Department has reported that though survivors were found in the rubble, none of those was the direct result of a dog’s discovery. Several people, though, have credited Trackr, a retired police dog, with having played a role in one rescue. His handler, a Canadian policeman who drove down from Nova Scotia, was suspended from his job for leaving without permission when his department saw him on television aiding the rescue efforts. (Jane Goodall later presented him with a humanitarian service award). Dr. Cynthia Otto, the director of the Penn Vet Working Dog Center in Philadelphia who looked after the dogs at ground zero, said the that, for the most part, the dogs’ injuries were only “very minor” — cuts and scrapes on their paw pads, legs and bellies, mainly, as well as fatigue and heat exhaustion. The bigger challenge, she said, was the frustration of searching for hours and not finding anyone. When the dogs began to get discouraged and lose their motivation to search, handlers had to stage “mock finds” so the dogs could feel successful. Also read | Twenty years on, pandemic gives 9/11 conspiracists fresh impetus “When they train, they don’t search for hours without finding anybody,” she said in a recent phone conversation. “You need to remind the dogs every so often that they do get to win.” Bretagne (pronounced Brittany), a golden retriever who was then 2 years old, arrived the week after the attacks and spent 10 days searching for survivors. She slept in a kennel at the Javits Center alongside her handler, Denise Corliss, an electrical engineer from Texas who had traveled to the city with Texas Task Force 1, one of the 28 teams that form the FEMA National Urban Search and Rescue System. Corliss, 56, said Bretagne, who died in 2016, was the last known living service dog to have been employed by FEMA at ground zero. She brought comfort to rescuers and firefighters, who would approach the dog and pet her. Soon, they’d open up to Corliss, sharing personal stories of the missing friends and colleagues they were searching for. “A gentleman came up and started petting Bretagne and said, ‘You know, I don’t really like dogs,’” she said. “Which was a surprising statement considering he was kneeling down to pet her. I said ‘Oh?’ And he goes, ‘Yeah, my best friend loved dogs; he had a golden retriever himself. My best friend is somewhere out there,’ and he pointed to the pile. It was a tie back to his missing friend.” And that, Fausel said, is what the Museum of the Dog hopes to capture in its new exhibition. “The search and rescue dogs didn’t rescue any people from the pile,” he said. “But I think they somewhat rescued the people who were searching.”

The dogs of 9/11: Their failed searches for life helped sustain it

The TV specials for the Sept. 11 anniversary offer any number of ways to return to hell. There are wrenching interviews with survivors and with those whose loved ones died; uplifting stories of rescues and agonizing stories of those who perished in the attempt; footage of the conflagration, chaos and shock, as seen on morning newscasts and in the ash-blanketed streets; images of the first responders and volunteers digging through wreckage.

A clarification: I actually took those descriptions from this newspaper’s review programming for the 10th anniversary. But they apply just as well this year, for the 20th.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/how-911-changed-air-travel-more-security-less-privacy-411141">How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy</a>

In documentary after documentary, on cable, streaming and broadcast, you can hear, over and over, the air traffic-control distress calls. You can see, again and again, the stunning footage of an airliner slamming into the north tower of the World Trade Center, captured by a documentary filmmaker accompanying firefighters on a routine call. You can be reminded, time after heartbreaking time, what a beautiful, blue-sky September morning it was.

The interview subjects have aged. Time has passed. The children who fled schools or lost parents that morning are now grown adults. (Two documentaries, on the History Channel and Discovery+, focus on them.) But the story, as told, is mostly the same.

Twenty years later, is there anything still to say about Sept. 11? Of course; it would be unimaginable to simply ignore it. A tougher question is: Is there anything&nbsp;more&nbsp;to say than there was five, 10, 15 years ago?

There is. But actually saying it can be riskier.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/freedom-tower-the-skyscraper-symbolising-new-yorks-resilience-411055">'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience</a>

TV’s treatment of Sept. 11 has changed over the years, in bits and pieces. The adrenaline rush of “24” gave way to the moral grayscale of “Homeland.” MSNBC finally ended its grim tradition of replaying the live coverage of the attacks. But the general approach of the memorial specials, tightly focused on honouring the loss and sacrifice of one discrete day, has kept a kind of ritual familiarity.

For 20 years, the refrain has been: Remember, remember, remember. Memory is so ingrained in the language of Sept. 11 — “Never forget” — as to imply that it is obligatory, and sufficient, for future generations merely to remember by revisiting the narrative and imagery of one terrible day, rather than to connect it to the years of history that followed.

But is Sept. 11 simply a day, or is it an era? Was it the beginning of something or a continuation? You can divide most of the anniversary specials between those that focus closely on the day that the towers fell and those that pull back, way back, to look at what emerged from the dust.

There are plenty of the former kind. On National Geographic, the four-part series “9/11: One Day in America” reassembles in granular detail the horrific experience of that morning. (It’s streaming on Hulu — all the programs mentioned here are currently streaming unless otherwise noted.) A special episode of “60 Minutes,” premiering Sept. 12, revisits the stories of firefighters who survived the catastrophe, and those who didn’t.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/twenty-years-on-pandemic-gives-911-conspiracists-fresh-impetus-411061">Twenty years on, pandemic gives 9/11 conspiracists fresh impetus</a>

Apple TV+’s “9/11: Inside the President’s War Room” interviews George W. Bush and former members of his staff about the decisions and chaos of that morning, with scant reference to any decisions — say, the invasion of Iraq — that followed. And the seven hours of new 9/11 programming on the History Channel include “9/11: Four Flights,” about the aircraft that crashed into the towers, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field, and “9/11: I Was There,” based on amateur video (both premiere on Sept. 11).

These remember-the-day documentaries tend to be heartfelt and reverent; they are often meticulously researched and assembled. (I cannot speak for “Long Island Medium: In Memory of 9/11,” the TLC special, premiering Thursday, that promises to bring families messages from the spirits of their lost loved ones.) They have the benefit of two decades of fact-finding. But for years now, it has been hard for anything to match the immediacy and urgency of “9/11,” the film by Gédéon and Jules Naudet — the brothers whose intended firefighter documentary produced that famous tower-impact shot — which aired on CBS in 2002. (CNN will re-air it on Sunday.)

Focusing on the emotion and heroism of one day, of course, avoids getting ensnared in everything that came after. It sticks to what we can all agree on. It’s safer, in the way that it’s safer to teach the Civil War or Jim Crow as horrors of the past instead of events on a continuum that reaches into the present.

The other approach is to decide that 20 years, a full generation, is long enough to treat the terror attacks as part of a larger historical era.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/911-attacks-us-president-moves-to-declassify-documents-as-20th-anniversary-approaches-410579">9/11 attacks: US president moves to declassify documents as 20th anniversary approaches</a>

Sept. 11 is not only in the past, as you can see in the bloody news from Afghanistan. For viewers who want to unpack how the attacks led to two decades of military entanglements, there’s Netflix’s five-part “Turning Point: 9/11 and the War on Terror,” which looks unsparingly at the intelligence failures before Sept. 11 and the mission creep through multiple administrations. Enlighteningly, it includes the voices of Afghan leaders and civilians. Sept. 11, as an epoch, meant upheaval for more than one nation.

But the history of Sept. 11 goes far beyond war and foreign policy. It affected domestic politics, domestic enmities and even American culture.

And two of the anniversary’s most striking documentaries present Sept. 11 as an event that struck at America’s democracy and even its soul.

The “Frontline” special “America After 9/11,” premiering Tuesday on PBS, is driven by a striking video juxtaposition. First, on the Capitol steps the day of the attacks, a chorus of members of Congress, Republican and Democratic, senators and representatives, join to sing “God Bless America.” Two decades later, on the same site, a mob besieges Congress in an attempt to overturn the results of an election.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/blame-for-afghanistan-lies-on-president-biden-says-911-era-nypd-commissioner-410532">Exclusive: Blame for Afghanistan 'lies on President Biden', says 9/11-era NYPD commissioner&nbsp;</a>

It’s a provocative connection, but filmmaker Michael Kirk lays it out economically: The attacks set off a chain of action and changes — military quagmires, suspicion and racism at home, the loss of trust in institutions — that demagogues used to undermine democracy, and that fulfilled Osama bin Laden’s goal of dividing and weakening America.

From the beginning, the special argues, America’s response was driven by paradox: the moral rhetoric of Bush and the strategies of his vice president, Dick Cheney, who said that America would need to work with “the dark side” to survive.

The dark side won, “America After 9/11” argues. It won when specious claims of weapons of mass destruction rationalized war in Iraq; when images of torture emerged from Abu Ghraib prison; when illustrations of Barack Obama as bin Laden circulated; when the media fed hysteria about terror threats; and when the 2016 election was won by a candidate who said, “I think Islam hates us” and used similar rhetoric for people he labelled domestic enemies.

In this light, the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol — with its racist language and its fantasy of reclaiming America from a shadowy existential threat — was, says former Obama aide Ben Rhodes, “the logical endpoint” of the 9/11 era.

<div class="videoWrapper trancodeVideo"><iframe allowfullscreen="" autoplay="1" class="includeVideo" frameborder="0" height="350" src="https://www.wionews.com/videos/former-commissioner-of-new-york-city-police-dept-bernard-kerik-speaks-on-911-attacks-410624/embed" style="width:100%;max-width:560px;" width="560"></iframe></div>

But the most sweeping — and, I expect, ultimately the most memorable — of this year’s documentaries is Spike Lee’s elegiac, messy and feisty “NYC Epicenters: 9/11-2021½,” airing in four parts on HBO.

As the title suggests, “Epicenters” is only partly about 9/11, and it makes a strong case that the 9/11 era can only be captured with the widest lens. It works backwards, starting from the <a href="https://www.wionews.com/topics/coronavirus">COVID-19 pandemic</a> and moving — through Black Lives Matter, the 2016 and 2020 elections and more — to its starting point. In Lee’s telling, Sept. 11 is not just a matter of terrorism, but also the opening act to decades of calamity and uproar.

If it seems like a stretch, “Epicenters” soon makes it difficult to see the subject otherwise, drawing connection after connection across the years. There is Rudy Giuliani, “America’s Mayor” in the days after the towers fell, spouting election-hoax fan fiction at Four Seasons Total Landscaping. There is the rash of Islamophobic attacks after Sept. 11, echoing in the xenophobia of the Trump era. There are emergency medical workers suffering from 9/11-related illnesses that loom as preexisting conditions during the pandemic.

Sept. 11, in Lee’s telling, is itself a preexisting condition. It is not a one-time injury but a chronic affliction, and other, pre-preexisting conditions express themselves through it as well. New York came back from it, and, “Epicenters” insists, it will come back from COVID. But in his crowning image, Lee likens that comeback to Marlon Brando’s bloodied stagger at the end of “On the Waterfront.” Each blow leaves a mark.

“Epicenters” uses clips from a lot of films to evoke the city, from “On the Town” to the 1976 remake of “King Kong” to Lee’s own work. Lee’s memory of New York, like many people’s, is a blend of lived experience and fantasy. And sometimes the exaggerated language of film is the only thing that can capture larger-than-life experience; as the series notes, people describe Sept. 11, over and over, as being “like a movie.”

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/entertainment/hollywood/news-spike-lee-re-edits-9-11-documentary-featuring-conspiracy-theorists-408396">Spike Lee re-edits 9-11 documentary featuring conspiracy theorists</a>

Lee’s interviews — with hundreds of people, from high elected officials to heavy-equipment operators at ground zero — are warm, emotional, sometimes sparring. He ribs every Boston Red Sox fan he talks to; when his subjects need time to collect themselves, he lets the moments play out. For politicians, he lets the raspberries fly freely (the captions refer to Donald Trump, in the words of the rapper Busta Rhymes, as “President Agent Orange”).

One could argue over which director is most essentially New York. But Lee’s passionate heckler’s breed of New York-ness may be the best suited to this subject. He is loving and critical, impulses that New Yorkers know as synonyms. And his focus on diversity and race helps him find less-heard voices in a much-told story, like those of the Vulcan Society for Black firefighters, or of the Black flight attendant who guiltily recalls “racially profiling” a Saudi passenger after Sept. 11.

Unfortunately, “Epicenters” has made the most news for what you won’t see in it: an extended, bizarre section in the original final episode that gave credence to the conspiracists who theorize that the towers were brought down by a controlled explosion. Lee snipped the entire section, and despite the blunt edit, the shorter final cut, which premieres on Sept. 11, actually flows better.

I could imagine a version of “Epicenters” that still covered the conspiracy theories, not to legitimize them, but as an example of the paranoia that thrives in a country lacking social trust — which Lee rightly deplores when it comes to anti-vaccine theories and the election hoaxes that drove some of the Capitol assailants.

There’s a sobering meta-lesson in the fact that the most artful of this season’s Sept. 11 documentaries became an example of one of the very problems it diagnosed. But at least the resolution shows that criticism can make a difference, and that it’s not too late to look at history seriously and make a change.

The TV specials for the Sept. 11 anniversary offer any number of ways to return to hell. There are wrenching interviews with survivors and with those whose loved ones died; uplifting stories of rescues and agonizing stories of those who perished in the attempt; footage of the conflagration, chaos and shock, as seen on morning newscasts and in the ash-blanketed streets; images of the first responders and volunteers digging through wreckage.

The TV specials for the Sept. 11 anniversary offer any number of ways to return to hell. There are wrenching interviews with survivors and with those whose loved ones died; uplifting stories of rescues and agonizing stories of those who perished in the attempt; footage of the conflagration, chaos and shock, as seen on morning newscasts and in the ash-blanketed streets; images of the first responders and volunteers digging through wreckage. A clarification: I actually took those descriptions from this newspaper’s review programming for the 10th anniversary. But they apply just as well this year, for the 20th. Also read | How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy In documentary after documentary, on cable, streaming and broadcast, you can hear, over and over, the air traffic-control distress calls. You can see, again and again, the stunning footage of an airliner slamming into the north tower of the World Trade Center, captured by a documentary filmmaker accompanying firefighters on a routine call. You can be reminded, time after heartbreaking time, what a beautiful, blue-sky September morning it was. The interview subjects have aged. Time has passed. The children who fled schools or lost parents that morning are now grown adults. (Two documentaries, on the History Channel and Discovery+, focus on them.) But the story, as told, is mostly the same. Twenty years later, is there anything still to say about Sept. 11? Of course; it would be unimaginable to simply ignore it. A tougher question is: Is there anything more to say than there was five, 10, 15 years ago? There is. But actually saying it can be riskier. Also read | 'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience TV’s treatment of Sept. 11 has changed over the years, in bits and pieces. The adrenaline rush of “24” gave way to the moral grayscale of “Homeland.” MSNBC finally ended its grim tradition of replaying the live coverage of the attacks. But the general approach of the memorial specials, tightly focused on honouring the loss and sacrifice of one discrete day, has kept a kind of ritual familiarity. For 20 years, the refrain has been: Remember, remember, remember. Memory is so ingrained in the language of Sept. 11 — “Never forget” — as to imply that it is obligatory, and sufficient, for future generations merely to remember by revisiting the narrative and imagery of one terrible day, rather than to connect it to the years of history that followed. But is Sept. 11 simply a day, or is it an era? Was it the beginning of something or a continuation? You can divide most of the anniversary specials between those that focus closely on the day that the towers fell and those that pull back, way back, to look at what emerged from the dust. There are plenty of the former kind. On National Geographic, the four-part series “9/11: One Day in America” reassembles in granular detail the horrific experience of that morning. (It’s streaming on Hulu — all the programs mentioned here are currently streaming unless otherwise noted.) A special episode of “60 Minutes,” premiering Sept. 12, revisits the stories of firefighters who survived the catastrophe, and those who didn’t. Also read | Twenty years on, pandemic gives 9/11 conspiracists fresh impetus Apple TV+’s “9/11: Inside the President’s War Room” interviews George W. Bush and former members of his staff about the decisions and chaos of that morning, with scant reference to any decisions — say, the invasion of Iraq — that followed. And the seven hours of new 9/11 programming on the History Channel include “9/11: Four Flights,” about the aircraft that crashed into the towers, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field, and “9/11: I Was There,” based on amateur video (both premiere on Sept. 11). These remember-the-day documentaries tend to be heartfelt and reverent; they are often meticulously researched and assembled. (I cannot speak for “Long Island Medium: In Memory of 9/11,” the TLC special, premiering Thursday, that promises to bring families messages from the spirits of their lost loved ones.) They have the benefit of two decades of fact-finding. But for years now, it has been hard for anything to match the immediacy and urgency of “9/11,” the film by Gédéon and Jules Naudet — the brothers whose intended firefighter documentary produced that famous tower-impact shot — which aired on CBS in 2002. (CNN will re-air it on Sunday.) Focusing on the emotion and heroism of one day, of course, avoids getting ensnared in everything that came after. It sticks to what we can all agree on. It’s safer, in the way that it’s safer to teach the Civil War or Jim Crow as horrors of the past instead of events on a continuum that reaches into the present. The other approach is to decide that 20 years, a full generation, is long enough to treat the terror attacks as part of a larger historical era. Also read | 9/11 attacks: US president moves to declassify documents as 20th anniversary approaches Sept. 11 is not only in the past, as you can see in the bloody news from Afghanistan. For viewers who want to unpack how the attacks led to two decades of military entanglements, there’s Netflix’s five-part “Turning Point: 9/11 and the War on Terror,” which looks unsparingly at the intelligence failures before Sept. 11 and the mission creep through multiple administrations. Enlighteningly, it includes the voices of Afghan leaders and civilians. Sept. 11, as an epoch, meant upheaval for more than one nation. But the history of Sept. 11 goes far beyond war and foreign policy. It affected domestic politics, domestic enmities and even American culture. And two of the anniversary’s most striking documentaries present Sept. 11 as an event that struck at America’s democracy and even its soul. The “Frontline” special “America After 9/11,” premiering Tuesday on PBS, is driven by a striking video juxtaposition. First, on the Capitol steps the day of the attacks, a chorus of members of Congress, Republican and Democratic, senators and representatives, join to sing “God Bless America.” Two decades later, on the same site, a mob besieges Congress in an attempt to overturn the results of an election. Also read | Exclusive: Blame for Afghanistan 'lies on President Biden', says 9/11-era NYPD commissioner It’s a provocative connection, but filmmaker Michael Kirk lays it out economically: The attacks set off a chain of action and changes — military quagmires, suspicion and racism at home, the loss of trust in institutions — that demagogues used to undermine democracy, and that fulfilled Osama bin Laden’s goal of dividing and weakening America. From the beginning, the special argues, America’s response was driven by paradox: the moral rhetoric of Bush and the strategies of his vice president, Dick Cheney, who said that America would need to work with “the dark side” to survive. The dark side won, “America After 9/11” argues. It won when specious claims of weapons of mass destruction rationalized war in Iraq; when images of torture emerged from Abu Ghraib prison; when illustrations of Barack Obama as bin Laden circulated; when the media fed hysteria about terror threats; and when the 2016 election was won by a candidate who said, “I think Islam hates us” and used similar rhetoric for people he labelled domestic enemies. In this light, the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol — with its racist language and its fantasy of reclaiming America from a shadowy existential threat — was, says former Obama aide Ben Rhodes, “the logical endpoint” of the 9/11 era. But the most sweeping — and, I expect, ultimately the most memorable — of this year’s documentaries is Spike Lee’s elegiac, messy and feisty “NYC Epicenters: 9/11-2021½,” airing in four parts on HBO. As the title suggests, “Epicenters” is only partly about 9/11, and it makes a strong case that the 9/11 era can only be captured with the widest lens. It works backwards, starting from the COVID-19 pandemic and moving — through Black Lives Matter, the 2016 and 2020 elections and more — to its starting point. In Lee’s telling, Sept. 11 is not just a matter of terrorism, but also the opening act to decades of calamity and uproar. If it seems like a stretch, “Epicenters” soon makes it difficult to see the subject otherwise, drawing connection after connection across the years. There is Rudy Giuliani, “America’s Mayor” in the days after the towers fell, spouting election-hoax fan fiction at Four Seasons Total Landscaping. There is the rash of Islamophobic attacks after Sept. 11, echoing in the xenophobia of the Trump era. There are emergency medical workers suffering from 9/11-related illnesses that loom as preexisting conditions during the pandemic. Sept. 11, in Lee’s telling, is itself a preexisting condition. It is not a one-time injury but a chronic affliction, and other, pre-preexisting conditions express themselves through it as well. New York came back from it, and, “Epicenters” insists, it will come back from COVID. But in his crowning image, Lee likens that comeback to Marlon Brando’s bloodied stagger at the end of “On the Waterfront.” Each blow leaves a mark. “Epicenters” uses clips from a lot of films to evoke the city, from “On the Town” to the 1976 remake of “King Kong” to Lee’s own work. Lee’s memory of New York, like many people’s, is a blend of lived experience and fantasy. And sometimes the exaggerated language of film is the only thing that can capture larger-than-life experience; as the series notes, people describe Sept. 11, over and over, as being “like a movie.” Also read | Spike Lee re-edits 9-11 documentary featuring conspiracy theorists Lee’s interviews — with hundreds of people, from high elected officials to heavy-equipment operators at ground zero — are warm, emotional, sometimes sparring. He ribs every Boston Red Sox fan he talks to; when his subjects need time to collect themselves, he lets the moments play out. For politicians, he lets the raspberries fly freely (the captions refer to Donald Trump, in the words of the rapper Busta Rhymes, as “President Agent Orange”). One could argue over which director is most essentially New York. But Lee’s passionate heckler’s breed of New York-ness may be the best suited to this subject. He is loving and critical, impulses that New Yorkers know as synonyms. And his focus on diversity and race helps him find less-heard voices in a much-told story, like those of the Vulcan Society for Black firefighters, or of the Black flight attendant who guiltily recalls “racially profiling” a Saudi passenger after Sept. 11. Unfortunately, “Epicenters” has made the most news for what you won’t see in it: an extended, bizarre section in the original final episode that gave credence to the conspiracists who theorize that the towers were brought down by a controlled explosion. Lee snipped the entire section, and despite the blunt edit, the shorter final cut, which premieres on Sept. 11, actually flows better. I could imagine a version of “Epicenters” that still covered the conspiracy theories, not to legitimize them, but as an example of the paranoia that thrives in a country lacking social trust — which Lee rightly deplores when it comes to anti-vaccine theories and the election hoaxes that drove some of the Capitol assailants. There’s a sobering meta-lesson in the fact that the most artful of this season’s Sept. 11 documentaries became an example of one of the very problems it diagnosed. But at least the resolution shows that criticism can make a difference, and that it’s not too late to look at history seriously and make a change.

Is 9/11 a day, or is it an Era?

Ask anyone old enough to remember travel before Sept. 11, 2001, and you're likely to get a gauzy recollection of what flying was like.

There was security screening, but it wasn't anywhere near as intrusive. There were no long checkpoint lines.

Passengers and their families could walk right to the gate together, postponing goodbye hugs until the last possible moment. Overall, an airport experience meant far less stress.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/freedom-tower-the-skyscraper-symbolising-new-yorks-resilience-411055">'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience</a>

That all ended when four hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania.

The worst terror attack on American soil led to increased and sometimes tension-filled security measures in airports across the world, aimed at preventing a repeat of that awful day. The cataclysm has also contributed to other changes large and small that have reshaped the airline industry,&nbsp;and, for consumers, made air travel more stressful than ever.

Two months after the attacks, President George W. Bush signed legislation creating the Transportation Security Administration, a force of federal airport screeners that replaced the private companies that airlines were hiring to handle security. The law required that all checked bags be screened, cockpit doors be reinforced, and more federal air marshals be put on flights.

There has not been another 9/11. Nothing even close. But after that day, flying changed forever.

New threats, privacy concerns

Here's how it unfolded.

Security measures evolved with new threats, and so travellers were asked to take off belts and remove some items from bags for scanning. Things that clearly could be wielded as weapons, like the box-cutters used by the 9/11 hijackers, were banned. After 'shoe bomber'&nbsp;Richard Reid's attempt to take down a flight from Paris to Miami in late 2001, footwear started coming off at security checkpoints.

Each new requirement seemed to make checkpoint lines longer, forcing passengers to arrive at the airport earlier if they wanted to make their flights. To many travellers, other rules were more mystifying, such as limits on liquids because the wrong ones could possibly be used to concoct a bomb.

"It's a much bigger hassle than it was before 9/11,&nbsp;much bigger,&nbsp;but we have gotten used to it,"&nbsp;Ronald Briggs said as he and his wife, Jeanne, waited at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport for a flight to London last month. The north Texas retirees, who traveled frequently before the pandemic, said they are more worried about <a href="https://www.wionews.com/topics/coronavirus">COVID-19</a> than terrorism.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/twenty-years-on-pandemic-gives-911-conspiracists-fresh-impetus-411061">Twenty years on, pandemic gives 9/11 conspiracists fresh impetus</a>

"The point about taking shoes off because of one incident on a plane seems somewhat on the extreme side," Ronald Briggs said, "but the PreCheck works pretty smoothly, and I've learned to use a plastic belt so I don't have to take it off."&nbsp;

The long lines created by post-attack measures gave rise to the PreCheck and Global Entry "trusted-traveler programs" in which people who pay a fee and provide certain information about themselves pass through checkpoints without removing shoes and jackets or taking laptops out of their bag.

But that convenience has come at a cost: privacy.

On its application and in brief interviews, PreCheck asks people about basic information like work history and where they have lived, and they give a fingerprint and agree to a criminal-records check. Privacy advocates are particularly concerned about ideas that TSA has floated to also examine social media postings (the agency's top official says that has been dropped), press reports about people, location data and information from data brokers including how applicants spend their money.

"It's far from clear that that has any relationship to aviation security,"&nbsp;says Jay Stanley, a privacy expert at the American Civil Liberties Union.

More than 10 million people have enrolled in PreCheck. TSA wants to raise that to 25 million.

The goal is to let TSA officers spend more time on passengers considered to be a bigger risk. As the country marks the 20th anniversary of the attacks, the TSA's work to expand PreCheck is unfolding in a way privacy advocates worry could put people's information at more risk.

Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/blame-for-afghanistan-lies-on-president-biden-says-911-era-nypd-commissioner-410532">Exclusive: Blame for Afghanistan 'lies on President Biden', says 9/11-era NYPD commissioner&nbsp;</a>

At the direction of Congress, the TSA will expand the use of private vendors to gather information from PreCheck applicants. It currently uses a company called Idemia, and plans by the end of the year to add two more ? Telos Identity Management Solutions and Clear Secure Inc.

Clear, which recently went public, plans to use PreCheck enrollment to boost membership in its own identity-verification product by bundling the two offerings. That will make Clear's own product more valuable to its customers, which include sports stadiums and concert promoters.

"They are really trying to increase their market share by collecting quite a lot of very sensitive data on as many people as they can get their hands on. That strikes a lot of alarm bells for me,"&nbsp;says India McKinney, director of federal affairs for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy group for digital rights.

TSA Administrator David Pekoske, though, sees Clear's strategy as helping TSA. Says Pekoske: "We have allowed the vendors to bundle their offerings together with the idea that would be an incentive for people to sign up for the trusted-traveler programs." The TSA is testing the use of kiosks equipped with facial-recognition technology to check photo IDs and boarding passes rather than having an officer do it. Critics say facial-recognition technology makes errors, especially on people of color.

Also read |&nbsp;​​​​​​​<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/911-attacks-us-president-moves-to-declassify-documents-as-20th-anniversary-approaches-410579">9/11 attacks: US president moves to declassify documents as 20th anniversary approaches</a>

TSA officials told privacy advocates earlier this year that those kiosks will also pull photos taken when the traveler applied for PreCheck, McKinney says. That concerns her because it would mean connecting the kiosks to the internet&nbsp;(TSA says that much is true)&nbsp;and potentially exposing the information to hackers.

"They are totally focusing on the convenience factor," McKinney says, "and they are not focusing on the privacy and security factors."

Security theatre&nbsp;

Despite the trauma that led to its creation, and the intense desire to avoid another 9/11, the TSA itself has frequently been the subject of questions about its methods, ideas and effectiveness.

Flight attendants and air marshals were outraged when the agency proposed in 2013 to let passengers carry folding pocket knives and other long-banned items on planes again. The agency dropped the idea. And after another outcry, the TSA removed full-body scanners that produced realistic-looking images that some travelers compared to virtual strip searches. They were replaced by other machines that caused fewer privacy and health objections. Pat-downs of travelers are a constant complaint.

In 2015, a published report said TSA officers failed 95 per cent of the time to detect weapons or explosive material carried by undercover inspectors. Members of Congress who received a classified briefing raised their concerns to Pekoske, with one lawmaker saying that TSA "is broken badly."

<div class="videoWrapper trancodeVideo"><iframe allowfullscreen="" autoplay="1" class="includeVideo" frameborder="0" height="350" src="https://www.wionews.com/videos/former-commissioner-of-new-york-city-police-dept-bernard-kerik-speaks-on-911-attacks-410624/embed" style="width:100%;max-width:560px;" width="560"></iframe></div>

Critics, including former TSA officers, have derided the agency as "security theater"&nbsp;that gives a false impression of safeguarding the traveling public. Pekoske dismisses that notion by pointing to the huge number of guns seized at airport checkpoints&nbsp;(more than 3,200 last year, 83 per cent&nbsp;of them loaded)&nbsp;instead of making it onto planes.

Pekoske also ticked off other TSA tasks, including vetting passengers, screening checked bags with 3-D technology, inspecting cargo and putting federal air marshals on flights.

"There is an awful lot there that people don't see,"&nbsp;Pekoske says. "Rest assured: This is not security theater. It's real security."

Many independent experts agree with Pekoske's assessment, though they usually see areas where the TSA must improve.

"TSA is an effective deterrent against most attacks,"&nbsp;says Jeffrey Price, who teaches aviation security at Metropolitan State University of Denver and has co-authored books on the subject. "If it's security theater, like some critics say, it's pretty good security theater because since 9/11 we haven't had a successful attack against aviation."

This summer, an average of nearly 2 million people per day have flowed through TSA checkpoints. On weekends and holidays they can be teeming with stressed-out travelers. During the middle of the week, even at big airports like DFW, they are less crowded; they hum rather than roar. Most travelers accept any inconvenience as the price of security in an uncertain world.

Travel "is getting harder and harder, and I don't think it's just my age,"&nbsp;said Paula Gathings, who taught school in Arkansas for many years and was waiting for a flight to Qatar and then another to Kenya, where she will spend the next several months teaching. She blames the difficulty of travel on the pandemic, not the security apparatus.

"They are there for my security. They aren't there to hassle me," Gathings said of TSA screeners and airport police. "Every time somebody asks me to do something, I can see the reason for it. Maybe it's the schoolteacher in me."

Threats from within

In 2015, a Russian airliner crashed shortly after taking off from Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt. American and British officials suspected it was brought down by a bomb.

It was, however, the exception rather than the rule. Even outside the United States, terror attacks on aviation since Sept. 11, 2001 have been rare. Is that because of effective security;&nbsp;Proving a negative, or even attributing it directly to a certain flavor of prevention, is always a dicey exercise.

And then there are the inside jobs.

— In 2016, a bomb ripped a hole in a Daallo Airlines plane shortly after takeoff, killing the bomber but 80 other passengers and crew survived. Somali authorities released video from Mogadishu’s airport that they said showed the man being handed&nbsp;a laptop containing the bomb.

— In 2018, a Delta Air Lines baggage handler in Atlanta was convicted of using his security pass to smuggle more than 100 guns on flights to New York.

— The following year, an American Airlines mechanic with Islamic State videos on his phone pleaded guilty to sabotaging a plane full of passengers by crippling a system that measures speed and altitude. Pilots aborted the flight during takeoff in Miami.

Those incidents highlight a threat that TSA needs to worry about — people who work for airlines or airports and have security clearance that lets them avoid regular screening. Pekoske says TSA is improving its oversight of the insider threat.

“All those folks that have a (security) badge, you’re right, many do have unescorted access throughout an airport, but they also go through a very rigorous vetting process before they are even hired,” Pekoske says. Those workers are typically reviewed every few years, but he says TSA is rolling out a system that will trigger immediate alerts based on law enforcement information.

With all the different ways that deadly chaos could happen on airplanes after 9/11, the fact remains: Most of the time, it hasn’t. The act of getting on a metal machine and rising into the air to travel quickly across states and countries and oceans remains a central part of the 21st-century human experience, arduous though it may be.

And while the post-9/11 global airport security apparatus has grown to what some consider unreasonable proportions, it will never neutralize all threats — or even be able to enforce the rules it has written. Just ask Nathan Dudney, a sales executive for a sporting goods manufacturer in Nashville who says he occasionally forgets about ammunition in his carry-on bag.

Sometimes it’s discovered, he says, and sometimes not. He understands.

“You can’t catch everything,” Dudney says. “They’re doing things to the best of their ability.”

Ask anyone old enough to remember travel before Sept. 11, 2001, and you're likely to get a gauzy recollection of what flying was like. There was security screening, but it wasn't anywhere near as intrusive.

Ask anyone old enough to remember travel before Sept. 11, 2001, and you're likely to get a gauzy recollection of what flying was like. There was security screening, but it wasn't anywhere near as intrusive. There were no long checkpoint lines. Passengers and their families could walk right to the gate together, postponing goodbye hugs until the last possible moment. Overall, an airport experience meant far less stress. Also read | 'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience That all ended when four hijacked planes crashed into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania. The worst terror attack on American soil led to increased and sometimes tension-filled security measures in airports across the world, aimed at preventing a repeat of that awful day. The cataclysm has also contributed to other changes large and small that have reshaped the airline industry, and, for consumers, made air travel more stressful than ever. Two months after the attacks, President George W. Bush signed legislation creating the Transportation Security Administration, a force of federal airport screeners that replaced the private companies that airlines were hiring to handle security. The law required that all checked bags be screened, cockpit doors be reinforced, and more federal air marshals be put on flights. There has not been another 9/11. Nothing even close. But after that day, flying changed forever. New threats, privacy concerns Here's how it unfolded. Security measures evolved with new threats, and so travellers were asked to take off belts and remove some items from bags for scanning. Things that clearly could be wielded as weapons, like the box-cutters used by the 9/11 hijackers, were banned. After 'shoe bomber' Richard Reid's attempt to take down a flight from Paris to Miami in late 2001, footwear started coming off at security checkpoints. Each new requirement seemed to make checkpoint lines longer, forcing passengers to arrive at the airport earlier if they wanted to make their flights. To many travellers, other rules were more mystifying, such as limits on liquids because the wrong ones could possibly be used to concoct a bomb. "It's a much bigger hassle than it was before 9/11, much bigger, but we have gotten used to it," Ronald Briggs said as he and his wife, Jeanne, waited at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport for a flight to London last month. The north Texas retirees, who traveled frequently before the pandemic, said they are more worried about COVID-19 than terrorism. Also read | Twenty years on, pandemic gives 9/11 conspiracists fresh impetus "The point about taking shoes off because of one incident on a plane seems somewhat on the extreme side," Ronald Briggs said, "but the PreCheck works pretty smoothly, and I've learned to use a plastic belt so I don't have to take it off." The long lines created by post-attack measures gave rise to the PreCheck and Global Entry "trusted-traveler programs" in which people who pay a fee and provide certain information about themselves pass through checkpoints without removing shoes and jackets or taking laptops out of their bag. But that convenience has come at a cost: privacy. On its application and in brief interviews, PreCheck asks people about basic information like work history and where they have lived, and they give a fingerprint and agree to a criminal-records check. Privacy advocates are particularly concerned about ideas that TSA has floated to also examine social media postings (the agency's top official says that has been dropped), press reports about people, location data and information from data brokers including how applicants spend their money. "It's far from clear that that has any relationship to aviation security," says Jay Stanley, a privacy expert at the American Civil Liberties Union. More than 10 million people have enrolled in PreCheck. TSA wants to raise that to 25 million. The goal is to let TSA officers spend more time on passengers considered to be a bigger risk. As the country marks the 20th anniversary of the attacks, the TSA's work to expand PreCheck is unfolding in a way privacy advocates worry could put people's information at more risk. Also read | Exclusive: Blame for Afghanistan 'lies on President Biden', says 9/11-era NYPD commissioner At the direction of Congress, the TSA will expand the use of private vendors to gather information from PreCheck applicants. It currently uses a company called Idemia, and plans by the end of the year to add two more ? Telos Identity Management Solutions and Clear Secure Inc. Clear, which recently went public, plans to use PreCheck enrollment to boost membership in its own identity-verification product by bundling the two offerings. That will make Clear's own product more valuable to its customers, which include sports stadiums and concert promoters. "They are really trying to increase their market share by collecting quite a lot of very sensitive data on as many people as they can get their hands on. That strikes a lot of alarm bells for me," says India McKinney, director of federal affairs for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an advocacy group for digital rights. TSA Administrator David Pekoske, though, sees Clear's strategy as helping TSA. Says Pekoske: "We have allowed the vendors to bundle their offerings together with the idea that would be an incentive for people to sign up for the trusted-traveler programs." The TSA is testing the use of kiosks equipped with facial-recognition technology to check photo IDs and boarding passes rather than having an officer do it. Critics say facial-recognition technology makes errors, especially on people of color. Also read | 9/11 attacks: US president moves to declassify documents as 20th anniversary approaches TSA officials told privacy advocates earlier this year that those kiosks will also pull photos taken when the traveler applied for PreCheck, McKinney says. That concerns her because it would mean connecting the kiosks to the internet (TSA says that much is true) and potentially exposing the information to hackers. "They are totally focusing on the convenience factor," McKinney says, "and they are not focusing on the privacy and security factors." Security theatre Despite the trauma that led to its creation, and the intense desire to avoid another 9/11, the TSA itself has frequently been the subject of questions about its methods, ideas and effectiveness. Flight attendants and air marshals were outraged when the agency proposed in 2013 to let passengers carry folding pocket knives and other long-banned items on planes again. The agency dropped the idea. And after another outcry, the TSA removed full-body scanners that produced realistic-looking images that some travelers compared to virtual strip searches. They were replaced by other machines that caused fewer privacy and health objections. Pat-downs of travelers are a constant complaint. In 2015, a published report said TSA officers failed 95 per cent of the time to detect weapons or explosive material carried by undercover inspectors. Members of Congress who received a classified briefing raised their concerns to Pekoske, with one lawmaker saying that TSA "is broken badly." Critics, including former TSA officers, have derided the agency as "security theater" that gives a false impression of safeguarding the traveling public. Pekoske dismisses that notion by pointing to the huge number of guns seized at airport checkpoints (more than 3,200 last year, 83 per cent of them loaded) instead of making it onto planes. Pekoske also ticked off other TSA tasks, including vetting passengers, screening checked bags with 3-D technology, inspecting cargo and putting federal air marshals on flights. "There is an awful lot there that people don't see," Pekoske says. "Rest assured: This is not security theater. It's real security." Many independent experts agree with Pekoske's assessment, though they usually see areas where the TSA must improve. "TSA is an effective deterrent against most attacks," says Jeffrey Price, who teaches aviation security at Metropolitan State University of Denver and has co-authored books on the subject. "If it's security theater, like some critics say, it's pretty good security theater because since 9/11 we haven't had a successful attack against aviation." This summer, an average of nearly 2 million people per day have flowed through TSA checkpoints. On weekends and holidays they can be teeming with stressed-out travelers. During the middle of the week, even at big airports like DFW, they are less crowded; they hum rather than roar. Most travelers accept any inconvenience as the price of security in an uncertain world. Travel "is getting harder and harder, and I don't think it's just my age," said Paula Gathings, who taught school in Arkansas for many years and was waiting for a flight to Qatar and then another to Kenya, where she will spend the next several months teaching. She blames the difficulty of travel on the pandemic, not the security apparatus. "They are there for my security. They aren't there to hassle me," Gathings said of TSA screeners and airport police. "Every time somebody asks me to do something, I can see the reason for it. Maybe it's the schoolteacher in me." Threats from within In 2015, a Russian airliner crashed shortly after taking off from Sharm El Sheikh in Egypt. American and British officials suspected it was brought down by a bomb. It was, however, the exception rather than the rule. Even outside the United States, terror attacks on aviation since Sept. 11, 2001 have been rare. Is that because of effective security; Proving a negative, or even attributing it directly to a certain flavor of prevention, is always a dicey exercise. And then there are the inside jobs. — In 2016, a bomb ripped a hole in a Daallo Airlines plane shortly after takeoff, killing the bomber but 80 other passengers and crew survived. Somali authorities released video from Mogadishu’s airport that they said showed the man being handed a laptop containing the bomb. — In 2018, a Delta Air Lines baggage handler in Atlanta was convicted of using his security pass to smuggle more than 100 guns on flights to New York. — The following year, an American Airlines mechanic with Islamic State videos on his phone pleaded guilty to sabotaging a plane full of passengers by crippling a system that measures speed and altitude. Pilots aborted the flight during takeoff in Miami. Those incidents highlight a threat that TSA needs to worry about — people who work for airlines or airports and have security clearance that lets them avoid regular screening. Pekoske says TSA is improving its oversight of the insider threat. “All those folks that have a (security) badge, you’re right, many do have unescorted access throughout an airport, but they also go through a very rigorous vetting process before they are even hired,” Pekoske says. Those workers are typically reviewed every few years, but he says TSA is rolling out a system that will trigger immediate alerts based on law enforcement information. With all the different ways that deadly chaos could happen on airplanes after 9/11, the fact remains: Most of the time, it hasn’t. The act of getting on a metal machine and rising into the air to travel quickly across states and countries and oceans remains a central part of the 21st-century human experience, arduous though it may be. And while the post-9/11 global airport security apparatus has grown to what some consider unreasonable proportions, it will never neutralize all threats — or even be able to enforce the rules it has written. Just ask Nathan Dudney, a sales executive for a sporting goods manufacturer in Nashville who says he occasionally forgets about ammunition in his carry-on bag. Sometimes it’s discovered, he says, and sometimes not. He understands. “You can’t catch everything,” Dudney says. “They’re doing things to the best of their ability.”

How 9/11 changed air travel: More security, less privacy

It is the skyscraper that replaced the Twin Towers in New York's skyline. Inaugurated in 2014, the One World Trade Center has become a symbol of resilience after the horror of 9/11.&nbsp;

Commonly referred to as the "Freedom Tower," it is America's tallest building at 1,776 feet (541 meters) and an emblem of the US economic capital.

From its conception, the tower had to testify to New York's durability -- looking to the future despite the tragedy -- according to one of its architects, Kenneth Lewis.

As harrowing as the images were of the Twin Towers collapsing to the ground on September 11, 2001, no one questioned replacing them with another skyscraper, situated right next "Ground Zero."

For the architects at SOM, which builds skyscrapers around the world, it was an opportunity to realize concepts that they had been thinking about for years.

"We were thinking it's the beginning of the millennium, we were thinking that this had to be the next generation of buildings, both in terms of safety, as well as environmental impact," recalled Lewis.

Evacuation time

Among the most nightmarish images from 9/11 are those of people jumping to their deaths from the towers to escape the blaze.

The architects launched ideas about how to evacuate people other than from the stairs. Inventors came back with a giant chute, and a zip wire, with a parachutist demonstrating the latter, Lewis remembers.

"It was the scariest thing," he says. "We just couldn't imagine someone who might be a little bit overweight or a little bit afraid taking a jump out the window."

In the end, the only solution was to shield the heart of the building with reinforced concrete, "broad enough that people can get out of there," he explained.

The architects implemented safety standards on One WTC that have since become standard for skyscrapers.

They include wide stairwells to allow a quick evacuation of the 104-storey tower, a signaling light to alert aircraft, fire-resistant cameras and communication tools on every floor to allow rescuers to constantly monitor the situation.

"We had a goal, which was an hour evacuation total time to evacuate the whole building," said Lewis. 
Firefighters were invited to planning meetings. It was they who suggested a back-up system capable of compensating for the failure of emergency generators on 9/11 to provide electricity long enough to evacuate the building.

"They had been through such trauma, they had to be a part of the solutions we were coming up with," said Lewis. 
Fire was not the only concern: in the fall of 2001, several anonymous letters containing anthrax were sent to some media and politicians, killing five people.

"We started to think about the filtering system and the air quality," Lewis explained.

"Think of a worst-case scenario and then what would that mean, and then prepare for it," he added, explaining their methodology.

'Transformative moment'

Almost 20 years later and the pandemic has left One WTC and most of Manhattan's prestigious towers empty for months.

"People were thinking we were going to come back much quicker than we have," admitted Lewis.

"We were immediately looking at the types of filtration systems that are in there these buildings, and most new buildings have high efficiency filters, particulate filters that also deal with viruses."

But if the office towers have not yet regained their pre-pandemic occupancy rate, their preeminence in New York's skyline cannot be called into question.

A tower of some 600 apartments is under construction in Brooklyn and will become the first "super-skyscraper" outside Manhattan when it is completed next year.&nbsp;

Around 20 other skyscrapers are in the works across New York.

As well as the environment, the mental health of the occupants of these buildings is now also a priority, said Lewis.

"We're in 2021 and we're talking about well-being and incorporating that into the spaces we're doing, creating outdoor spaces that people can work in, rooftop terraces that are really workspaces, meeting spaces.

"It really is a transformative moment," he said.

In the meantime, One WTC is on the way to becoming as iconic as its predecessors.

While the 9/11 Memorial symbolises "the void" created by the attacks, the "Freedom Tower" tower represents "the positive," according to Lewis.

"A place of innovation and new thinking and modern ideas of safety and security," he said.

It is the skyscraper that replaced the Twin Towers in New York's skyline. Inaugurated in 2014, the One World Trade Center has become a symbol of resilience after the horror of 9/11.

It is the skyscraper that replaced the Twin Towers in New York's skyline. Inaugurated in 2014, the One World Trade Center has become a symbol of resilience after the horror of 9/11. Commonly referred to as the "Freedom Tower," it is America's tallest building at 1,776 feet (541 meters) and an emblem of the US economic capital. From its conception, the tower had to testify to New York's durability -- looking to the future despite the tragedy -- according to one of its architects, Kenneth Lewis. As harrowing as the images were of the Twin Towers collapsing to the ground on September 11, 2001, no one questioned replacing them with another skyscraper, situated right next "Ground Zero." For the architects at SOM, which builds skyscrapers around the world, it was an opportunity to realize concepts that they had been thinking about for years. "We were thinking it's the beginning of the millennium, we were thinking that this had to be the next generation of buildings, both in terms of safety, as well as environmental impact," recalled Lewis. Evacuation time Among the most nightmarish images from 9/11 are those of people jumping to their deaths from the towers to escape the blaze. The architects launched ideas about how to evacuate people other than from the stairs. Inventors came back with a giant chute, and a zip wire, with a parachutist demonstrating the latter, Lewis remembers. "It was the scariest thing," he says. "We just couldn't imagine someone who might be a little bit overweight or a little bit afraid taking a jump out the window." In the end, the only solution was to shield the heart of the building with reinforced concrete, "broad enough that people can get out of there," he explained. The architects implemented safety standards on One WTC that have since become standard for skyscrapers. They include wide stairwells to allow a quick evacuation of the 104-storey tower, a signaling light to alert aircraft, fire-resistant cameras and communication tools on every floor to allow rescuers to constantly monitor the situation. "We had a goal, which was an hour evacuation total time to evacuate the whole building," said Lewis. Firefighters were invited to planning meetings. It was they who suggested a back-up system capable of compensating for the failure of emergency generators on 9/11 to provide electricity long enough to evacuate the building. "They had been through such trauma, they had to be a part of the solutions we were coming up with," said Lewis. Fire was not the only concern: in the fall of 2001, several anonymous letters containing anthrax were sent to some media and politicians, killing five people. "We started to think about the filtering system and the air quality," Lewis explained. "Think of a worst-case scenario and then what would that mean, and then prepare for it," he added, explaining their methodology. 'Transformative moment' Almost 20 years later and the pandemic has left One WTC and most of Manhattan's prestigious towers empty for months. "People were thinking we were going to come back much quicker than we have," admitted Lewis. "We were immediately looking at the types of filtration systems that are in there these buildings, and most new buildings have high efficiency filters, particulate filters that also deal with viruses." But if the office towers have not yet regained their pre-pandemic occupancy rate, their preeminence in New York's skyline cannot be called into question. A tower of some 600 apartments is under construction in Brooklyn and will become the first "super-skyscraper" outside Manhattan when it is completed next year. Around 20 other skyscrapers are in the works across New York. As well as the environment, the mental health of the occupants of these buildings is now also a priority, said Lewis. "We're in 2021 and we're talking about well-being and incorporating that into the spaces we're doing, creating outdoor spaces that people can work in, rooftop terraces that are really workspaces, meeting spaces. "It really is a transformative moment," he said. In the meantime, One WTC is on the way to becoming as iconic as its predecessors. While the 9/11 Memorial symbolises "the void" created by the attacks, the "Freedom Tower" tower represents "the positive," according to Lewis. "A place of innovation and new thinking and modern ideas of safety and security," he said.

'Freedom Tower' - the skyscraper symbolising New York's resilience

As a supportive gesture to victims' families, US President Joe Biden signed an executive order directing the declassification of certain documents related to the September 11, 2001&nbsp;terrorist attacks, on Friday.

The families have been asking for the records for a long time. Coming little more than a week before the 20th anniversary of the attacks,&nbsp;the order&nbsp;is a significant moment in a years-long tussle between the government and the families over what classified information about the run-up to the attacks could be made public.

Watch | Gravitas: America's lies on the trillion-dollar Afghan war

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Last month, the conflict was on display when some 1,800 relatives, survivors and first responders opposed Biden's participation in 9/11 events if the documents remained declassified.

"The significant events in question occurred two decades ago or longer, and they concern a tragic moment that continues to resonate in American history and in the lives of so many Americans," the executive order said.

"It is therefore critical to ensure that the United States Government maximises transparency, relying on classification only when narrowly tailored and necessary," added the order.

Also Read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/un-chief-to-host-afghanistan-aid-meeting-in-geneva-on-sept-13-spokesman-410578" hreflang="en">UN chief to host Afghanistan aid meeting in Geneva on Sept 13: Spokesman</a>

The order has directed the Justice Department and other executive branch agencies to begin a declassification review and requires that declassified documents be released over the next six months.

The executive order's practical impact and any new documents it might yield was not immediately clear.

(With inputs from agencies)

As a supportive gesture to victims' families, US President Joe Biden signed an executive order directing the declassification of certain documents related to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, on Friday.

As a supportive gesture to victims' families, US President Joe Biden signed an executive order directing the declassification of certain documents related to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, on Friday. The families have been asking for the records for a long time. Coming little more than a week before the 20th anniversary of the attacks, the order is a significant moment in a years-long tussle between the government and the families over what classified information about the run-up to the attacks could be made public. Watch | Gravitas: America's lies on the trillion-dollar Afghan war × Last month, the conflict was on display when some 1,800 relatives, survivors and first responders opposed Biden's participation in 9/11 events if the documents remained declassified. "The significant events in question occurred two decades ago or longer, and they concern a tragic moment that continues to resonate in American history and in the lives of so many Americans," the executive order said. "It is therefore critical to ensure that the United States Government maximises transparency, relying on classification only when narrowly tailored and necessary," added the order. Also Read: UN chief to host Afghanistan aid meeting in Geneva on Sept 13: Spokesman The order has directed the Justice Department and other executive branch agencies to begin a declassification review and requires that declassified documents be released over the next six months. The executive order's practical impact and any new documents it might yield was not immediately clear. (With inputs from agencies)

9/11 attacks: US president moves to declassify documents as 20th anniversary approaches

It is going to be 20 years since the world suffered a devastating loss in the US on September 11 as a terrorist-controlled aircrafts struck the famous World Trade Center.<o:p></o:p>

Now, two decades later, the fear caused by those horrifying attacks still continue to haunt several people living in the US, a study claims.<o:p></o:p>

On September 11, 2001, nearly 3,000 people were declared dead and several hundred others were injured in the US.

<o:p>Also read |&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/jacinda-ardern-calls-new-zealand-stabbing-terrorist-attack-suspect-shot-dead-410375">Jacinda Ardern calls New Zealand stabbing 'terrorist attack'; suspect shot dead</a></o:p>

Data collected before Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan suggests that a lot of people in America are still scared about possible terrorist attacks and have developed a fear of entering skyscrapers.<o:p></o:p>

Majority of Americans who are old enough to remember the attack have clear memories of where they were and what were doing when the heinous attack took place. These people are also scared of travelling in planes and going to a skyscraper now.<o:p></o:p>

Nearly 26 per cent Americans are now scared of flying in airplanes and 36 per cent are hesitant about travelling abroad. In addition to this, 27 per cent people are unwilling to enter a skyscraper and 37 per cent people admit they try to avoid any event that is being attended by hundreds of people.<o:p></o:p>

While the numbers have reduced, the fear still continues decades later, and some believe it may increase now as Taliban took control of Afghanistan.<o:p></o:p>

In a survey, it was also revealed that 44 per cent people from minority groups have altered their lifestyle and are scared of flying since the attack. This showed the way the minority groups were targeted in the country after the attack, as only 21 per cent of White Americans agreed to this change.

<o:p><a href="https://www.wionews.com/videos/gravitas-what-is-the-cost-of-talking-to-the-taliban-410307">WATCH |</a></o:p>

<div class="videoWrapper trancodeVideo"><iframe allowfullscreen="" autoplay="1" class="includeVideo" frameborder="0" height="350" src="https://www.wionews.com/videos/gravitas-what-is-the-cost-of-talking-to-the-taliban-410307/embed" style="width:100%;max-width:560px;" width="560"></iframe></div>

Americans are sceptical and doubtful about the US government’s hold on terrorism and claim that irrespective of what the officials claim, they believe the government has failed to achieve an upper hand in its fight against terrorism.<o:p></o:p>

US troops were deployed in Afghanistan following the 9/11 attack, as the government vowed to take revenge and justice for those killed in the brutal attack. However, now decades later, as the US troops returned to their home country and Taliban took control of Afghanistan once again, 28 per cent Americans claim they have permanently changed the way they live.<o:p></o:p>

Even before the current Afghan crisis, 22 per cent of people believed that the terrorists are winning the war, rather than the US and 49 per cent of people say that nobody is winning the 'forever war'.<o:p></o:p>

Now, people are also hesitant about whether or not the US government will be able to protect its citizens from terrorism as nearly 36 per cent of people were worried about becoming a victim of some terrorist attack, even before the current Afghan crisis.<o:p></o:p>

It is going to be 20 years since the world suffered a devastating loss in the US on September 11 as a terrorist-controlled aircrafts struck the famous World Trade Center.

It is going to be 20 years since the world suffered a devastating loss in the US on September 11 as a terrorist-controlled aircrafts struck the famous World Trade Center. Now, two decades later, the fear caused by those horrifying attacks still continue to haunt several people living in the US, a study claims. On September 11, 2001, nearly 3,000 people were declared dead and several hundred others were injured in the US. Also read | Jacinda Ardern calls New Zealand stabbing 'terrorist attack'; suspect shot dead Data collected before Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan suggests that a lot of people in America are still scared about possible terrorist attacks and have developed a fear of entering skyscrapers. Majority of Americans who are old enough to remember the attack have clear memories of where they were and what were doing when the heinous attack took place. These people are also scared of travelling in planes and going to a skyscraper now. Nearly 26 per cent Americans are now scared of flying in airplanes and 36 per cent are hesitant about travelling abroad. In addition to this, 27 per cent people are unwilling to enter a skyscraper and 37 per cent people admit they try to avoid any event that is being attended by hundreds of people. While the numbers have reduced, the fear still continues decades later, and some believe it may increase now as Taliban took control of Afghanistan. In a survey, it was also revealed that 44 per cent people from minority groups have altered their lifestyle and are scared of flying since the attack. This showed the way the minority groups were targeted in the country after the attack, as only 21 per cent of White Americans agreed to this change. WATCH | Americans are sceptical and doubtful about the US government’s hold on terrorism and claim that irrespective of what the officials claim, they believe the government has failed to achieve an upper hand in its fight against terrorism. US troops were deployed in Afghanistan following the 9/11 attack, as the government vowed to take revenge and justice for those killed in the brutal attack. However, now decades later, as the US troops returned to their home country and Taliban took control of Afghanistan once again, 28 per cent Americans claim they have permanently changed the way they live. Even before the current Afghan crisis, 22 per cent of people believed that the terrorists are winning the war, rather than the US and 49 per cent of people say that nobody is winning the 'forever war'. Now, people are also hesitant about whether or not the US government will be able to protect its citizens from terrorism as nearly 36 per cent of people were worried about becoming a victim of some terrorist attack, even before the current Afghan crisis.

Two decades later, Americans fear entering skyscraper as memories of 9/11 attack still haunt US

As the US enters the final phase of its pullout from <a href="https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/several-rockets-fired-towards-kabul-airport-intercepted-by-us-defence-system-report-409275">Afghanistan</a>&nbsp;amid attacks on Kabul airport, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said people on the ground working with indigenous forces is the "best insurance policy against another 9/11".

Graham was speaking to a US television network asserted that, "I wouldn’t have withdrawn" while adding, "I would have kept the counterterrorism forces on the ground."

"I would have held the Taliban to the conditions set out in the agreement with Trump,” the Republican Senator said referring to the Doha talks which opened last year between the former Trump administration officials and the Taliban.

Watch:

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The Republican Senator said, "parade of horribles" has been unfolding in Afghanistan amid the US evacuation with "hundreds of American citizens" being left behind.

"The chance of another 9/11 just went through the roof. These drone attacks will not degrade ISIS," Graham said, adding," the number of <a href="https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/hibatullah-akhundzada-talibans-reclusive-leader-set-to-play-key-role-in-afghanistan-409338">ISIS</a> fighters have doubled. We have turned our back on our allies and we set the conditions for another 9/11.”

US has evacuated several thousand personnel including Afghans with just hours left for the pullout deadline. President Biden had set August 31 as the date for US personnel to leave the country.

<a href="https://www.wionews.com/south-asia/watch-taliban-militants-surround-tv-anchor-during-news-show-as-video-goes-viral-409309">Watch: Taliban militants surround TV anchor during news show as video goes viral</a>

On Monday&nbsp;rockets were fired towards Kabul airport as reports said the rocket attack was launched from the back of a vehicle. However, there were no reports of causalities.

The incident was confirmed by the White House and President Biden was briefed about the incident even as airport evacuation operations continued.

On Sunday, a US drone strike had killed a suicide car bomber which the US said was preparing&nbsp;another attack on Kabul airport with ISIS-K which had claimed responsibility for the attack on Thursday suspected to be planning another attack in an explosive-laden vehicle.

(With inputs from Agencies) 
&nbsp;

As the US enters the final phase of its pullout from Afghanistan amid attacks on Kabul airport, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said people on the ground working with indigenous forces is the "best insurance policy against another 9/11".

As the US enters the final phase of its pullout from Afghanistan amid attacks on Kabul airport, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said people on the ground working with indigenous forces is the "best insurance policy against another 9/11". Graham was speaking to a US television network asserted that, "I wouldn’t have withdrawn" while adding, "I would have kept the counterterrorism forces on the ground." "I would have held the Taliban to the conditions set out in the agreement with Trump,” the Republican Senator said referring to the Doha talks which opened last year between the former Trump administration officials and the Taliban. Watch: The Republican Senator said, "parade of horribles" has been unfolding in Afghanistan amid the US evacuation with "hundreds of American citizens" being left behind. "The chance of another 9/11 just went through the roof. These drone attacks will not degrade ISIS," Graham said, adding," the number of ISIS fighters have doubled. We have turned our back on our allies and we set the conditions for another 9/11.” US has evacuated several thousand personnel including Afghans with just hours left for the pullout deadline. President Biden had set August 31 as the date for US personnel to leave the country. Watch: Taliban militants surround TV anchor during news show as video goes viral On Monday rockets were fired towards Kabul airport as reports said the rocket attack was launched from the back of a vehicle. However, there were no reports of causalities. The incident was confirmed by the White House and President Biden was briefed about the incident even as airport evacuation operations continued. On Sunday, a US drone strike had killed a suicide car bomber which the US said was preparing another attack on Kabul airport with ISIS-K which had claimed responsibility for the attack on Thursday suspected to be planning another attack in an explosive-laden vehicle. (With inputs from Agencies)

Chance of another 9/11 just went through the roof, says Republican Senator Lindsey Graham on Afghanistan

The US Department of Homeland Security issued a&nbsp;new&nbsp;terrorism&nbsp;threat&nbsp;advisory on Friday&nbsp;ahead&nbsp;of the&nbsp;anniversary&nbsp;of the September&nbsp;11&nbsp;terror attacks and amid a resurgence of the coronavirus pandemic.

The National&nbsp;Terrorism&nbsp;Advisory System Bulletin said the United States faces a "heightened&nbsp;threat&nbsp;environment" from both domestic terrorists "and those inspired or motivated by foreign terrorists and other malign foreign influences."

It cited increased use of "online forums to influence and spread violent extremist narratives and promote violent activity."

The&nbsp;new&nbsp;advisory updated a January alert following the attack on the US Congress by supporters of then-president Donald Trump, when DHS said the country faced "increasingly complex and volatile" threats from anti-government and racially motivated extremists, often stirred up by online influence from abroad.

The bulletin had already been amended in May, with DHS&nbsp;warning&nbsp;violent extremists could exploit the easing of Covid-19 restrictions to conduct attacks.

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"Extremists may seek to exploit the emergence of Covid-19 variants by viewing the potential re-establishment of public health restrictions across the United States as a rationale to conduct attacks," the DHS advisory said, adding that "pandemic-related stressors... may contribute to more violence this year."

Despite a rapid vaccination program, coronavirus case numbers have increased sharply in recent months in the United States due to the spread of the Delta variant, prompting&nbsp;new&nbsp;health measures.

The advisory, which expires on November&nbsp;11, also noted that in the lead-up to the 20th&nbsp;anniversary&nbsp;of the September&nbsp;11&nbsp;attacks, the Yemeni branch of Al-Qaeda, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), had put out an English-language version of its propaganda "Inspire" magazine for the first time in over four years.&nbsp;

This "demonstrates that foreign terrorist organisations continue efforts to inspire US-based individuals susceptible to violent extremist influences," DHS said.

The United States, which considers AQAP the terror group's most dangerous branch, has carried out a campaign of drone strikes against its fighters in Yemen since soon after the&nbsp;9/11&nbsp;attacks.&nbsp;

DHS was established after&nbsp;9/11&nbsp;and regularly&nbsp;issues&nbsp;terrorism&nbsp;threat&nbsp;advisories.

The US Department of Homeland Security issued a new terrorism threat advisory on Friday ahead of the anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks and amid a resurgence of the coronavirus pandemic.

The US Department of Homeland Security issued a new terrorism threat advisory on Friday ahead of the anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks and amid a resurgence of the coronavirus pandemic. The National Terrorism Advisory System Bulletin said the United States faces a "heightened threat environment" from both domestic terrorists "and those inspired or motivated by foreign terrorists and other malign foreign influences." It cited increased use of "online forums to influence and spread violent extremist narratives and promote violent activity." The new advisory updated a January alert following the attack on the US Congress by supporters of then-president Donald Trump, when DHS said the country faced "increasingly complex and volatile" threats from anti-government and racially motivated extremists, often stirred up by online influence from abroad. The bulletin had already been amended in May, with DHS warning violent extremists could exploit the easing of Covid-19 restrictions to conduct attacks. Also read | Businesses in Portland, Oregon, close early amid scorching heat "Extremists may seek to exploit the emergence of Covid-19 variants by viewing the potential re-establishment of public health restrictions across the United States as a rationale to conduct attacks," the DHS advisory said, adding that "pandemic-related stressors... may contribute to more violence this year." Despite a rapid vaccination program, coronavirus case numbers have increased sharply in recent months in the United States due to the spread of the Delta variant, prompting new health measures. The advisory, which expires on November 11, also noted that in the lead-up to the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, the Yemeni branch of Al-Qaeda, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), had put out an English-language version of its propaganda "Inspire" magazine for the first time in over four years. This "demonstrates that foreign terrorist organisations continue efforts to inspire US-based individuals susceptible to violent extremist influences," DHS said. The United States, which considers AQAP the terror group's most dangerous branch, has carried out a campaign of drone strikes against its fighters in Yemen since soon after the 9/11 attacks. DHS was established after 9/11 and regularly issues terrorism threat advisories.

US issues new terrorism threat warning ahead of 9/11 anniversary

The Biden administration on Monday transferred its first detainee out of Guantánamo Bay, repatriating a Moroccan man who had been recommended for discharge from the wartime prison starting in 2016 but nevertheless remained there during the Trump years.

The transfer of the man, Abdul Latif Nasser, 56, was the first sign of a renewed effort under President Joe Biden to winnow the population of prisoners by sending them to other countries that promise to ensure the men remain under security measures. Nasser was never charged with a crime.

The transfer process, which was pursued by the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations, had atrophied under President Donald Trump. With Nasser’s departure, there are now 39 prisoners at Guantánamo, 11 of whom have been charged with war crimes. At its peak in the years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the invasion of Afghanistan, the prison complex at the U.S. naval base held about 675 men.

Far more complex policy decisions about transfers await the Biden team, including whether to transfer a mentally ill Saudi man, Mohammed al-Qahtani, who was tortured at Guantánamo and is considered to have been one of several candidates to be a potential 20th hijacker on 9/11.

The remaining 28 prisoners who have not been charged during the nearly two decades they have been in custody are held as Nasser had been — as indefinite law-of-war detainees in the armed conflict against al-Qaida. Of those, 10 have been recommended for transfer with security arrangements by a federal parole-like panel.

The Biden White House, while supporting the goal of closing the prison, has adopted a low-key approach in that effort. Obama made it a signature policy, ordering that the prison be closed during his first year in office — and failed in the face of intense opposition from Congress. Biden and his aides have sought to avoid igniting the same kind of backlash by working quietly to begin reducing the prison population again.

“The United States is grateful to the Kingdom of Morocco for its willingness to support ongoing U.S. efforts to close the Guantánamo Bay detention facility,” a senior administration official said Sunday, while the transfer was underway, and so declined to be identified by name. The official said the White House was “dedicated to a deliberate and thorough process of responsibly reducing the detainee population and ultimately closing the Guantánamo Bay detention facility.”

Military intelligence officials have cast Nasser as a former Taliban fighter who battled the invading US&nbsp;forces in the Tora Bora mountains in late 2001. He told an interagency panel through a representative five years ago that he “deeply regrets his actions of the past,” and he was approved for release by the government panel on July 11, 2016, on the condition that he be sent only to his native Morocco with security assurances from its government.

Details of such arrangements are not public, but in the Obama years they typically included not letting the former detainee travel abroad for several years and a commitment to monitor him and to share information with the U.S. government about him.

U.S. forces delivered Nasser to Moroccan government custody early Monday. His attorney, Thomas Anthony Durkin of Chicago, said he was being held at a police station in the Casablanca area and that they expected him to be reunited with his family in coming days.

The Moroccan national news agency, MAP, said he was under investigation “for his alleged involvement in the perpetration of terror acts.” Detainees who were repatriated to Morocco in earlier administrations were similarly investigated, and some were prosecuted.

Nasser’s family members in Casablanca have pledged to support him by finding him work in his brother’s swimming pool cleaning business, Durkin said.

Durkin, who has represented Nasser for more than a decade, noted that Nasser was on the verge of release in early 2017 when the Trump administration halted all transfers and closed the office at the State Department that negotiated security arrangements for such deals.

Only one detainee left the prison during the Trump years, and under very different circumstances: A confessed al-Qaida terrorist was repatriated to Saudi Arabia to serve out a prison sentence imposed by a U.S. military commission, in accordance with an earlier plea agreement.

In a statement, Durkin called the last four years of Nasser’s 19-year detention “collateral damage of the Trump administration’s and zealous Republican war-on-terror hawks’ raw politics,” adding, “If this were a wrongful conviction case in Cook County, it would be worth $20 million.”

“We applaud the Biden administration for causing no further harm,” he said.

The Biden administration did not renegotiate the Obama-era agreement to repatriate Nasser, the senior official said, but the State Department did need “to reaffirm” the terms of the transfer agreement with Morocco. They were not disclosed.

A public radio personality with a similar name, Latif Nasser, now of the public radio program “Radiolab,” devoted a six-part audio series to questions about whether his near-namesake’s activities, including a stint at an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan in the late 1990s, merited two decades of U.S. military detention.

Nasser, the Guantánamo detainee, had been captured in 2001 by Pakistani security forces, which turned him over to the US&nbsp;military.

As part of its low-key approach, the Biden team has not revived the Obama-era position of a special envoy to travel the world negotiating deals for other countries to take in lower-level detainees. Instead, regional diplomats and career employees in the State Department’s Bureau of Counterterrorism handled talks with the Moroccan government, according to officials familiar with the matter.

“We are trying to find a way to act on each individual case,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at a human rights discussion in Paris on June 25. “In certain cases you need to find a country that is ready to welcome the person in question.”

Once a country is identified, he said, “we must have a guarantee that the rights of these people will be protected in that country. That’s not easy, either.”

On Monday, State Department spokesman Ned Price praised the Moroccan government for taking custody of Nasser and used the opportunity to urge other countries — which he did not name — to repatriate their citizens who were captured in Syria or Iraq in the conflict against the Islamic State group. Many European countries have hesitated to take responsibility for handling their nationals, leaving them in the hands of Kurdish fighters.

“Morocco’s leadership in facilitating Nasser’s repatriation, alongside its past willingness to return its foreign terrorist fighters from northeast Syria, should encourage other nations to repatriate their citizens who have traveled to fight for terrorist organizations abroad,” Price said.

The Biden administration has reinvigorated a parole-like process that was established in the Obama years to consider each Guantánamo detainee who was not charged with crimes, to decide whether to recommend turning him over to the custody of another country. The interagency Periodic Review Board has announced five decisions since Biden took office, and all of those detainees were approved for transfers — including the oldest man held at Guantánamo, a 73-year-old Pakistani with heart disease and other geriatric ailments.

The panel has representatives from six national security agencies, including the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Pentagon’s Joint Staff and the Department of Homeland Security, but a recommendation for transfers does not assure release. The State Department must still come up with a transfer deal, and the defense secretary must personally approve it and provide notice to Congress.

The board also held a hearing May 18 on whether to recommend the transfer of the Saudi prisoner who was tortured at Guantánamo, al-Qahtani, but has not announced a decision.

He has a separate lawsuit pending in federal court over whether his psychiatric condition, acute schizophrenia, justifies repatriating him to medical care in Saudi Arabia because he cannot receive adequate care at the naval base. As part of that lawsuit, his lawyers obtained a court order to have a panel of doctors, including two non-American ones, examine him.

The Justice Department during the Trump administration had opposed that lawsuit, and days before Trump left office his Army secretary changed a regulation to try to disqualify all Guantánamo prisoners, notably al-Qahtani, from the possibility of a court-ordered independent examination by outside doctors.

Some Democrats in Congress, signalling impatience at the pace of efforts to close the prison, have proposed legislation in the Appropriations Committee that would defund the detention operation at Guantánamo, which has been estimated to cost more than $13 million per prisoner per year.

Doing so, however, would require finding a place for the remaining 39 detainees to go. And even if the transfer of Nasser to Morocco turns out to be the first of a flurry, transfers of lower-level detainees alone will not close the prison.

Some prisoners would have to be brought to the United States, potentially to a military detention setting, notably Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who has yet to go on trial as the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Current federal law dating to early 2011 forbids such transfers. The Biden White House’s 2022 budget proposal would restore presidential authority to transfer Guantánamo detainees to a mainland prison facility. But that would be up to Congress.

Republicans and some Democrats have opposed the transfer of Mohammed and the others to detention in the United States and sought to stoke fears that giving them a trial on US&nbsp;soil or simply detaining them in the mainland would be more of a danger to national security. Opponents of the restrictions say that the federal government already holds many convicted terrorists on domestic soil safely and that bringing detainees from Guantánamo to similar detention would be no different.

In a sign that such political messaging may soon return, on May 25, eight Republican senators wrote Biden opposing his intent to close the detention center through transfers.

“The remaining 40 detainees are all high risk,” the senators wrote.

Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma led the effort. The others who signed it were Marsha Blackburn, Kevin Cramer, Ted Cruz, Steve Daines, James Inhofe, Jerry Moran and Thom Tillis.

The Biden administration on Monday transferred its first detainee out of Guantánamo Bay, repatriating a Moroccan man who had been recommended for discharge from the wartime prison starting in 2016 but nevertheless remained there during the Trump years.

The Biden administration on Monday transferred its first detainee out of Guantánamo Bay, repatriating a Moroccan man who had been recommended for discharge from the wartime prison starting in 2016 but nevertheless remained there during the Trump years. The transfer of the man, Abdul Latif Nasser, 56, was the first sign of a renewed effort under President Joe Biden to winnow the population of prisoners by sending them to other countries that promise to ensure the men remain under security measures. Nasser was never charged with a crime. The transfer process, which was pursued by the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations, had atrophied under President Donald Trump. With Nasser’s departure, there are now 39 prisoners at Guantánamo, 11 of whom have been charged with war crimes. At its peak in the years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the invasion of Afghanistan, the prison complex at the U.S. naval base held about 675 men. Far more complex policy decisions about transfers await the Biden team, including whether to transfer a mentally ill Saudi man, Mohammed al-Qahtani, who was tortured at Guantánamo and is considered to have been one of several candidates to be a potential 20th hijacker on 9/11. The remaining 28 prisoners who have not been charged during the nearly two decades they have been in custody are held as Nasser had been — as indefinite law-of-war detainees in the armed conflict against al-Qaida. Of those, 10 have been recommended for transfer with security arrangements by a federal parole-like panel. The Biden White House, while supporting the goal of closing the prison, has adopted a low-key approach in that effort. Obama made it a signature policy, ordering that the prison be closed during his first year in office — and failed in the face of intense opposition from Congress. Biden and his aides have sought to avoid igniting the same kind of backlash by working quietly to begin reducing the prison population again. “The United States is grateful to the Kingdom of Morocco for its willingness to support ongoing U.S. efforts to close the Guantánamo Bay detention facility,” a senior administration official said Sunday, while the transfer was underway, and so declined to be identified by name. The official said the White House was “dedicated to a deliberate and thorough process of responsibly reducing the detainee population and ultimately closing the Guantánamo Bay detention facility.” Military intelligence officials have cast Nasser as a former Taliban fighter who battled the invading US forces in the Tora Bora mountains in late 2001. He told an interagency panel through a representative five years ago that he “deeply regrets his actions of the past,” and he was approved for release by the government panel on July 11, 2016, on the condition that he be sent only to his native Morocco with security assurances from its government. Details of such arrangements are not public, but in the Obama years they typically included not letting the former detainee travel abroad for several years and a commitment to monitor him and to share information with the U.S. government about him. U.S. forces delivered Nasser to Moroccan government custody early Monday. His attorney, Thomas Anthony Durkin of Chicago, said he was being held at a police station in the Casablanca area and that they expected him to be reunited with his family in coming days. The Moroccan national news agency, MAP, said he was under investigation “for his alleged involvement in the perpetration of terror acts.” Detainees who were repatriated to Morocco in earlier administrations were similarly investigated, and some were prosecuted. Nasser’s family members in Casablanca have pledged to support him by finding him work in his brother’s swimming pool cleaning business, Durkin said. Durkin, who has represented Nasser for more than a decade, noted that Nasser was on the verge of release in early 2017 when the Trump administration halted all transfers and closed the office at the State Department that negotiated security arrangements for such deals. Only one detainee left the prison during the Trump years, and under very different circumstances: A confessed al-Qaida terrorist was repatriated to Saudi Arabia to serve out a prison sentence imposed by a U.S. military commission, in accordance with an earlier plea agreement. In a statement, Durkin called the last four years of Nasser’s 19-year detention “collateral damage of the Trump administration’s and zealous Republican war-on-terror hawks’ raw politics,” adding, “If this were a wrongful conviction case in Cook County, it would be worth $20 million.” “We applaud the Biden administration for causing no further harm,” he said. The Biden administration did not renegotiate the Obama-era agreement to repatriate Nasser, the senior official said, but the State Department did need “to reaffirm” the terms of the transfer agreement with Morocco. They were not disclosed. A public radio personality with a similar name, Latif Nasser, now of the public radio program “Radiolab,” devoted a six-part audio series to questions about whether his near-namesake’s activities, including a stint at an al-Qaida training camp in Afghanistan in the late 1990s, merited two decades of U.S. military detention. Nasser, the Guantánamo detainee, had been captured in 2001 by Pakistani security forces, which turned him over to the US military. As part of its low-key approach, the Biden team has not revived the Obama-era position of a special envoy to travel the world negotiating deals for other countries to take in lower-level detainees. Instead, regional diplomats and career employees in the State Department’s Bureau of Counterterrorism handled talks with the Moroccan government, according to officials familiar with the matter. “We are trying to find a way to act on each individual case,” Secretary of State Antony Blinken said at a human rights discussion in Paris on June 25. “In certain cases you need to find a country that is ready to welcome the person in question.” Once a country is identified, he said, “we must have a guarantee that the rights of these people will be protected in that country. That’s not easy, either.” On Monday, State Department spokesman Ned Price praised the Moroccan government for taking custody of Nasser and used the opportunity to urge other countries — which he did not name — to repatriate their citizens who were captured in Syria or Iraq in the conflict against the Islamic State group. Many European countries have hesitated to take responsibility for handling their nationals, leaving them in the hands of Kurdish fighters. “Morocco’s leadership in facilitating Nasser’s repatriation, alongside its past willingness to return its foreign terrorist fighters from northeast Syria, should encourage other nations to repatriate their citizens who have traveled to fight for terrorist organizations abroad,” Price said. The Biden administration has reinvigorated a parole-like process that was established in the Obama years to consider each Guantánamo detainee who was not charged with crimes, to decide whether to recommend turning him over to the custody of another country. The interagency Periodic Review Board has announced five decisions since Biden took office, and all of those detainees were approved for transfers — including the oldest man held at Guantánamo, a 73-year-old Pakistani with heart disease and other geriatric ailments. The panel has representatives from six national security agencies, including the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Pentagon’s Joint Staff and the Department of Homeland Security, but a recommendation for transfers does not assure release. The State Department must still come up with a transfer deal, and the defense secretary must personally approve it and provide notice to Congress. The board also held a hearing May 18 on whether to recommend the transfer of the Saudi prisoner who was tortured at Guantánamo, al-Qahtani, but has not announced a decision. He has a separate lawsuit pending in federal court over whether his psychiatric condition, acute schizophrenia, justifies repatriating him to medical care in Saudi Arabia because he cannot receive adequate care at the naval base. As part of that lawsuit, his lawyers obtained a court order to have a panel of doctors, including two non-American ones, examine him. The Justice Department during the Trump administration had opposed that lawsuit, and days before Trump left office his Army secretary changed a regulation to try to disqualify all Guantánamo prisoners, notably al-Qahtani, from the possibility of a court-ordered independent examination by outside doctors. Some Democrats in Congress, signalling impatience at the pace of efforts to close the prison, have proposed legislation in the Appropriations Committee that would defund the detention operation at Guantánamo, which has been estimated to cost more than $13 million per prisoner per year. Doing so, however, would require finding a place for the remaining 39 detainees to go. And even if the transfer of Nasser to Morocco turns out to be the first of a flurry, transfers of lower-level detainees alone will not close the prison. Some prisoners would have to be brought to the United States, potentially to a military detention setting, notably Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who has yet to go on trial as the accused mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks. Current federal law dating to early 2011 forbids such transfers. The Biden White House’s 2022 budget proposal would restore presidential authority to transfer Guantánamo detainees to a mainland prison facility. But that would be up to Congress. Republicans and some Democrats have opposed the transfer of Mohammed and the others to detention in the United States and sought to stoke fears that giving them a trial on US soil or simply detaining them in the mainland would be more of a danger to national security. Opponents of the restrictions say that the federal government already holds many convicted terrorists on domestic soil safely and that bringing detainees from Guantánamo to similar detention would be no different. In a sign that such political messaging may soon return, on May 25, eight Republican senators wrote Biden opposing his intent to close the detention center through transfers. “The remaining 40 detainees are all high risk,” the senators wrote. Sen. James Lankford of Oklahoma led the effort. The others who signed it were Marsha Blackburn, Kevin Cramer, Ted Cruz, Steve Daines, James Inhofe, Jerry Moran and Thom Tillis.

Biden administration transfers its first detainee from Guantánamo Bay

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