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There are occasions when a politician is required to say what happened. September 11 is one of them.
Nearly 3,000 people were murdered by Islamist terrorists. They were not unfortunate extras in some abstract pageant of global suffering. They were not incidental casualties of an unspecified “war that followed.” They were murdered by men who hijacked passenger aircraft and flew them into buildings on purpose. It is hard to think of a historical fact that requires less interpretation.
Yet the words of New York City’s Mayor, Zohran Mamdani, have raised the awkward question of whether he means to mark the day as an act of remembrance or as another occasion to lecture the public about the consequences of American foreign policy.
A post from 2023 has resurfaced. “Nearly 3,000 New Yorkers died on 9/11; 22 years later, the death hasn't stopped. We mourn our neighbors who died that day. The hundreds of thousands who died in the wars that followed. The unknown millions injured & displaced. In their memory, we work toward a better world,” Mamdani wrote on X in 2023.
There is nothing objectionable in mourning civilians killed in later wars. There is nothing objectionable in wanting a better world. There is something peculiar, however, in commemorating the greatest terrorist attack in American history without mentioning the terrorists.
The sentence contains the dead. It contains the wars. It contains the injured and the displaced. It contains the pious hope of a better world. What it does not contain is the word “terrorists.” Nor does it say that the nearly 3,000 New Yorkers were murdered. This may appear a small matter of wording. To the families of the dead it is not.
Some of those families are now asking that Mamdani stay away from New York’s 25th-anniversary commemoration. Their unease has only grown after his interview with Hasan Piker, who said in 2019, “America deserved 9/11.”
Mamdani first declined to condemn the remark. He later called it “objectionable and reprehensible.” One might have thought that identifying as reprehensible the claim that America deserved to be attacked by terrorists would be the easy part. Apparently even that required a pause for reflection.
Marc Thiessen, who was inside the Pentagon when the planes hit, was less given to philosophical hesitation. “As someone who was in the Pentagon when the planes hit, this is absolutely disgraceful. You have no business ever setting foot at Ground Zero, much less on 9/11. If you dare show up, I hope you are greeted with such a Bronx cheer that you slink away in shame,” wrote Thiessen.
New York City Councilwoman Inna Vernikov was no more impressed. “I guess they all just ‘died’ in an accident? And then you wonder why the families of 9/11 victims don’t want you at the ceremony. Stay home, Mamdani,” wrote Vernikov.
Florida Rep. Randy Fine was blunter still. “Nearly 25 years later, NYC’s Mayor is in bed with Muslim terrorists and refuses to call out evil for what it is. Unfortunately, it seems the city forgot when they elected Jihadi Mamdani mayor. But we never will,” wrote Fine.
Fox News contributor and former NYPD officer Paul Mauro offered the mayor some advice. “You've made this easy. Don't show up on 9/11 this year -- or any year. We're not interested in your moral equivalency, nepo baby. Stick to the parlor communism daddy taught you. You and your buddy Piker can spend the day practicing Mandarin,” he said.
Michael La Rosa, a former spokesman for first lady DOCTOR Jill Biden, captured the general reaction with economy. “Is this real?”
Nancy Mace had no interest in economy of that kind. “Americans were MURDERED by TERRORISTS in the most horrific way,” she wrote.
Joey Jones, co-host of “Big Weekend Show,” put the matter more personally. “What a coward. They were murdered and sleep well at night knowing I and thousands of my brothers did our part to even the f—–g score,” he wrote.
The argument is not about whether wars produce suffering. Everyone knows that they do. It is about whether September 11 can be spoken of without first stating the most elementary moral fact of the day.The terrorists did this. They chose their targets. They chose their victims. They chose to murder thousands of people. And those who died were not responsible for the wars that followed their deaths.
That is why the language used to commemorate September 11 matters. There are many days in the year for arguing about American foreign policy. There are fewer for remembering 3,000 people who were murdered because Islamist terrorists decided they should die.
Mamdani says he intends to attend the commemoration to honor the victims, survivors, families and first responders alongside Vice President JD Vance and former presidents, including Biden and Bush. Some of the families would prefer that he think again.
A petition organized by several victims’ families asks the organizers to consider whether his presence is appropriate to the purpose of the ceremony. “We respectfully ask that the organizers carefully consider whether Mr. Mamdani’s participation would align with the intention of the ceremony and the expectations of the families most directly affected by the tragedy,” a Change.org petition states.
It is a reasonable question.
There is a difference between remembering that thousands of people were killed and remembering why they were killed. The first requires memory. The second requires moral clarity.
On September 11, 2001, New York did not suffer an unfortunate episode in the general history of human misery. It was attacked. And nearly 3,000 people were murdered. For the families who lost them, that remains difficult to forget. One would hope the mayor of New York could manage the same.
I will always remember the soot from office papers that ended up in the gutters of my Brooklyn home.
What do you remember about that day 25 years ago?
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