9/11 And The “Missing 4,000 Jews”

I don’t normally respond to ignorant propaganda, but this one was so vile and so appalling that I have no choice. Since I am fortunate enough to have this platform, I am compelled to use it.

This came across my Facebook newsfeed this morning – from a young person no less:

With the announcement of the attacks at the World Trade Center in New York, the international media, particularly the Israeli one, hurried to take advantage of the incident and started mourning 4,000 Israelis who work at the two towers. Then suddenly, no one ever mentioned anything about those Israelis and later it became clear that they remarkably did not show up in their jobs the day the incident took place. 

None of us needed any reminders after the events of September 11 about what an ugly place the world could be, but we continued to receive those reminders nonetheless. In this case, there were plenty of anti-Semitic, anti-Zionist, and anti-Israeli groups eager to use the horrors of September 11 as fodder for propaganda to serve their own political ends. The pieces quote above scarcely merit the dignity of a rebuttal.

I can cite more, but there is no need beyond perhaps this from the History Channel.

That anyone could believe that a coordinated messaging system could have somehow been devised so as to reach some “4,000 Jews” – and only Jews – is beyond bizarre.

It is dangerous. It is delusional. It is demonic.

Let me tell you this my young friend:

By 8:30 a.m., I was already at work on that beautiful fall day. I was about to head downtown for conferences on Church Street, just yards away from the World Trade Center.

But I soon began hearing reports on the news about a “small plane” striking one of the towers. I ran to the opposite side of my office, where we had a clear view of both. I was in literal shock when I saw the huge, gaping, and fiery hole. Clearly, this was not caused by some “small plane.”

By 9:03 a.m., still at watch, several of my office colleagues and I witnessed United Airlines Flight 175 strike the South Tower dead on. We then knew that America was under attack, despite what the early reports had said. This was not some sanitized television image being fed to us by CNN or Fox News.

This was mass death unfolding before our very own eyes.

Minutes later, in paralyzed horror, we watched – as if in slow motion – first one tower and then the second explode, crash, and literally melt away. We could not grasp the reality of what we were seeing. I saw the North Tower’s antenna collapse into itself and then disappear, gone in an instant.

The huge fireball accompanying the meltdown and explosion released black smoke, red ash, and what could only be described as the depths of hell itself – all enveloped within an oppressive and eeire silence.

As I stood there, I knew – I could literally feel – thousands of lives being instantly pulverized, with their dust being spewed wide across the City. (Weeks later, when I finally had to venture downtown, the stench of death still lingered everywhere. I could only imagine my lungs being filled with the mixed ashes of some 3,000 crushed and cremated souls). 

For many, many months afterward just the sight of an airplane or smoke gave me nightmares.

The images from that day are forever seared into my brain.

And, my young friend – as many other New Yorkers did – I actually knew people who were killed on that day.

Three-thousand lives touched many others far and wide, for time never-ending.

And of the two people that I knew who were murdered on that beautiful fall day, both were Jewish.

But I suppose that you’ll just tell me that they were unlucky and that they just never got the message.

Your racist paranoia literally sickens me.

But, still, I’ll pray for your soul.

Peace

Photo Credit Here: via Wikimedia Commons