This year marks the 25th anniversary of 9/11, the largest terror attack on U.S. soil. The date this year falls on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the beginning of the Jewish New Year. On Sept. 11, 2001, Americans faced the morning’s horror with extraordinary bravery. A generation later, as memory fades and old lies fill the silence, honoring the fallen demands moral courage to speak the truth and condemn those who falsify or deny history.
Twenty-five years after the World Trade Center towers fell, 9/11 is slipping out of living memory. Younger generations of Americans are growing up without knowing who brought the towers down or why; about a third of Americans were born after the deadliest attack in the United States. Many first learn about the attacks in school, if at all. Vicious lies often fill that void.
Antisemitic conspiracy theories surfaced within days of 9/11. One of the most widespread libels was that Jews or Israelis were behind the attacks. Another falsehood claims that thousands of Jews had skipped work at the World Trade Center that morning. These were as false then just as they are now, but they are no longer confined to the fringe.
Tucker Carlson, formerly a host on Fox News and now an influential podcast host with millions of listeners, recently spread several 9/11 conspiracies, including that Israel had advance knowledge of the attacks. Another personality on the far right, political commentator Candace Owens, told her millions of followers that the Mossad spy agency was to blame.
Conspiracy theories are not only prevalent on the far right. Former Pink Floyd frontman Roger Waters, a far-left activist, is headlining a 9/11 “truth” conference at a New York City-owned museum promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories, falsely linking Israel to the Sept. 11 attack. The New Jersey branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) recently removed a curriculum link in its K-12 back-to-school guide that blamed the 9/11 attacks on U.S. support for Israel. The CAIR-NJ resource also recommended that students read mastermind Osama bin Laden’s manifesto, which falsely accuses Jews of controlling America.
Nicholas Haros Jr., whose mother died at the World Trade Center, condemned the CAIR-NJ materials as “evil propaganda.” He continued: “Israel had nothing to do with 9/11. The further we get from 9/11, this new generation of kids will learn to blame our country. These kids are going to be poisoned—and that’s the intent.”
Running toward the fire
The first person murdered that morning was American Israeli entrepreneur Daniel Lewin. When the hijackers moved toward the cockpit of American Airlines Flight No. 11, Lewin, 31, acted to stop them with the fearless resolve of an elite commando, who he had once been. According to phone call records from flight attendants, a hijacker stabbed him from behind. Less than half an hour later, the terrorists flew the plane into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.
Abe Zelmanowitz took a different kind of stand in the North Tower. An Orthodox Jewish computer programmer, he worked beside Ed Beyea, a quadriplegic colleague who could not make it down the stairs. As the tower filled with smoke, Zelmanowitz told Beyea’s nurse to save herself while remaining, with quiet courage, by his side. Both men and a firefighter died together while descending the stairs. Three days later, at the National Day of Prayer and Remembrance, President George W. Bush praised the “national character” in “one man, who could have saved himself, stayed until the end at the side of his quadriplegic friend.”
Firefighter David Weiss worked in Rescue 1, a special operations command unit. Years earlier, while off duty, he jumped into the East River after watching a car plunge into the water. On Sept. 11, the 14-year FDNY veteran and 41-year-old father of two young children reached the 30th floor of the North Tower when the order came to evacuate. Shell Kaylie, who raised Weiss, described his final act of courage: “He got a ‘Mayday’ to evacuate the building. David said, “No.” People on the 50th floor needed his help. They never found him. No helmet, no boots, nothing.”
Lewin, Zelmanowitz and Weiss were not exceptions to the American story that day. In total, 2,977 people were killed that day, with many more dying of injuries and related illnesses in the aftermath of the attack. Americans of every background were heroes who showed that same courage—many running toward the Twin Towers that were engulfed in flames, including 343 firefighters and paramedics who gave their lives to rescue others.
Remembrance and renewal
A nation that forgets 9/11 forgets the people who fought the hijackers, stayed beside the helpless and ran toward the fire. Judaism emphasizes zachor, “remembrance.” To remember is a form of moral courage; it refuses the comfortable silence that lets lies take hold.
Remembrance in the Jewish tradition is a powerful call to action. The Torah instructs Jews to “remember the days of old” (Deuteronomy 32:7) and pass down faith, tradition and memory from generation to generation: l’dor v’dor. It requires recalling history, learning from it and letting it shape life today.
On Rosh Hashanah, even as Jews mark their own beginning, they pray for all of humanity. The holiday is a celebration that welcomes the year ahead marked with the blowing of the shofar—a ram’s horn—recalling the history of the Jewish people even as the prayers look toward a better year to come. This year, the Jewish people welcome the year 5787, still here, still proud.
Points to consider:
1. Remembering 9/11 demands the moral courage to speak the truth.
The 9/11 heroes displayed bravery in the face of unimaginable horror. This year’s anniversary asks a quieter courage of the rest of us—the courage to name a lie, to refuse the comfortable silence, to confront those who spread hatred even when they are friends or allies. Too many public figures choose to look away. Moral courage is not a comfortable virtue. It is a debt we owe the fallen.
2. Antisemitic conspiracy theories about 9/11 help fuel today’s antisemitism.
When the true accounts of Sept. 11 fade, lies move in to take their place. The libel that Jews or Israel were behind the attacks is no longer confined to extremist fringes. It is being repeated on some of the most popular podcasts to millions of followers and amplified on social media, even inserted into some teachers’ lesson plans. Blood libels against Jews have existed for many centuries, and they continue to fuel the antisemitism that has erupted on college campuses and city streets.
3. The radical Islamist terror threat remains potent worldwide.
The ideology that motivated Osama bin Laden and the 9/11 hijackers, Hamas on Oct. 7 and countless other deadly worldwide attacks did not die with the terrorists. The political extremists who hold a radical interpretation of Islam endanger free societies everywhere.
4. The Jewish people are still here, refusing to be erased.
In every generation, many try to write the Jewish people out of history, to deny their past or recast them as villains. The writer Dara Horn argues that antisemitism is not ordinary bigotry but a lie about power, the charge that Jews are the hidden cause of what a society most fears losing. The answer is not to apologize or explain away the hatred, but to stand tall and teach the truth. The Jewish people are not a story to be rewritten. They are a people who endure.
5. On Rosh Hashanah, Jews confront hatred by praying for all humanity.
This year, the Jewish New Year begins on the 25th anniversary of Sept. 11, 2001. Even as some wish for the end of Jewish civilization, Jews will gather in synagogue, sound the shofar and pray not only for themselves but for all of humanity. Rosh Hashanah carries the memory of what the Jewish people have survived into the hope of what the year ahead can bring and the courage to bless a world that has not always blessed the Jewish people—to welcome the year 5787 with hope.
