Yesterday, right minded people throughout the World joined with survivors and bereaved family members to remember those who died or were injured in the 9/11 atrocities in 2001.
Family members have long considered that Saudi officials were somehow involved in planning for the hijacks, although the Saudis deny this. Most of the people involved in the 9/11 attacks were Saudis, although that doesn’t prove a connection, of course.
Following a long campaign by the families of people who were killed in the attacks, late yesterday the FBI released a newly declassified document detailing support given to the hijackers prior to the 9/11 attacks. The report includes ways in which Saudi officials may have helped the hijackers. Of course, the Saudi government has denied involvement, as they did with the murder of the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in their Embassy in Turkey.
FBI releases first declassified 9/11 document after Biden order (msn.com)
That Saudi Arabia might be involved in an horrific attack on their greatest ally may seem surprising, but their brutality is shown by other deaths, such as of USA based Jamal Khashoggi, and in December 2019 when a Saudi trainee opened fire and killed 3 and wounded 8 others in a classroom at Naval Air Station Pensacola in Florida. Other Saudi trainees were detained in connection with filming the Pensacola attacks, suggesting that the attacker wasn’t acting alone.
The Celtic League has long campaigned against Saudi attacks on civilians in the Yemen. Saudi pilots train at Valley Airbase in Wales, their training including low flying approaches to Ronaldsway Airport, methods which they use when they return home to bomb Yemeni civilians, including children.
In May 2019 I asked Chief Minister Howard Quayle if he would ask the UK to stop Saudi pilots from Valley from using Ronaldsway for training. On that occasion and subsequently he made excuses for not asking for the training to stop, including that the UK is responsible for our defence. How does killing children and other civilians in the Yemen promote our defence?
Yesterday was the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, and I am sure that, like me, most people will remember them for the rest of their lives. Significantly, in only one Middle Eastern country did all places of worship offer up prayers for the almost 3000 people who died in the 9/11 attacks. That country was the Yemen, where the pilots of the Royal Saudi Air Force, including those who practice their low flying approaches at Ronaldsway, have been bombing and killing thousands of civilians in recent years. Those attacks have caused a massive humanitarian crisis in the Yemen, as documented by the United Nations World Food Programme.
Yemen emergency | World Food Programme (wfp.org)
Allen Moore,
Mannin Branch Secretary, Celtic League (12th September 2021)
