Jackson Jambalaya

As we approach the 25^th anniversary of 9/11 we need to remember that 100 million Americans can’t remember 9/11 as a live event. I don’t remember Pearl Harbor as a live event. Before 9/11, Pearl Harbor was as close as Americans had come to being attacked by a foreign enemy on our own soil.

I have no living memories of WWII, but I have a lot of memories of stories about WWII. My dad was a Naval Aviator, a term I learned early in my education about the big war. I played “aviator” wearing my dad’s flying cap and earphones. In the 1950s and early 60s at least one of the three television stations we could receive would have a TV show or movie about fighting in WWII. Watching on TV was almost as good as being there for a kid.

In the 25 years since 9/11 we’ve lived through a bonanza of media and technology that have blown our imaginations and completely overwhelmed what little we know about 7^th century primitive cultures and religions as well as geography. What do those who’ve grown up in America since 9/11 know about Islam? Do they know anything about the Crusades, who was fighting whom and why? Do they know about the Barbary Wars? Do they know about more than three centuries of Barbary pirates capturing and selling white Europeans in North Africa? No, but they can set up Wi-Fi and digital gadgets quicker than an adult can text “IIWII.”

9/11 was an Islamic terrorist attack perpetrated by19 terrorists who highjacked four commercial passenger aircrafts and flew them into the Twin Towers in New York City and the Pentagon, and the fourth crashed in a field in Pennsylvania after passengers overcame the hijackers. These suicide attacks killed 2,977 people and injured thousands more. The September 11, 2001, attack has been memorialized as 9/11.

This year’s commemoration of the attack has become embroiled in the midterm elections by Muslim candidates who have chosen to opine about 9/11. Some of these candidates and their supporters have also made antisemitic smears about Jewish communities and Israel. As far as I know neither 9/11 nor antisemitism play any roles as political issues. 

Some enemies are forever. We have seen protests against the nation of Israel on college campuses and other venues for alleged abuses against some of their citizens. Think of Old Testament times when Israeli heroes like Samson and King David won battles against Philistines. 

But did you know about Muslims’ alliance with Nazis in WWII. According to an article in Wikipedia, “The Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini met with Adolf Hitler on November 28, 1941, where he expressed support for Nazi Germany and proposed collaboration against their common enemies, including the British and Jews.” An official German record of the meeting can be found at “Documents on German Foreign Policy 1918-1945, Series D, Vol SIII, London, 1964.”

This year’s midterm elections have somehow become part of a long history of enmity between Muslims and Jews. According to USA Today, “A petition with more than 65,000 signatures urges NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani not to attend this year’s 25^thanniversary 9/11memorial.”

The 25^th anniversary of  9/11 memorial is much bigger than a mayor or a college protest by students who were not taught history.

Daniel L. Gardner is a columnist who lives in Starkville, MS. You may contact him at PJandMe2@gmail.com.