In the years prior to 9/11, if you lived in New Jersey as I do and drove into New York there was a sweeping curve of roadway leading into the Lincoln Tunnel that provides a view across the Hudson River of downtown Manhattan. One could see the Twin Towers from that vantage point and it always bespoke the financial power of the nation, the greatness of our economic system, and our role in the world.


Little wonder it was targeted, along with the Pentagon, for destruction by al Qaeda, the evil spawn of a seventh century religion whose name translates as “submission.”

Though preceded by a number of violent attacks that included U.S. embassies and other manifestations of the Islamic mandate to make war until the entire world accepts Islam, it was 9/11 that demonstrated the demonic forces it has let loose in the world. There are more than a billion Muslims worldwide and most desire peace no less than the vast majority of mankind. Too many, however, are driven by their worst instincts, their sense of victimization, their romanticized view of Middle Eastern culture and history.

It is instructive, therefore, to see how active leaders throughout the Middle East have become in their effort to hunt down and destroy al Qaeda. Awash in oil billions, the monarchies that control the region understand the threat to their suzerainty. In the meantime, the West continues its own largely secretive war.

It is the reason President George W. Bush sent the CIA, followed by U.S. military into Afghanistan to chase out the Taliban and al Qaeda following 9/11.

It is the reason President Bush decided to rid Iraq of its dictator and establish a U.S. military presence there. Too many other nations were too eager to do “business as usual” with Saddam Hussein and to continue likewise with Syria’s dictator and others who threaten the peace of the world.

It is the reason the U.S. military can be found in Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Yemen. It is the reason we can be found in places large and small around the world. We are the guarantor of peace and the safety of the world’s sea lanes.

It is the reason the U.S. Secretary of State recently sat down with the dictator of Libya, granting him a measure of forgiveness after he abandoned the pursuit of nuclear weapons and made payments for the losses inflicted by the bombing of a Pan Am flight.

And these are the reasons, in part, why the United States of America has not been attacked by al Qaeda since 9/11.

I am mindful of these things as my mind goes back to dining at the doomed Windows on the World, a restaurant at the top of the North Tower of the World Trade Center from 1972 until the horror of 9/11. One could walk the perimeter of the restaurant and enjoy magnificent vistas of Manhattan, look out to New Jersey and Brooklyn, and see the Statue of Liberty, still welcoming those seeking freedom in the New World.

My mind goes back to 9/11 and the willful destruction of both buildings by men who believed they had a place waiting for them in Paradise and that Islam justified killing thousands of innocents trapped in airliners and in the great structures that stood for a new age of world trade and worldwide prosperity.

A religion that celebrates such barbarity has no place in the modern world.

It is not a religion of love and forgiveness of sin, the central theme of Christianity. It is not a religion that has produced countless scientists, artists, and others devoted to advancing knowledge and the welfare of mankind as Judaism has. It is not a religion that seeks harmony with the world as does Buddhism. It is not Hinduism devoted to a single divine principle, nor any of the other faiths that offer prayers for peace and tolerance.

9/11 occurred because of a religion that literally divides the world into Dar al Islam and Dar al harb, the world of war.

9/11 was an act of war, not just against the United States, but against the West in particular and the whole of the rest of the world that resists Islam, a religion that has been at war with the world from its inception.

We need to be mindful of that on 9/11/08. We need to stir the embers of our memory of 9/11/01 when we hear calls to withdraw from that war and to yield to its terrorism and threats of war.

Al-Qaida has released a video featuring a senior commander who was rumoured to have been killed in Pakistan in July, threatening more attacks against Denmark after a suicide bombing on its Embassy in Islamabad, according to the SITE group which monitors Islamist websites.

"We have warned previously - and we warn once more - the crusader states which insult, mock and defame our Prophet and Quran in their media and occupy our lands, steal our treasure and kill our brothers that we will exact revenge at the appropriate time and place," Mustafa Abu al-Yazid said in the video, SITE reported on Thursday.

The Embassy in June bombing killed six Pakistanis and came amid anger in the Muslim world over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed first printed in Danish newspapers in 2005.

There were reports that Yazid was killed in a July air strike on a hideout in a tribal region of Pakistan bordering Afghanistan, but the identity of the slain militant was never confirmed.

Yazid, an Egyptian Al-Qaida commander based in Afghanistan, was identified by the 9/11 Commission as the group's chief financial manager.

The US-based SITE Intelligence Group said the video, released by Al-Qaida's media arm Al-Sahab, shows the Saudi suicide bomber who carried out the attack and an "animation" of the bombing itself.

Yazid said the Embassy attack "is but the beginning. If you don't end your errant ways and aggression," SITE said in a translation of the video message, adding that the date it was recorded was not known.

Accusing Pakistan of misusing the massive American aid to fight the war on terror, Democratic nominee for the US Presidential election Barack Obama, in a sensational comment, has said Islamabad was using these funds for "preparing for a war against India".

Senator Obama vowed to hold Islamabad accountable for the massive military aid it has received from Washington if he is elected to the White House.

He said his administration will increase pressure on the Pakistan to come to terms with terrorist safe havens along its northern border with Afghanistan.

"What we can do is stay focused on Afghanistan and put more pressure on the Pakistanis," Senator Obama said in an interview with Fox News.

He noted that the US was providing Pakistan military aid "without having enough strings attached".

"So they're (Pakistan) using the military aid...Pakistan...they're preparing for a war against India,"
Senator Obama said.

Maintaining that he will follow the Al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden to the "gates of hell", the Democratic nominee said that this could be accomplished without resorting to sending ground troops to Pakistan.

However, he said his future administration is not going to pullout from the war on terror and allow the fundamentalists to take over Pakistan.

"What we say is, look, we're going to provide them with additional military support, targeted at terrorists, and we're going to help build their democracy.... We've wasted $10 billion with Musharraf without holding them accountable for knocking out those safe havens," Senator Obama said.

He stressed that "nobody talked about some full-blown invasion of Pakistan", but "we've got to put more pressure on Pakistan to do what they need to do".

Six persons, including three women, were killed and 20 others injured in a missile strike by unmanned US drones on a house and a seminary linked to a key Taliban commander Jalauddin Haqqani in Pakistan's restive North Waziristan tribal region on Monday.

The suspected drones operated by the US-led forces in Afghanistan fired six to seven guided missiles at the seminary in Tanda Darpakhel, two kilometres from Miranshah, the headquarters of North Waziristan.

Four missiles hit a madrassa run by senior Taliban leader Jalaluddin Haqqani while three hit nearby houses. A news agency quoted official sources and local residents as saying.
Three female seminary students and three labourers were among the dead, official sources said, but other sources said that among the killed were three militants.

Whether Haqqani, who is a close aide of fugitive Taliban leader Mullah Omar was present in the area or not at the time of the strike, was not known.

The Pasthun leader of Khost in Afghanistan has not seen since the fall of the Taliban regime in Kabul in 2001.

Taliban fighters surrounded the area around the madrassa and did not allow people to approach the site. North and South Waziristan tribal regions are considered strongholds of the Pakistani Taliban led by Baitullah Mehsud.

Since last week, Pakistan's tribal belt has witnessed a sharp increase in attacks by drones operated by US-led coalition forces in Afghanistan. More than 40 people have died in these attacks.

Twenty people, a majority of them women and children, were killed in a raid in South Waziristan by gunship helicopters and commandos of the coalition forces on September three.

That attack marked the first time that US-led ground forces from Afghanistan had intruded into Pakistan.