#7 September 11th, 2001

As I begin to wrap up this blog, I feel there is one major violent crime that I have failed to address. It is one that everybody is familiar with, and I feel it is due its respect. Considered the worst attack on American Soil since the bombing of Perl Harbor, the series of attacks that took place on September 11th, 2001 will forever go down in infamy. I would first like to go through exactly what occurred on that fateful day in our nation's history.

The primary attack that occurred on the morning of September 11th was directed at the Twin Towers which stood in the financial district of Manhattan. At 8:46, the first plane hit the North Tower, crashing in and starting a massive fire. At that instant, Americans were not sure that this was a terrorist attack. Their fear was confirmed when. at 9:03, another plane crashed into the South Tower, exploding upon impact. At 9:40, a third plane crashed into the Pentagon. At 9:59, the South Tower, the second struck, collapsed. At 10:03, heroic passengers on the fourth plane overpowered the hijackers targeting the capital and the fourth plane crashed in a field in Pennsylvania. At 10:28, the North Tower fell.
2,753 people died in the New York attack. 40 people died in Pennsylvania.  184 people died in Washington D.C.
Heroic men and women continued searching for survivors in the rubble until October 9th. The last fire from the New York City attack was not fully extinguished until December 20th.
Following these attacks, Current President George W. Bush declared a "War on Terror" to hunt down the Al Qaeda terrorists responsible, particularly their leader Osama bin-Laden who was killed after ten years of searching.

Photo History of 9/11

After such a horrific event, the natural response is to ask why someone would do such a thing. The answer to this is complicated, and we will begin by looking at Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda is a militant Islamist extremist group founded by Osama bin-Laden in Peshawar, Pakistan. It began as a movement against non-Muslims, with members taking radical action against those they considered Kafir (disloyal).  The organization formed as a major response to the writings of one Sayyid Qutb, an Islamic thinker and philosopher who preached that the Islam of today was impure, with follower having resorted to pre-Islamic ignorance. He believed that, in this Muslim World, it was the duty of the pure to eradicate any who did not agree with their teachings. He opposed socialism, nationalism, Judaism, Orientalism, and a number of other groups who he saw as "wicked opposition" to the development of a pure and righteous world. Today, the many decedents of Qutb are fighting for the complete eradication of any foreign influence in Muslim countries. Some common beliefs include the idea that the killing of civilians is justified, the suspicion that there is a Judio-Christian alliance forming that has set out to attack Muslims, and the theory that man-made laws are sinful. These ideas are indoctrinated into the minds of all jihadists, almost as a form of brain-washing. Today, the organization has been deemed a terrorist organization by NATO, the UN Security Council, the European Union, and multiple countries around the world because of its violent actions. Characteristic of the organization is mass-terror attacks and suicide bombings.

The next question is how this group came to target the United States. In a 2002 "Letter to the United States," bin-Laden enumerate the reasons for his attack against the country, but many of the hypothesized reasons were not explicitly stated. He gave three main reasons:
1) Sanctions imposed against Iraq
     -After Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, the UNSC declared an embargo on Iraq, excluding all essential humanitarian imports.
2) Presence of US Military in Saudi Arabia.
     -After the Gulf War in 1991, the United States maintains troops in Saudi Arabia, with one goal being to enforce the no-fly zone over Iraq. Saudi Arabia contains the two holiest sites of Islam-Mecca and Medina.
3) American Support of Israel
     -bin-Laden saw the growth and expansion of Israel to be a crime against humanity. He believed that the very creation of Israel as a country was a grave sin and all associated, particularly the United States, must pay dearly.
In addition to these stated reasons, many suspect that Al-Qaeda also targeted the United States because of its promotion of globalization and for the purpose of starting a war with us.

Now that the ideology of the terrorists has been explained, the biggest question one should be asking himself is how could someone believe and follow these ideas to the point of mass terrorism against another people, especially in the name of religion. In fact, this concept is not that foreign. The socialization that has occurred from a very young age amongst these individuals has left them engrained with the belief that their way of life is best for humanity and that all other ways must be harmful for the innocent members. They consider themselves enlightened, thriving on this given sense of superiority rooted in the inherent human desire to feel superior. While acting a suicide bomber in our society is seen as deviant behavior, in their culture, it is seen as a noble and honorable way to die, bearing with it a guaranteed entrance to paradise. The incredible pressure of the group on any individual to conform leads to immense group think, where any individual who questions what they are doing is seen as a traitor. Religion serves as the largest agent of socialization amongst these people, instilling in them a unique sense of morality. As a whole, the process of socialization that they undergo is very common and, in fact, when considered objectively, it is rather easy to see how they might succumb to such pressure. It is scary to think that, with such an intense socialization, any one of us could have fallen in line behind those 19 terrorists.