Today is September 11, 2006, the fifth anniversary of that date in 2001 when our world changed completely. We should all pause to reflect on just what this date means to us, as Americans and citizens. To some, it means the birth of a child, a welcome, joyous moment not meant to be marred by death and misery. To most, it means the destruction of an iconic part of the New York City skyline by young Muslim men bent on killing not just themselves, but as many of us as they could in the name of their "religion," which worships death and intolerance.
Where was I on 9/11? It was a Tuesday morning and I was awake, drinking my morning coffee, watching Matt Lauer and Katie Couric on the Today show as was my usual morning routine. Suddenly, there was a commotion offscreen, and they broke away from their story to tell us, the viewing public, that there had been an explosion at the North Tower. The picture changed to a view of the smoking north tower. Of course, at first blush, everyone watching thought it was nothing more than a horrible, tragic accident. After all, nobody would
purposely fly an airplane into one of the Towers, would they?
As I stood there, eyes glued to the television, watching the tower smoke and burn, coffee forgotten in my hand, a second plane flew into the second tower and hell erruped right there on my TV! Live!! Oh horror of horrors! Another one! Hard on the heels of this came the reports of the Shanksville crash and the Pentagon. What was going on?? Who would do this?
Why did they do it? Nobody knew. I continued to watch the horror from my living room as the scenes played out 1500 miles away in Manhattan, with the occasional cuts to Washington and Shanksville in an unending loop of death, wondering, as did we all, how many more would explode before it was all over....of course, the scenes playing out right before my eyes were nothing more than a bad B-movie plot until it happened. Imagine blowing up the World Trade Center! What an idea....
The evidence was right there....in front of my disbelieving eyes.
Somebody had attacked the twin towers of the World Trade Center with commercial airplanes, as well as the Pentagon and a fourth plane meant either for the Capitol or the White House, which was successfully defended by the brave passengers of that flight, ending in the crash in Shanksville, PA. Using commercial airliners as guided missiles. Who'da thunk it? And who knew that the buildings, crippled by the heat of jet fueled fires melting the infrastructure, would then collapse in such a disasterous way? I confess, the way the buildings collapsed was strangely beautiful, sort of like 2 concrete and steel prima ballerinas doing their ballet of death for all the world to see.
To say that I was stunned would be an understatement. The
world was stunned. And when we found out who was responsible, we Americans were stunned and
angry. Especially when we found out who and what was responsible for these horrific acts, and why.
What religion encourages its adherants to kill? What sort of God wishes for people to die or kill in His name? The answer is: NONE. No real God asks that of anybody, but the God that
does thirst for blood is Allah, that is, according to his prophet on earth, Muhammed. Consult any given copy of the Quran and the Hadith (the immortalization of Mohammed's exhortations to his flock) and you will find very few chapters or quotations that refer to Allah's mercy. Most of what you will find are exhortations to lie, cheat, steal and murder, as Islam isn't so much a religion as it is a manifesto for war, or Holy War (Jihad), as the Muslims call it.
If you do your homework, you'll find out that Mohammed was nothing more than a terrorist himself, and the proof is right there under everybody's nose in none other than the Hadith, which is a compilation of Mohammed's speeches to the faithful. By their own admission, historians and Muslims alike will tell you that the Hadith is Allah's own words through his prophet on earth, Mohammed.
What they don't tell you is that Allah started his life out as a rock. Evidently, a piece of a meteorite or some kind of rock that fell to earth from the sky, and was worshipped along with 364 other rocks by pagans in Mecca, hundreds of years
after the birth of Christ. Mohammed's father was named Abd'allah, which means "slave of Allah." Abd'allah was the keeper of the Ka'aba in Mecca which housed the Allah rock and all the others, as was his father before him. Abd'allah's father made a promise to the rock god, Allah, when he was young that he would sacrifice one of his sons to the rock if Allah (rock) granted him 10 sons. Of course, after his wish was granted by the rock god, Abd'allah's father got himself out of the bargain by offering 1000 camels in his son's stead. Kind of like wealthy families offering up a servant to do military service for a fortunate son.
Ever wonder why a fatwa was issued for Salmon Rushdie? His book was called the Satanic Verses and it was about the 3 rocks that Mohammed christened as the daughters of Allah. There were verses in the Quran about the 3 daughter rocks of Allah until it was pointed out to him that they were FEMALES and goddesses, therefore not worthy of worship, at which point Mohammed declared those verses Satanic and struck them from the Quran.
That is why the fatwah was issued for Salmon Rushdie. He had the temerity to bring that to light in a novel, and that was enough to put a price on his head.
Anyway, Mohammed (son of the Ka'aba Keeper, and a Pagan) was illiterate and the Quran is nothing more than Old Testament Bible stories turned inside out. Evidently Mohammed was a wannabe, and more or less failed at everything he did, including founding a religion until he hit upon the mix of sex and money to sell his product (Islam). Once he realized that he could tempt his followers with either booty in this life or sex in the next one, he started to acquire adherants. Up until that time, however, his religion was a failed one. Then he started robbing caravans, and it blew up from there.
This "religion" is more of a social structure than a religion. Allah says, through Mohammed of course, that it's ok to lie, steal and murder in his name, which means the Religion of Peace has nothing in common with Peace. The Islamists do not want peace. They want to dominate the world and we'd better wake up and smell the coffee or our great-grandchildren will be wearing burkhas and praying 5 times a day.
I sat glued to the television for the next 2 days, watching that unending loop of death and destruction on every television station (I could afford cable back then, so I had like, 50 channels). I barely moved off the couch. I didn't bathe. I didn't even change out of my pyjamas. I cried alot, and grieved, and wondered what was going to change in my life. And like millions of other Americans, I swore I would not forget this day.
