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US Marks September 11th Anniversary

by VOA News

   The United States is marking the 15th anniversary of the September 11th
   terrorist attacks, when al-Qaida terrorists hijacked planes and flew
   them into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon near
   Washington. Another plane crashed in rural Pennsylvania.

   President Barack Obama observed a moment of silence at the White House
   Sunday at 8:46 a.m., when the first of the four hijacked planes slammed
   into the World Trade Center, before speaking at a ceremony at the
   Pentagon honoring those killed in the attacks.

   Victims killed in the attack on the World Trade Center will be
   remembered in New York, where the country's leading 2016 presidential
   candidates, Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump, are
   paying their respects at Ground Zero but halting their political
   campaigns for the day.

   As they have been in past 9/11 commemorations in New York, the names of
   the 2,983 killed that horrifying day will be read slowly by their
   relatives as music plays in the background. As daylight ends Sunday in
   New York, spotlights will project two giant beams of light into the sky
   to represent the fallen twin towers of the World Trade Center.

   "Fifteen years ago, a September day that began like any other became
   one of the darkest in our nation's history," Obama said Saturday in his
   weekly address.

   The president said nearly "3,000 innocent lives were lost" that
   September day "from all walks of life, all races and religions, all
   colors and creeds, from across America and around the world." It was
   the worst attack on U.S. soil since Pearl Harbor was bombed in 1941 at
   the start of World War Two.

   Nineteen hijackers, 15 of them from Saudi Arabia, were killed in the
   attacks, which led directly to the U.S. war in Afghanistan, where
   al-Qaida trained attackers against the United States, and indirectly to
   the war in Iraq. The U.S. still has thousands of forces in Iraq and
   Afghanistan even as it has ended large-scale combat operations.

   Obama said a lot has changed over the past 15 years, but "it's also
   important to remember what has not changed - the core values that
   define us as Americans. The resilience that sustains us . . .
   terrorists will never be able to defeat the United States."

   Writing on Twitter Sunday, Secretary of State John Kerry said, "On
   9/11, we remember those we lost, those who tried to save them. We honor
   them by pursuing peace, security, justice worldwide."

   Near Shanksville in western Pennsylvania Sunday, the Flight 93 National
   Memorial stands in memory of the passengers and crew members who
   carried out a sustained assault against the hijackers for control of
   the plane 15 years ago.

   A September 11 Museum has been erected on the New York site where the
   World Trade Center once stood, housing artifacts and photographs
   connected to the attack.

   At the Pentagon, the 184 people who died on September 11, 2001 are
   honored with 184 benches over pools of water.