UNITED24 - Make a charitable donation in support of Ukraine!

Military

11 November 2001

Ceremony Marks Two-Month Anniversary of Terrorist Attacks

(President Bush, UN and local officials at World Trade Center
site)(590)
By Judy Aita
Washington File Staff Correspondent
New York -- The flags of more than 80 nations - from Slovakia to South
Africa, Antigua to Ukraine -- moved in a slow procession, and were
deposited at the site of the World Trade Center terrorist attack
during a brief November 11 memorial ceremony remembering those killed
exactly two months ago.
President George Bush, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, New York
Governor George Pataki, and New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani attended
the ceremony in memory of the international victims of the attack. The
political leaders stood silently on the platform erected amid the
rubble of what was once a bustling office complex while Muslim,
Jewish, and Christian clerics conducted religious services.
Referring to a verse from the Koran, Imam Dewider of the Midtown
Islamic Center said that "Allah commanded to do acts of goodness and
giving to kith and kin and the Almighty forbids all shameful deeds,
evil acts, and transgression."
The imam said, "The Koran considers the bee's honey as the main source
of healing. So we are here today to seek a scriptural healing and the
word of God. We...pray we shed our differences with tolerance and work
together to nourish and cultivate the earth.
"We need to return to God and perform acts of goodness on Earth, to
elevate the conditions of people's mind, body, and soul." Imam Dewider
said. "Be sure, as God promises in the Koran, verily with every
hardship there is relief."
Rabbi Haskel Lookstein of the Kehilagh Josurum Congregation said that
throughout history at times of great destruction there were also
"small signs of hope; indications that life would somehow go on; that
good would ultimately conquer evil.
"We thank God for our symbols of hope in American even at the time of
destruction on September 11," the rabbi said. "The firefighters,
police officers, medical workers made the ultimate sacrifice and
turned the day of pure evil perpetrated by man into a day of
remarkable heroism on the part of man.
"We thank them for restoring our faith in humanity at the moment that
that faith was waning. We thank God for a city and a country that set
aside all possible differences and united into a family," Rabbi
Lookstein said.
Bishop Patrick Sheridan of the Catholic Archdiocese of New York said
that the "victims of this vicious cruelty and diabolical
revenge...were the members of our human family, our beloved brothers
and sisters, the sons and daughters of more than 80
nations.....welcome them into paradise where there will be no more
sorrow or weeping or pain but only peace and joy."
At the end of the ceremony, President Bush and the secretary general
wrote their names beside the flags of the United States and the United
Nations, which were displayed on a large billboard with the names and
flags of the other countries whose citizens were killed.
Bush was in New York November 10 and 11 to address the UN General
Assembly and meet with other world leaders participating in the annual
general debate. Many of those attending the session have been making
their way to the World Trade Center site as well as devoting a major
portion of their speeches to the need for a united, uncompromising,
international fight against terrorists and those who support them.
(Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S.
Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)



NEWSLETTER
Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list