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Palestinians Celebrated the September 11 Attacks for Years: An Illustrated History
Yesterday was the 23rd anniversary of the heinous September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States.
As we move further away from 2001, it is worth remembering how the Palestinian Authority (PA) celebrated the attacks year after year, with cartoons glorifying Osama Bin Laden or mocking and attacking the US.
The PA’s official media outlets made a concerted effort to bash the United States by rubbing salt in its most sensitive wounds, and by depicting America as evil, while appropriating Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims as the victims.
In the cartoon below, Bin Laden is shown forming a victory sign with his fingers, which are made up of the smoldering Twin Towers next to a plane about to fly into them.
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, September 12, 2007]
In this next cartoon, the PA depicts Iran and Iraq as the real victims of 9/11:
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, September 11, 2006]
Another cartoon shows the PA’s view that the real victims of 9/11 were Iraq and the Palestinians:
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida and Palestinian daily Al-Quds, September 12, 2003]
The text on Tower One reads “Palestine,” and the text on Tower Two reads “Iraq.’
In another cartoon, the PA mocked the US by portraying Uncle Sam fleeing in terror from the date “September 11”:
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al Jadida, reprinted from Al-Wattan of Kuwait, September 11, 2002]
In the below cartoon — an effort to say that the US is immoral and imperialistic — the PA places the Twin Towers over a mass of dead bodies, who are supposedly the victims of American imperialism.
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, reprinted from Al-Khalij (UAE), September 11, 2002]
Text on wall: “September,” Twin Towers form “11” over dead bodies. Text on down tower: “Rights of Nations.” Text on up tower: “American hegemony”
Below, the PA shows that it believes that 9/11 was an American conspiracy against Arabs and Muslims:
After the massacre and atrocities committed by Palestinians in southern Israel on October 7, a senior Palestinian official repeated the accusation that the US knew about the 9/11 attacks but wanted them to happen:
They [Israel] knew about this [Oct. 7 attack] and were silent because they wanted that what happened would happen, just as their teacher [America] did in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.
[Fatah Revolutionary Council member Adnan Al-Damiri, Facebook page, Dec. 20, 2023]
In the below cartoon, the PA accused Israel of using the 9/11 attack on America as an excuse to attack Palestinians. The cartoon also gives a nod to the Palestinian libel of Jews as terrorists:
[Palestinian daily Al-Ayyam, October 19, 2001]
The two letters “L” of Ramallah take the form of the Twin Towers and the “o” in TERRORISM takes the form of a Jewish star.
The PA also claimed that 9/11 was just an excuse to jail Arabs and Muslims:
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, September 11, 2002]
The fact is that nothing about the Palestinian Authority has changed until this day. As Palestinian Media Watch continues to bring to the fore, the PA constantly demonizes America and appropriates itself as the victim of the crimes that it openly supports, such as the October 7 massacre. And that’s not even counting the untold number of Palestinians who danced in the streets to celebrate the attack when it took place in America 23 years ago.
Itamar Marcus is PMW’s Founder and Director, and Ephraim D. Tepler is a contributor to PMW. A version of this article originally appeared at PMW.
The post Palestinians Celebrated the September 11 Attacks for Years: An Illustrated History first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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US House Members Ask Marco Rubio to Bar Turkey From Rejoining F-35 Program
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio attends a cabinet meeting at the White House in Washington, DC, US, April 10, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Nathan Howard
A bipartisan coalition of more than 40 US lawmakers is pressing Secretary of State Marco Rubio to prevent Turkey from rejoining the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, citing ongoing national security concerns and violations of US law.
Members of Congress on Thursday warned that lifting existing sanctions or readmitting Turkey to the US F-35 fifth-generation fighter program would “jeopardize the integrity of F-35 systems” and risk exposing sensitive US military technology to Russia. The letter pointed to Ankara’s 2017 purchase of the Russian S-400 surface-to-air missile system, despite repeated US warnings, as the central reason Turkey was expelled from the multibillion-dollar fighter jet program in 2019.
“The S-400 poses a direct threat to US aircraft, including the F-16 and F-35,” the lawmakers wrote. “If operated alongside these platforms, it risks exposing sensitive military technology to Russian intelligence.”
The group of signatories, spanning both parties, stressed that Turkey still possesses the Russian weapons systems and has shown “no willingness to comply with US law.” They urged Rubio and the Trump administration to uphold the Countering American Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) and maintain Ankara’s exclusion from the F-35 program until the S-400s are fully removed.
The letter comes after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan claimed during a NATO summit in June that Ankara and Washington have begun discussing Turkey’s readmission into the program.
Lawmakers argued that reversing course now would undermine both US credibility and allied confidence in American defense commitments. They also warned it could disrupt development of the next-generation fighter jet announced by the administration earlier this year.
“This is not a partisan issue,” the letter emphasized. “We must continue to hold allies and adversaries alike accountable when their actions threaten US interests.”
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US Lawmakers Urge Treasury to Investigate Whether Irish Bill Targeting Israel Violates Anti-Boycott Law
A pro-Hamas demonstration in Ireland led by nationalist party Sinn Fein. Photo: Reuters/Clodagh Kilcoyne
A group of US lawmakers is calling on the Treasury Department to investigate and potentially penalize Ireland over proposed legislation targeting Israeli goods, warning that the move could trigger sanctions under longstanding US anti-boycott laws.
In a letter sent on Thursday to US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, 16 Republican members of Congress expressed “serious concerns” about Ireland’s recent legislative push to ban trade with territories under Israeli administration, including the West Bank, Gaza, East Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights.
The letter, spearheaded by Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY), called for the US to “send a clear signal” that any attempts to economically isolate Israel will “carry consequences.”
The Irish measure, introduced by Foreign Affairs and Trade Minister Simon Harris, seeks to prohibit the import of goods and services originating from what the legislation refers to as “occupied Palestinian territories,” including Israeli communities in the West Bank and East Jerusalem. Supporters say the bill aligns with international law and human rights principles, while opponents, including the signatories of the letter, characterize it as a direct extension of the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which seeks to isolate Israel as a step toward the destruction of the world’s lone Jewish state.
Some US lawmakers have also described the Irish bill as an example of “antisemitic hate” that could risk hurting relations between Dublin and Washington.
“Such policies not only promote economic discrimination but also create legal uncertainty for US companies operating in Ireland,” the lawmakers wrote in this week’s letter, urging Bessent to determine whether Ireland’s actions qualify as participation in an “unsanctioned international boycott” under Section 999 of the Internal Revenue Code, also known as the Ribicoff Amendment.
Under that statute, the Treasury Department is required to maintain a list of countries that pressure companies to comply with international boycotts not sanctioned by the US. Inclusion on the list carries tax-reporting burdens and possible penalties for American firms and individuals doing business in those nations.
“If the criteria are met, Ireland should be added to the boycott list,” the letter said, arguing that such a step would help protect US companies from legal exposure and reaffirm American opposition to economic efforts aimed at isolating Israel.
Legal experts have argued that if the Irish bill becomes law, it could chase American capital out of the country while also hurting companies that do business with Ireland. Under US law, it is illegal for American companies to participate in boycotts of Israel backed by foreign governments. Several US states have also gone beyond federal restrictions to pass separate measures that bar companies from receiving state contracts if they boycott Israel.
Ireland has been one of the fiercest critics of Israel on the international stage since the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, amid the ensuing war in Gaza, leading the Jewish state to shutter its embassy in Dublin.
Last year, Ireland officially recognized a Palestinian state, a decision that Israel described as a “reward for terrorism.”
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US Families File Lawsuit Accusing UNRWA of Supporting Hamas, Hezbollah
A truck, marked with United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) logo, crosses into Egypt from Gaza, at the Rafah border crossing between Egypt and the Gaza Strip, during a temporary truce between Hamas and Israel, in Rafah, Egypt, Nov. 27, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amr Abdallah Dalsh
American families of victims of Hamas and Hezbollah attacks have filed a lawsuit against the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, accusing the organization of violating US antiterrorism laws by providing material support to the Islamist terror groups behind the deadly assaults.
Last week, more than 200 families filed a lawsuit in a Washington, DC district court accusing the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) of violating US antiterrorism laws by providing funding and support to Hamas and Hezbollah, both designated as foreign terrorist organizations.
The lawsuit alleges that UNRWA employs staff with direct ties to the Iran-backed terror group, including individuals allegedly involved in carrying out attacks against the Jewish state.
However, UNRWA has firmly denied the allegations, labeling them as “baseless” and condemning the lawsuit as “meritless, absurd, dangerous, and morally reprehensible.”
According to the organization, the lawsuit is part of a wider campaign of “misinformation and lawfare” targeting its work in the Gaza Strip, where it says Palestinians are enduring “mass, deliberate and forced starvation.”
The UN agency reports that more than 150,000 donors across the United States have supported its programs providing food, medical aid, education, and trauma assistance in the war-torn enclave amid the ongoing conflict.
In a press release, UNRWA USA affirmed that it will continue its humanitarian efforts despite facing legal challenges aimed at undermining its work.
“Starvation does not pause for politics. Neither will we,” the statement read.
Last year, Israeli security documents revealed that of UNRWA’s 13,000 employees in Gaza, 440 were actively involved in Hamas’s military operations, with 2,000 registered as Hamas operatives.
According to these documents, at least nine UNRWA employees took part directly in the terror group’s Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel.
Israeli officials also uncovered a large Hamas data center beneath UNRWA headquarters, with cables running through the facility above, and found that Hamas also stored weapons in other UNRWA sites.
The UN agency has also aligned with Hamas in efforts against the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), an Israeli and US-backed program that delivers aid directly to Palestinians, blocking Hamas from diverting supplies for terror activities and selling them at inflated prices.
These Israeli intelligence documents also revealed that a senior Hamas leader, killed in an Israeli strike in September 2024, had served as the head of the UNRWA teachers’ union in Lebanon, where Lebanon is based,
UNRWA’s education programs have been found by IMPACT-se, an international organization that monitors global education, to contribute to the radicalization of younger generations of Palestinians.