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When then-U.S. President Joe Biden visited Saudi Arabia in July 2022, hoping to “reset” relations with the kingdom and its rulers, commentators condemned the trip itself as “an act of weakness,” “political cowardice,” and a “capitulation” to a murderous autocrat in the wake of dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi’s killing and dismemberment four years earlier, and the September 11 terrorist attacks before that.
Fifteen of the 19 Al Qaeda operatives who carried out the attacks were Saudis, and although the Saudi Arabian government has long denied any direct role in 9/11, some evidence suggests that Saudi Arabia was not only the primary source of funding for the attackers, but that the Saudi regime knew about the plot that killed more than 3,000 people and did nothing to stop it.
After Biden arrived, he greeted Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman Al Saud – or, “MBS,” for short – who is said to have approved Khashoggi’s execution, with a friendly smile and a fist bump, drawing outrage. When Donald Trump, the current occupant of the Oval Office, jetted off to Saudi Arabia earlier this week, he went far beyond Biden’s comparatively muted pleasantries. If MBS still craves validation, the 47th president delivered – despite once having blamed the kingdom entirely for 9/11.
“What a great place, but more importantly, what great people,” Trump marveled in Riyadh. “I want to thank his royal highness, the crown prince, for that incredible introduction. He’s an incredible man. I’ve known him a long time now. There’s nobody like him.”
The compliments and extravagant amiability didn’t sit well with some. One 9/11 widow told The Independent that it was painful to watch Trump’s glad-handing with the leader of the nation she blames for her husband’s death, asking, “Haven’t we been through enough?”
Or, as a retired firefighter who was at the World Trade Center on September 11 said, “What ever happened to ‘Never Forget?’”
The apparently awed president was treated to an over-the-top reception during his Middle East visit featuring, among other things, a squadron of jet fighters that escorted Air Force One in for a landing, an honor guard brandishing golden sword and a coterie of Arabian horses to accompany his motorcade.
“He’s your greatest representative, greatest representative,” Trump said of MBS. “And if I didn’t like him, I’d get out of here so fast. You know that, don’t you? He knows me well. I do – I like him a lot. I like him too much. That’s why we give so much, you know? Too much. I like you too much.”
Trump, who announced a $600 billion investment package with the kingdom, continued to lavish praise onto his young host, spotlighting MBS’s economic record while addressing him like a lifelong pal: “Mohammed… [c]ritics doubted that it was possible, what you’ve done, but over the past eight years, Saudi Arabia has proved the critics totally wrong.”
Unlike Trump, many family members of those who died on 9/11, along with first-responders who tried to save them, are less enamored of MBS.
Terry Strada, whose husband Tom was on the 104th floor of the WTC’s North Tower when the first plane hit, is the national chair of 9/11 Families United. Among other things, she continues to slam Trump for taking “blood money” from LIV Golf, a professional league backed by the Saudi government’s sovereign wealth fund, by hosting tournaments at his Bedminster, New Jersey country club.
On Wednesday, Strada described Trump’s behavior in Riyadh as “appalling.”
“I’ve heard from a lot of [9/11] family members, and it really saddens me to hear how painful it was to watch all of this,” Strada told The Independent. “… We cannot overlook [everything] just because we’re going to begin a new chapter of commerce. The truth needs to still be told.”
Strada worries that Trump will now abandon his past promises to declassify the remaining intelligence materials that she and others see as the key to proving, once and for all, Saudi complicity in 9/11.
“It is a national security risk to bury the truth,” she said. “He’s hurting a whole population of people who have been through hell. Haven’t we been through enough?”
The White House did not provide a comment about the families concerns in time for this report.
New York City firefighter Adam Lake was at Ground Zero on September 11, searching for survivors, then searching “The Pile” for bodies. He was later forced to retire after being diagnosed with a 9/11-related cancer that he continues to battle.
Lake, whose SoHo firehouse lost 11 men in the World Trade Center attack, told The Independent, “Really, this guy’s not for anybody but himself… What ever happened to ‘Never Forget?’ F*** you, you know?”
Saudi Arabia “masterminded and funded the worst attack on American soil, ever,” Lake emphasized, saying, “If you worked that day, you remember what you went through… well, [how do you feel] when the president is in bed with the people that attacked us?”
There are multiple Trump supporters among Lake’s ex-colleagues, and Lake wonders how they will reconcile the president’s stance.
“I’m just a guy who lost a ton of people [on 9/11] and was [medically] retired from a job I wanted to keep doing,” he said.
As Robert Kobus talked about his 36 year-old sister Deborah, who on 9/11 died on “the impact floor” of Two World Trade Center, his voice caught frequently and he paused several times to compose himself.
“It was just terrible, that day,” Kobus told The Independent.
However, Kobus, a former FBI civilian employee who was forced out of the bureau after 35 years for blowing the whistle on alleged time-card fraud, said his anger at Saudi officialdom of a quarter-century ago outweighs whatever he may feel about Trump or the prince.
“At that time, there were some very bad people in the Saudi government,” Kobus said. “Should we despise the current leaders of Saudi Arabia for what happened 20-something years ago? No. If they made business deals, whatever. I’m not going to disparage the president, I’m going to talk about Saudi Arabia and their complicity 25 years ago.”
To that end, Kobus thinks the U.S. government’s still-secret evidence will reveal Saudi responsibility.
“You can’t hide the truth,” he asserted. “The truth will never be hidden, no matter how much they try.”
Kristen Breitweiser is a World Trade Center widow-turned-activist who successfully pushed for the formation of the 9/11 Commission but later found its final report to be “utterly hollow.” She said she considers herself “pragmatic” about resolving the issue once and for all, and distanced herself from Strada’s organization.
Breitweiser’s focus at this stage is fixed on the alleged shortcomings of the U.S. intelligence community vis-a-vis 9/11, as opposed to Saudi Arabian culpability. She said that 9/11 widows and children have not received appropriate compensation from the government, nor have they “been provided any modicum of justice.”
“I don’t think President Trump is inclined to hold the kingdom accountable, I don’t know if we have the evidence to hold the kingdom accountable, I don’t know if we have the will as a country to hold the kingdom accountable,” Breitweiser told The Independent.
Breitweiser said she “did not look to the kingdom to protect my husband that day,” but rather, to the FBI, CIA and other domestic agencies charged with protecting the nation. She would like to know “why this country is not demanding accountability and justice from our own government before we start looking overseas.”
“We have more evidence to support holding the U.S. intelligence apparatus accountable than we do the kingdom,” Breitweiser asserted. “I’m not saying the kingdom didn’t have anything to do with 9/11, but our intelligence community does not have clean hands with regard to their failure to prevent the attacks.”
The U.S. government has an obligation to compensate those who lost loved ones on 9/11 with payments “in alignment with what other victims have received in the past,” according to Breitweiser. “Let’s start the accountability there.”
“I recognize that what I’m saying is the proverbial 3rd rail,” Breitweiser concluded. “But I don’t care. I just want justice for my murdered husband.”
