By Donald H. Harrison
SAN DIEGO — From the foothills of Jerusalem, the Jewish National Fund-USA brought by webcast on Wednesday a ceremony memorializing 2,977 victims who lost their lives in the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks on the United States.
U.S. Ambassador to Israel Jacob J. Lew was the keynote speaker followed by representatives of partner organizations Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael-JNF and Jewish National Fund-USA. The ceremony was held at the 9-11 Living Memorial where the names of all 2,977 of those victims are permanently engraved in an amphitheater dominated by a large empty tomb topped by a sculpted American flag with a representation of a flame at its tip.
The base is made from a piece of metal that fell from the Twin Towers. Eliezer Weishoff was the designer of the cenotaph.
Memorial ceremonies have been performed each year since 2019 at that location – the only monument outside the United States that memorializes each of the victims. However, this year the terrorist-inflicted horrors of 9-11 and October 7 were conflated.
“In this country, at this time, no one needs to be told how it feels when a terrorist attack destroys people and places we love,” Ambassador Lew said. “Looking back to 9-11 and ahead to the first anniversary of October 7th, for me this is a day to focus on our human capacity to remember and mourn but also to heal and find the strength and resilience to build a future with light that emerges from the darkness.”
It was a theme echoed by other speakers. Ifat Ovadia-Luski, the chair of Keren Kayemeth LeIsrael said “the radical Islamists that attacked the Twin Towers are the same terrorists that on October 7th reached our southern communities and slaughtered innocent civilians. It is the same radical ideology the State of Israel is still fighting against.”
Ovadia-Luski continued, “Just as the United States arose and recovered from the severe blow of the Twin Towers attack, so will the State of Israel rise and recover from October 7th.”
Agreeing, Talia Tzour Avner, chief of staff in Israel of Jewish National Fund-USA, said, “this memorial embodies our shared spiritual roots and mutual principles while also symbolizing our joint struggle against global terrorism.”
The hour-long late afternoon ceremony included numerous poignant moments. Kaddish was recited by a father of one of the passengers in a plane seized by 9-11 terrorists and crashed into the Twin Towers. Lt. Aston Bright of the Plantation, Florida, Fire Department who volunteered in Ashkelon, Israel, after Oct. 7th pledged continued support for his fellow first responders; and Chabad Rabbi Yosef Carlbach, chaplain at Rutgers University, recited Psalm 23 and urged the audience attending the international gathering to “do a mitzvah.” The Special in Uniform Band—comprised of IDF soldiers with developmental disabilities—sang “Wind Beneath My Wings.”
Jill Pila, whose husband was killed when a Twin Tower collapsed, told of speaking to him by telephone moments before the horrifying tragedy. She was joined at the podium by Jamie Gartenberg, the daughter with whom she was pregnant on 9-11. Jamie is now a Lone Soldier, serving as a first sergeant in an IDF intelligence unit.
Daniel Weiss, a Kibbutz Be’eri resident whose father was killed on Oct 7th and whose mother perished as a hostage, accompanied himself on guitar while singing John Lennon’s “Imagine.”
This was followed by a wreath-laying ceremony with representatives of many different organizations conducted to the base of the flame sculpture by honor guards consisting of a U.S. Marine and an IDF soldier.
The ceremony concluded with Weiss and a member of The Special in Uniform Band leading the audience in a solemn rendition of Hatikvah, Israel’s National Anthem.
*
Donald H. Harrison is publisher and editor of San Diego Jewish World