9/11 victims' relatives blame 'spineless' political leaders, social media for bin Laden letter going viral
'I find it appalling,' says Terry Strada, whose husband was killed on 9/11
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Several family members of Americans murdered on September 11, 2001, spoke out to FOX News on what led to Usama bin Laden's "Letter to America" going viral on TikTok and praised by youth online.
Terry Strada, the wife of Twin Towers victim Tom Strada, said on "America Reports" Friday she is sickened by the fact Gen Zers who did not necessarily live through 9/11 are suddenly entranced by bin Laden's anti-Zionist and anti-American screed the militant claimed justified the attacks he planned.
"I find it appalling," she said. "I mean, it's hard to find words to describe just how upsetting this is to the entire 9/11 community, to have to see these young people out there."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"But the truth is, is that they are very misinformed, and they are uneducated and ignorant on the subject."
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Strada blamed American political leaders and executive branch bureaucrats who she said have hidden the truth and protected the Saudi Arabian government amid allegations they helped fund the attacks.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"We have had spineless — and I mean spineless — leaders in the White House and in the State Department that choose to protect the kingdom of Saudi Arabia over the American people knowing the truth, and we have to remember that the truth is what will always be our best weapon against history repeating itself," she said.
"And as long as we have government, our officials that continue to protect the truth from being told, which is that the kingdom funded this terrorist attack, they funded Al-Qaeda, which spread the Wahhabism, which spread this radical Islamism that this young group of people that were born before 9/11 are just so unaware of, because it's not taught in our schools and the parents aren't aware of it."
She called on the feds to take decisive action to stem this trend. Brett Eagleson, whose father died on 9/11, added that the trend forwarded on platforms like TikTok is an inherent threat to the United States itself.
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"[T]his is unbelievable. There are not enough horrible words to describe… what is happening right now in America. This is an existential threat to this country if we were going to have kids of that generation, children on TikTok trying to in some way whitewash what happened on 9/11… " said Eagleson, who was 15 when his father Bruce died at the Twin Towers. "It all starts in the education system."
Eagleson pointed to some rays of hope, namely in actions by people like Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who shepherded state legislation to mandate 9/11 be taught in public schools.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}He said many states don't require it and it's not federally required curricula either — adding those defending or giving the benefit of the doubt to malign entities worldwide should realize they could be victimized themselves by the same ilk.
"So we need to… start re-educating America, and to the TikTokers that are saying these inflammatory remarks: You should all know that Hamas and Al-Qaeda and people that you are supporting and giving credibility to would not hesitate one second to kill you or kidnap you and your family and hold you ransom simply based on the color of your skin or your gender identity or your nationality or your religion," he said.
Later on FOX News, Matt Bocchi — who lost his father on 9/11 — said it is appalling to see youngsters disseminating such propaganda without being grounded in the knowledge of what happened that day.
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}"It just unfortunately shows the reality that these teenagers are being spread misinformation and how they're finding sympathy for bin Laden is beyond me," he told "The Story"
"This is an individual who was the perpetrator in a tragedy that took nearly 3,000 innocent Americans, my dad included, and this is something that is extremely hurtful to all of us."
{{#rendered}} {{/rendered}}Bocchi said following the 2001 attacks, he encountered a rough road of addiction and other struggles, adding he would search the videos of the North Tower to see if he could find his father clinging to a window ledge.
He added the CCP-linked TikTok should at least reach a point where it is "monitored" by U.S. officials, if not entirely be forced to be sold to American interests — and that young minds are being "polluted" by what they're seeing on the app.
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