Lest we forget

Lest we forget

Ten years ago, the forces of Islamic fascism tore a hole in New York City, and our hearts.

Nineteen al-Qaida terrorists, 15 of them from Saudi Arabia, attacked America that day, in the name of a violent interpretation of Islam promoted by Wahhabi clerics.

Al-Qaida had attacked the West before. As far back as 1993, they tried to destroy the World Trade Center in New York City with a truck bomb - it killed seven people and injured hundreds more. The response from American authority was to shrug it off, to treat it as a criminal matter for lawyers to deal with, instead of a military matter or a strategic attack on the West.

And it's easy to see why - the world was still enjoying the illusion of perpetual peace that came with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. There was a sense, as Francis Fukuyama wrote, the world was at the end of history - that everything was resolved, that it would only be a matter of time before everyone believed in freedom and there were McDonald's in every corner of the world.

But alas, the world isn't that way. There are people in the world who want to kill us or enslave us. And in the case of al-Qaida and other Islamic terrorists, that is the choice they offer us: To submit to Sharia law, to submit to the global rule of Islam in a new medieval-style theocracy or to die.

Islamic radicals like to split the world into two houses -- they call it Dar al-Islam (the house of Islam, or literally the house of submission) and Dar al-Harb (the house of war).

In case you're wondering, we're in the house of war.

The two most devastating attacks on 9/11 were aimed at the World Trade Center in New York City, the twin towers that were for several years the tallest buildings in the world.

They were the symbol of other great ideas, too - the free market, the idea of world trade. And of course, all in the heart of the most vibrant city in America, perhaps the world - home to immigrants from a hundred countries, entryway to generations of immigrants seeking the American dream.

The World Trade Center wasn't just an economic target and a target full of thousands of people - it was a symbol of American greatness and aspirations and leadership.

But even amidst the horror of that day, American greatness showed. In the first responders who rushed in to the World Trade Center, knowing it would likely mean their own deaths. In the passengers on United Flight 93 who initially thought they were the victims of a garden variety hijacking. But when they learned, by making phone calls from the plane, about the other attacks that day, they decided to do something very American. They decided to fight back.

Todd Beamer was one of the men who stormed the cockpit. The last words heard from him by GTE phone operator Lisa Jefferson were "let's roll."

They lost their own lives, of course, but likely saved hundreds of others at the U.S. Capitol building. They were proof of the noble American instincts of freedom and rebellion and self-sacrifice and courage.

Those values are still alive. But in the 10 years since the horrific day, they have been overtaken, in many quarters, by other less appealing American values. Like bureaucracy, political correctness and overlawyering.

The official ceremony Sunday at Ground Zero is being styled as a National Day of Service and Remembrance by President Barack Obama. He said it's a day for volunteerism.

No, it's not. Volunteerism and service are good things. But this is about remembering what happened. It's about remembering who made it happen, and why.

It's about calling evil by its proper name - not avoiding the discussion because it's uncomfortable.

9/11 ought to be a day to rededicate ourselves to freedom. Not just Americans, but Canadians, too, and everyone who shares the values that America epitomizes, the values for which America was attacked.

EZRA LEVANT, QMI AGENCY