Hamas terrorists during October 7 massacre (photo: Geti)
Michael Oren: Israel-September and October—Parallels and Contrasts
Thanks to Clarity with Michael Oren
The following article was adapted from an op-ed I published last week in YNET. The thesis bears repeating—and expanding—here.
Twenty-three years ago last week, on September 11, 2001, nineteen al-Qaeda terrorists hijacked four commercial aircraft and crashed them into the Pentagon, a field in rural Pennsylvania, and the twin towers of the World Trade Center. Close to 3,000 Americans were killed.
Nearly a year ago, Hamas terrorists attacked the State of Israel. The 1,200 Israelis they murdered were the proportional equivalent of 40,000 Americans.
The two events—9/11 and October 7—were similar in multiple ways. Like al-Qaeda, Hamas is a Sunni Jihadist organization that sanctifies mass violence to conquer the Middle East, and eventually the world, for radical Islam. Both are recognized as terrorist groups by the U.S. and most of the Western world. Al-Qaeda and Hamas alike are viciously anti-Semitic and sworn to destroy the Jewish State. The attacks of 9/11 and October 7 identically caught their victims unawares and spurred them to mount large-scale retaliations. But there the similarities end.
The United States responded to 9/11 with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Both countries are located thousands of miles away from the U.S.; neither was directly involved in al-Qaeda’s attack. By contrast, Israel struck back at the terrorists who were directly responsible for October 7. Their state—the Gaza Strip—is not thousands of miles distant but borders Israel’s south.
While America’s wars resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians, the United States was never once accused of committing genocide. Israel, which has reduced the civilian-to-combatant fatality ratio to a quarter of what it was in Iraq and Afghanistan, has been accused by its own American ally of indiscriminately bombing Gaza and killing “far too many Palestinians.” U.S. officials routinely cite Hamas’s casualty figures that make no distinction between civilians and terrorists. That would be similar to claiming that the 9/11 attack resulted in the deaths of 3,019 people.
In the aftermath of 9/11, the United States never once considered negotiating with al-Qaeda. Instead, the U.S. hunted down and eventually killed al-Qaeda’s leader, Osama Bin Laden. By contrast, the U.S. has engaged in prolonged and detailed talks with Hamas, often treating it as a legitimate and honest negotiator. It has expected Israel to do the same
Osama bin Laden and his successor, Ayman al-Zawahiri (photo: gettyimages
On October 7, Hamas took 251 hostages—the equivalent of more than 8,000 Americans. Al-Qaeda took no hostages, yet even if it had, it is unlikely that the United States would have refrained from waging war. It would almost certainly not, in exchange for securing the hostages’ freedom, agree to a ceasefire with Al-Qaeda and allow it to reorganize and rearm. It’s hard to imagine that, as part of that deal, the U.S. would have released dozens of convicted killers from its jails.
Clearly, the differences between 9/11 and October 7 outweigh their similarities. In one fundamental way, though, the two events are fatefully linked.
By no longer insisting, as they did last October, that Hamas must be destroyed—by now insisting on a prolonged ceasefire that may enable Hamas to declare victory—the United States risks emboldening jihadists worldwide. The result could be an acute spike in terrorist attacks across the Middle East, Africa, and Europe. The path to the next 9/11, perhaps even more catastrophic, might open.
