An article about the capture of Al Qaeda?s 3rd man

The friendliest place on the web for anyone that follows U2.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

follower

Refugee
Joined
Jul 30, 2000
Messages
2,302
Location
Porto Alegre/Brasil
I was searching for news about the capture of the man (maybe monster suits him better) that planned the atttacks in Sep.11th, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, when I found this article from The New York Times. Btw, I haven?t seen no comments on this capture here, I mean, this is very good news IMO. It?s good to read that Pakistan has done the right thing to catch such bastard. Maybe the capture of Bin Laden is closer now.

But back to the article, what Mrs. Maloney and her little girl named Megan said is heartbreaking, and so is everything that was said in the article by the remaining relatives and friends of the dead in that atrocity. It got me thinking a lot. What I would feel if I were Mrs.Maloney? What I would do? What I would expect to be done by the authorities? And you?

Qaeda Leader's Capture Fails to Ease the Grief of 9/11
By JAN HOFFMAN

Beatrice Sandler found out almost immediately about the capture of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed. Since her brother's death on Sept. 11, when she is not burying herself and her grief in work at her Toronto office, she is home staring fixedly at CNN. Marta Peterson of Laguna Beach, Calif., whose son as well as her daughter's boyfriend died in the collapsing towers, also found out swiftly. In her agonized effort to make sense of the attack, she has followed the news fastidiously and reads innumerable articles and books on the topic.

But Julie Tam of Staten Island, whose daughter and brother were killed that day, learned about the arrest from a reporter who woke her with a call. Mrs. Tam shuns the news, walling herself in work six days a week. But though she has turned her back on the very information that other victims' families crave, her reaction to the capture was not markedly different.

"Nothing can compensate for what I've lost," she said dully. "I'm just too numb. Whatever they're going to do to him doesn't matter much to me anymore."

She began to weep: her daughter Maurita Tam would have turned 24 last week.

While reactions ranged from depressed indifference to a qualified sense of relief, the victims' families did echo a common sense of despair.

"It won't bring back my children's father now that they're finding these bigwigs," said Kathy Maloney of Farmingville, N.Y., whose husband, Firefighter Joseph E. Maloney, died in the attack.

Mr. Mohammed's capture on Saturday had only a glancing impact on the victims' families because they are still so overwhelmed by the impact of the attack that the authorities think he set in motion.

Just that day, Mrs. Maloney said, her daughter had had another meltdown: Megan Maloney, 8, sobbed and said she was afraid that when she became an old woman and died and went to heaven, her father would not recognize her.

"I can't really worry about foreign affairs, because I have to worry about what's going on in my own home," Mrs. Maloney said. "My children's well-being is all that matters. I can't mend their broken hearts, and it's killing me."

Some, like Christine LeVeen of Manhasset, N.Y., whose husband, Jeff, a partner at Cantor Fitzgerald, died in the attack, said that the capture marked a turn in what she saw as a long and so far largely fruitless effort to find the perpetrators.

"It makes me feel good, because I've been frustrated that we didn't catch Osama bin Laden," she said. "Those people got away with murder. And in the last few weeks, we've been so tense about another bombing and now I feel really good: we're making progress."

For many families, Mr. Mohammed's detention was but a drop in the bucket, because the man they consider to be the bogeyman, Mr. bin Laden, is still at large. For others, the capture seemed unremarkable because, as Mrs. Peterson, the mother of Davin Peterson, noted, "I'm glad, but there are so many others in Al Qaeda who are anxious to pick up where he stopped."

To some families, the news suggested that the goal of ferreting out Qaeda operatives had not been completely set aside by Washington's focus on Iraq.

"Catching these cowardly murderers should be our nation's first priority," said Cameron F. MacRae of Manhattan, whose 23-year-old daughter, Catherine, had been a stock analyst at Fred Alger Management. "That's where we should focus our primary attention, both because of 9/11 and for the protection of people in the future."

Mr. MacRae, a lawyer, added, "I would hope they would take this character to another jurisdiction and extract every bit of information from him by every means possible." He continued: "And after he is brought before a tribunal and undoubtedly convicted, I think he should be sentenced to death 3,000 times."

Mrs. Peterson, whose son worked on the 104th floor of the north tower and whose daughter's boyfriend, Frederick Cox, worked on the 104th floor of the south tower, said that she was glad Mr. Mohammed had been apprehended. But, she added, not enough attention has been paid to the way in which the American government's policies and inaction had contributed to 9/11.

"The United States has a huge part of the blame because of their foreign policies, the oil and the lack of security at airports, which has been documented for years," she said.

The news of Mr. Mohammed's arrest seemed to give all the families a fresh taste of grief. Nearly 18 months after the attack, their lives are permanently scarred. Ms. Sandler, whose younger brother, Edmund Glazer, was a passenger on Flight 11, is afraid to board an airplane.

Some victims' relatives feel self-conscious about their sieges of mourning: so many friends and relatives expect them to move on already. Mr. MacRae, who started the Cat MacRae Fund to give disadvantaged youngsters educational aid, dejectedly said, "It doesn't get any better."

Mrs. Peterson said: "I think the loss of Davin doesn't get easier, it gets harder. At first you're numb and you wait for him to come home and then the reality comes in that you will never see him grow older. I look at what was Davin, and it's just a few things that fit into a trunk. I can't say, there's his son or his daughter: there are only memories."

She has three other children, who all live in New York City. She is considering moving there from California. "If anything is going to happen again in New York," she said, "I want to be there with them."
 
Last edited:
its incredible how some people's actions impact others.
i do think in the hereafter, we will be shown exactly how our own actions impacted everyone else we dealt w/in this life.

i think yesterday was a good day for the people who oppose terrorism.
 
Back
Top Bottom