A decade later - Fundação Luso-Americana

A trail of war and debt
“The ten years following the 9/11 attacks have left a trail of
war and debt. A study by the Watson Institute estimates that by
last June, the Afghan and Iraqi Wars had cost nearly 225 thousand
lives, which included 6 thousand US service personnel and 1200
allies. The US Congress estimates that the War on Terror, carried
out by George W. Bush, ran up a tab of between 3.6 and 4.4
billion dollars. The cost of secret service operations, responsible
for the death this year of Osama bin Laden, has increased by
250%, with close to 30 thousand people working in wiretapping
in the US alone.”
[ Diário económico, September 7, Lionel Barber ]
Being a Muslim
in the US
“Being a Muslim in the United States those days didn’t mean
you were under suspicion. The greatest obstacle was ignorance.
Then 9/11 happened. […] No other community has suffered the
consequences of September 11th as much as the Muslims, who
began to be subject to questioning and were prevented from
traveling solely based on their appearance. […] The legacy of 9/11
has sparked different reactions among the Muslim community in
the United States, which is estimated at 2.4 million.”
[ Público, September 7, Kathleen Gomes ]
Works of art destroyed
“A significant number of artworks […] were lost forever when
the World Trade Center collapsed with the 9/11 terrorist attacks
in New York, ten years ago to the day on Sunday. […] There is
still no certainty about how many artworks and historical documents
were lost because of the attack. Records tell of letters and
40 thousand photo negatives of President John F. Kennedy.
The World Trade Center housed the headquarters of over 400
companies and at least 21 document libraries, which were all
destroyed. In the Ferdinand Gallozzi Library alone there was a
collection of documents dealing with US trade since 1840.”
[ Lusa, September 9 ]
9/11
A decade later
press revieW
by Ana maria silva*
Reality trumps fiction
Reality trumped fiction on September 11th , when the most
truth-defying attacks of all occurred; and in the ten years that
have followed, we have seen fiction attempt to trump that reality,
leading us to reflect on how much the world has changed.
American writers like Philip Roth, Don DeLillo, and John
Updike and Britain’s Ian McEwan and Portugal’s Pedro Guilherme-
Moreira are just a few of the authors who have written about
the hyper-reality of 9/11, when a terrorist strike targeting the
Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York, and the
Pentagon in Washington provoked the highest number of civil
casualties in history.”
[ Lusa, September 10 ]
In America
and Afghanistan
The US – namely Washington, DC and New York City – were
on red alert after receiving ‘specific, credible, but unconfirmed
intelligence’ that Al-Qaeda was preparing another strike. […]
‘Every September 11th , the Afghans are reminded of an event
that they took no part in, an event that served as the pretext for
American colonialist designs to shed the blood of millions of
innocent, poverty-stricken Afghans,’ the Taliban stated.”
[ Diário de Notícias, September 11, Susana Salvador ]
The world has changed
It is practically undeniable that the world has changed since
September 11th , 2001. Al-Qaeda’s 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers
in New York has gone on to shape ideals, opinions, and the
decade that ensued and is coming to a close this weekend. The
attacks pushed the US into two wars, a financial crisis the country
had never experienced before; and one can go so far as to
say that the US does not wield the same hegemonic power it
did until 2001.”
[ Jornal i, September 10, Joana Azevedo Viana ]
Parallel no. 6 | FALL | WINTER 2011 5