The video of revelers cheering 9/11 that no one got to see

By Harry Litman

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A flag marks the name of a loved one at the 9/11 Memorial North Pool.Photo: AP

If Donald Trump believes he saw videos of revelers celebrating after the Sept. 11 attacks that in fact never were broadcast, he’s in large company. Many of us believe we recall seeing similar footage of Palestinians living in the West Bank exulting in the wake of the attacks.

But implausible as it sounds, those recollections are faulty, and the actual footage has never been seen, because a major US news organization has kept it under wraps for the last 14 years.

Here are the facts, all of which are matters of public record. On the afternoon of Sept. 11, 2001, thousands of jubilant Palestinians took to the streets, chanting “God is great,” firing automatic weapons and handing out sweets to passers-by. The largest demonstration took place in Nablus in the West Bank, where some 3,000 marchers danced and cheered as guerrillas fired assault rifles and grenades into the air.

Many journalists were on the scene, but they were forcibly detained in a hotel by armed Palestinian security forces to prevent coverage of the rally. One cameraman — a freelance AP reporter — nevertheless managed to film some of the celebration.

The next day, members of Tanzim, the military arm of Fatah, physically threatened the cameraman and warned AP not to air the material. A cabinet secretary for the Palestinian government told the Associated Press that the government could not “guarantee the life” of the cameraman if the film were broadcast.

The Palestinian information minister explained to the Washington Post that the coercive tactics “were not against the freedom of the press but in order to ensure our national security and our national interest. We will not permit a few kids here or there to smear the real face of the Palestinians.”

The threat worked. After initially declining to confirm the incident, the AP bureau chief in Jerusalem acknowledged the intimidation and the news organization’s capitulation to it. On Sept. 14, 2001, the news organization made known that “in light of the danger,” it wouldn’t release the video for world broadcast because “the safety of our staff is paramount. At this point we believe there to be a serious threat to our staff if the video is released.”

Fourteen years later, the historic footage from 9/11 remains inaccessible to public view.

But wait a minute. Wasn’t video of the West Bank celebrations transmitted around the world? In fact, the footage that many people remember consisted of a few still shots and brief clips of other, far smaller rallies in Lebanon and East Jerusalem. In contrast to the riotous celebrations in Nablus and elsewhere, these were possible to explain away as the repugnant response of “a few kids here or there.”

The suppressed video isn’t simply a historical artifact. The episode contains current lessons for the reliability of reporting from the Middle East, where the propaganda war can be every bit as intense and ruthless as ground combat. And the passionate anti-Western views it puts on vivid display appear to remain in full force.

A recent examination of more than 300 public-opinion polls among Palestinians revealed widely held views about terrorist attacks on Israel and the West that would be stunning even among Israel’s fiercest critics in the United States. A majority of respondents were unwilling to describe the 9/11 attacks — or, for that matter, the Madrid train explosions in 2004 and the London underground explosions in 2005 — as “terrorism.”

Fifty-nine percent responded that suicide bombings were often or sometimes justified. A similar percentage agreed with the statement “US involvement in the region justifies armed operations against the US everywhere.”

The continued suppression of the footage from 9/11 is a blot on the free press that, 14 years after the events, should long since have been removed. It was discreditable in the first instance for the AP to have capitulated to the shakedown, but whatever exigency it could point to in 2001 cannot justify a permanent gap in the documentary account of the worst domestic attack in US history.

These searing images belong in the public record, not in the closed video vault of a cowed news agency.

Harry Litman, the former US attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvnia, is a lawyer and teacher.

http://nypost.com/2015/12/03/the-video-of-revelers-cheering-911-that-no-one-got-to-see/