Muslims, Islam and the Twin Towers

Hadidjatou Karamoko Traoré, a 9/11 widow, with her sons, Siaka, left, 9, and Souleymane, 11.

I'm still at work, nearing the end of a long day before the calendar turns to 9/11. Volumes have been written about that day in 2001 when the world changed forever because of foreign terrorist attacks on our largest city and our national capital. No need to go over that ground, especially not the whack-job Florida minister who in recent days grabbed worldwide headlines for his threat to organize a Quran-burning day to protest the proposed Muslim community center near Ground Zero.

Instead, I'll just post two excellent stories from today's New York Times that remind us that Muslim blood was spilled, too, in those horrific attacks on the Twin Towers.

First, a piece on a 40-year-old immigrant from Africa's Ivory Coast, whose husband worked as a cook in the Windows on the World restaurant and whose death left her with three children to raise on a nurse's assistant.

According to the piece, "Visiting Ground Zero, Asking Allah for Comfort," Hadidjatou Karamoko Traoré "is the widow of one of roughly 60 Muslim victims — cooks, businessmen, emergency responders and airline passengers — believed to have died on 9/11. It is a group that has been little examined, and no precisely reliable count of their ranks exists. But their stories, when told, have frequently been offered as counterweights in the latest public argument over terrorism and Islam."

Second, an article on the "financial analysts, carpenters, receptionists, secretaries and ironworkers" and many others -- American natives and immigrants alike -- who made regular use of the Muslim prayer room on the 17th floor of the south tower. The piece, "Muslim and Islam Were Part of Twin Towers' Life," illuminates the reality that "that Muslim people and the Muslim religion were part of the life of the World Trade Center."

Nine years after the devastation that took so many lives, I think back to how we were once all united in our grief and our shock and how we responded to President Bush's urgings to not blame all Muslims for the misguided, murderous acts of fringe fanatics. I despair at what's happened since, when ignorant loudmouths try to whip up fear and resentment toward American Muslims who want only to enjoy the freedoms and the pursuit of happiness that everyone else has a right to claim. Articles like these help shine a light on the truth.

Photograph: Nicole Bengiveno, The New York Times