Nournews: The 25th anniversary of the September 11 attacks comes as the world continues to bear the heavy costs of U.S. war-driven policies. Yet senior White House officials, including Donald Trump and U.S. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, have once again placed Iran at the center of their accusations. Hegseth has portrayed the war against Iran as a continuation of the U.S. response to the September 11 attacks, claiming that the Pentagon remains fully vigilant against “enemies who hate us.” Trump, meanwhile, has called Iran the “world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism” and claimed that he will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons. Such claims, however, appear less reflective of realities on the ground than an attempt to manufacture achievements, justify warmongering, and conceal Washington’s failures in confronting Iran’s power.

September 11: A Case That Remains Unresolved

Washington is seeking to link September 11 to today’s developments in order to manufacture legitimacy for a war against Iran. Yet as more documents related to the attacks are released, more questions are emerging about the circumstances, background, and causes of the tragedy.

The release by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency of 71 new documents—70 of them dating from before the attacks—shows that U.S. intelligence agencies had received multiple warnings about al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden prior to September 11. The continued censorship of parts of these documents has further fueled questions and uncertainties.

At the same time, some previously released documents and accounts have raised allegations concerning the role of Zionist networks and Western intelligence structures in shaping developments following September 11. These allegations remain disputed and require clear answers.

From 2,977 Victims to Millions of War Victims

September 11, which claimed the lives of 2,977 people, marked the beginning of one of the most extensive periods of U.S. military intervention in the modern world. By turning the attacks into a pretext for war, sanctions, and intervention, Washington—from Afghanistan and Iraq to Syria and Libya—set in motion a chain of security and humanitarian crises.

Estimates cited in various assessments put the number of direct and indirect victims of the post-9/11 wars at more than 4.5 to 4.7 million, while the number of people forcibly displaced across West Asia and Africa has reached at least 38 million.

Economic terrorism has been another dimension of this policy: sanctions that have subjected millions of people to economic and humanitarian hardship and turned the collective punishment of entire populations into an instrument of foreign policy.

The result of 25 years of this approach has not been a safer world, but a more unstable region, deeper divisions, and a generation trapped in the consequences of war.

Jolani: A Mirror of Washington’s Contradictions on Terrorism

America’s claim to be fighting terrorism faces serious questions when Washington’s treatment of groups such as ISIS, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), and Abu Mohammad al-Jolani is examined.

In 2016, Trump made remarks about the U.S. role in the emergence of ISIS. During his second presidential term, meanwhile, Washington paved the way for engagement with Jolani and HTS by removing them from the list of terrorist organizations. Jolani, who was once the subject of a $10 million U.S. reward for information leading to his capture, later became a guest at the White House.

This shift creates an apparent contradiction between Washington’s anti-terrorism rhetoric and its conduct on the ground, particularly as Trump has repeatedly spoken during the Ramadan war about U.S. support for terrorist and separatist groups opposed to Iran.

Washington’s support for Benjamin Netanyahu and armed groups opposed to Iran further raises the question of what criteria the United States actually uses to define terrorism.

From Joe Kent’s Admission to the Collapse of the Victory Narrative

The narrative surrounding Iran’s alleged nuclear threat also appears to diverge from the facts on the ground.

Joe Kent, the former U.S. deputy counterterrorism coordinator, stated in his resignation letter that Iran did not pose a nuclear threat and that the United States entered the war because of Israel. He described the Israeli regime as the primary threat to U.S. interests and stressed that U.S. intelligence agencies had not identified a threat from Iran.

At the same time, opposition to war against Iran among roughly 70 percent of Americans, along with the refusal of Washington’s NATO allies to participate directly in the war, demonstrated that—unlike the war in Afghanistan—the domestic and international consensus needed for such an adventure had failed to materialize.

Widespread international condemnation of U.S. attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities and the crimes committed during the Ramadan war further deepened Washington’s isolation.

On the battlefield, too, America’s claim of victory does not appear to match the realities of the conflict. Iran’s missile and drone capabilities, the vulnerability of U.S. military bases across the region, maritime operations, and attacks targeting Washington’s interests and military assets have produced a picture very different from Trump’s narrative of victory.

Iran’s control over the Strait of Hormuz, developments in maritime shipping, and reactions in global energy markets have also demonstrated that the costs of war do not remain confined to the battlefield.

Trump now faces a reality that neither his campaign promises, nor anti-Iran polarization, nor attempts to link Iran to September 11 can conceal: the 25-year record since September 11, rather than serving as evidence against Iran, has increasingly become a heavy record of war, terrorism, intervention, and destabilization carried out in the name of the United States.