Leaked papers divulge Iran’s position on 9/11

Mohamed Youssri

In 2016, US District Judge, George Daniels, ordered Tehran to pay more than $10.5 billion in compensation for the families of the people killed in the 9/11 attacks.

Daniels said Iran had failed to defend itself against accusations that it had helped the perpetrators of the attacks.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry ridiculed at the time the US ruling, considering it a kind of ‘Iranophobia’.

In December 2019, the British Supreme Court backed the US government and agreed to consider the possibility of allowing relatives of some of those killed in the attacks in the US to claim Iranian assets in Britain.

Testimonials

Despite Iranian objections to previous judicial rulings, testimonies from within al-Qaeda itself revealed that Iran should be on the list of suspects in the 9/11 attacks.

This was especially true after al-Qaeda revealed how Iranian cities became safe havens for a large number of al-Qaeda’s leaders after the 9/11 attacks.

Among important testimonies in this regard was a document written by an al-Qaeda leader.

This document was found in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad where the then leader of al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, was hiding before his death.

Doctrinal disagreement, unity of purpose

The author of the letter admits that sectarian differences between al-Qaeda and Iran had faded away in the face of the unity of the goals of the two sides, namely attacking the US.

“The doctrine of the Iranians is well known to all of us,” he wrote. “Their belief in us is well known, and their belief in Sunnis, is clear and well-known, and their ambition to dominate the Islamic world and their desire to take the reins of leadership in the Islamic world are known as well.”

He added that the Iranians were perfectly willing to cooperate with anybody, regardless of who he was as long as this person or group was acting against the Americans.