The United States today, September 11, 2026, commemorates the 25th anniversary of the terrorist attacks that shook the country in 2001, when 19 members of Al Qaeda hijacked four commercial airliners and used them to attack targets in New York, Virginia, and Washington, D.C.
The attacks left 2,996 dead and around 25,000 wounded, becoming the deadliest terrorist attacks in history.
On Tuesday morning 25 years ago, four commercial flights that had departed from the northeastern United States bound for California were hijacked by terrorists.
American Airlines Flight 11 was the first to reach its target. At 8:46 a.m., it struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center in Manhattan.
Seventeen minutes later, at 9:03 a.m., United Airlines Flight 175 crashed into the South Tower. Images of the two buildings engulfed in flames circled the globe, marking the beginning of one of the most traumatic days in recent history.
Both towers, 110 stories high, eventually collapsed. The South Tower fell approximately 56 minutes after the impact, while the North Tower collapsed about 102 minutes after being hit.
The collapse also caused the destruction of other structures in the complex and serious damage to nearby buildings.
The Pentagon was also attacked
At 9:37 a.m., American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the west side of the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense.
The impact caused a fire and the partial collapse of a section of the building.
Passengers tried to recover flight 93
The fourth hijacked plane was United Airlines Flight 93, which was headed to Washington DC.
After learning through phone calls what had happened in New York and at the Pentagon, several passengers and crew members tried to regain control of the aircraft.
The plane crashed at 10:03 a.m. in a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania. Subsequent investigations determined that the hijackers planned to use it to attack a target in Washington, identified as the U.S. Capitol.
A day that changed the United States
The attacks triggered a profound transformation in American security and had consequences that extended far beyond the country's borders.
Twenty-five years after that morning, September 11 remains a date of remembrance for the victims and as one of the events that defined the politics and international security of the 21st century.
The hours of that day were marked by four impacts: the collapse of the Twin Towers, the attack on the Pentagon, and the crash of Flight 93 in Pennsylvania, on a day that forever changed contemporary history.
The 9/11 legal labyrinth: between targeted killings and the eternal limbo of Guantanamo
The "mastermind" of the attack now has a trial date: June 2028
The legal proceedings against the masterminds of the deadliest attack on U.S. soil are progressing slowly in the military courts at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), considered the chief planner of the attack, and three of his co-defendants (Walid bin Attash, Mustafa al-Hawsawi , and Ali Abdul Aziz Ali) have been formally scheduled to begin their trial on June 5, 2028.The announcement, issued by military judge Michael Schrama, places the final resolution nearly three decades after the attack.
The definitive collapse of plea bargains
The road to trial has been marked by profound legal instability. In mid-2024, the military prosecution reached a historic plea deal with Mohammed and two accomplices, in which they pleaded guilty in exchange for avoiding the death penalty and receiving life imprisonment. However, then-Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin immediately revoked the agreement. After a lengthy battle in the U.S. appeals courts, the federal courts definitively overturned the agreement, leaving the death penalty firmly on the table for the 2028 trial.
CIA torture undermines the validity of the evidence
The delay of more than twenty years is largely due to the defendants' detention history. KSM and his associates spent three years in CIA black sites, where they endured brutal interrogation methods such as waterboarding.In a significant setback for the prosecution, Judge Schrama invalidated the testimony Mohammed gave to "clean" FBI agents in 2007, ruling that those confessions were still tainted by prior psychological coercion and torture.
The end of Al Qaeda's leadership through counterterrorism operations
Outside the courtroom, the US response against the leaders of the terrorist organization was resolved militarily:
Osama bin Laden: The founder of Al Qaeda was killed on May 2, 2011 in Pakistan by Navy SEALs during the historic Operation Neptune Spear.
Ayman al-Zawahiri: Bin Laden's successor and a key strategist of 9/11, was killed on July 31, 2022 in Kabul by a CIA precision drone strike.
The only conviction upheld in civil courts
The only member of the conspiracy successfully prosecuted in the ordinary federal system is Zacarias Moussaoui. The French-born citizen was arrested weeks before the hijackings due to suspicious activity at flight schools. In 2005, he pleaded guilty to terrorist conspiracy charges and is serving an irrevocable life at the ADX Florence supermax prison in Colorado.
A new symbol of New York
On the site of the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, destroyed during the attacks of September 11, 2001, a new complex was built in the heart of New York City. The most prominent building is One World Trade Center, a 541-meter-tall skyscraper that has become one of the city's main symbols and represents reconstruction and recovery after the tragedy.
A space to remember
Two large reflecting pools were built on the site of the former Twin Towers as part of the 9/11 Memorial. Inscribed along their edges are the names of those who died in the September 11 attacks and the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center. The site serves as a place of remembrance and reflection for family members, visitors, and the public.
A modern complex
In addition to One World Trade Center and the memorial, the new World Trade Center complex includes the 9/11 Memorial & Museum and the Oculus, a striking structure that serves as a transportation hub and shopping center. Together, these buildings have transformed the area once again, turning the former site of the Twin Towers into a space that blends historical memory, modern architecture, and urban activity.
Journalistic and institutional sources consulted:
The reconstruction of these events is based on updated coverage and cables from the international agency Reuters, investigative reports on the ground in Guantanamo from The New York Times, the judicial monitoring of the BBC News, the information bulletins of the counterterrorism analysis center The Soufan Center, the dispatches of the German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) and the records of the US federal circuit of appeals disseminated by NPR.
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