9/11 attacks remembered

25:33Since the 1990s, Ireland has stood out among small countries as hosting a big number of US presidential visits, often with huge public welcomes for the visitors. Over the years, stories of this place have become part of my soul. I am happy to be in Ireland. I am now a free man of Dublin. The roots of the relationship lie in emigration during America's formative years. Almost one in ten Americans now claim Irish ancestry. The wheels of the presidential airliner were running on irie soil. John F. Kennedy was in the land of his forebears. JFK was the first president to visit Ireland in 1963. This is the man whose great-grandfather somehow scraped together the four pounds for a sailing ship passage and emigrated to the United States.

26:22Barack Obama was another president with Irish heritage, and he paid homage with humour. My name is Barack Obama of the Moneygall Obamas. and I've come home to find the apostrophe that we lost somewhere along the way. One of the most visible and diplomatically valuable outworkings of the country's links happens every year on the 17th of March in Washington. Let me wish everyone a very happy St. Patrick's Day. On Ireland's national holiday, the Irish Prime Minister, the Taoiseach, has a meeting and a ceremony with the President. Time-honoured tradition, I'm going to present the bowl of shamrock to President.

27:02Dan Mulhall is a former Irish ambassador to the US. I don't know of any other country that has a guaranteed annual outing in Washington. Some of my European colleagues kind of puzzled as to how Ireland had managed to pull this off. Donald Trump's visit here to Dublin and to the west of Ireland will be different to most of his predecessors. He has no known Irish ancestry. There won't be a large public rally involving him. Protests are being planned, focused on US actions in the Middle East. Dr Peter McLaughlin believes there are parallels with another visit, that of Ronald Reagan in 1984. The US was severely criticised at that point by people in Ireland at what was going on in the Cold War broadly, but very specifically in Central America.

27:48Many people in Ireland would have a cousin or someone who was serving abroad as a nun or a priest in Latin America and was able to bring back these first-hand reports of how there were very controversial associations there with US policy. And yet at the same time, this was the US president. He needed to be courted and that was the start of the real investment of the US in the Republic of Ireland and indeed Northern Ireland. I want you to know that for this great grandson of Ireland, this is a moment of joy. Ireland is more used than most nations to hosting the holder of the most powerful office in the world.

28:22This weekend of diplomacy and demonstrations will be another episode in a story dating back decades. A story told by our Ireland correspondent, Chris Page.

28:39You're listening to the BBC World Service. This is NewsHour, coming to you live from London with James Kamarasamy. Even as senior figures in the US government were using today's 9-11 ceremonies to talk up America's progress in the war against Iran, a new dimension to that conflict has been rapidly taking shape, a new threat to global oil supplies. Because it's been reported that the Iranian-backed Houthi movement in Yemen has taken control of the entire Red Sea coast, including strategic islands which give it control over the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, a key shipping route linking Asia and Europe. That comes a day after the Houthis, who control much of the north of Yemen, including the capital Sana 'a, captured the Red Sea port city of Mokka.

29:21This all seems to be a significant moment in the Houthis' struggle against the internationally recognised and Saudi-backed Yemeni government and a big setback for Saudi Arabia, which increasingly relies on the Red Sea for its oil exports. This is what the Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sari had to say.

29:41Navigation remains safe for all shipping companies except Saudi vessels in the Strait of Bab al-Mandeb, a strategic link between the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea via the Red Sea and the Suez Canal. Earlier I asked our chief international correspondent Lise Doucette what she made of the last few days' developments. This is very, very significant. This is the largest military advances by the Houthis in many years. All the reports are that they've taken control of much of the West Coast along the Red Sea. But they have also been seizing islands which are smack in the middle of that strategic choke point, the Bab el-Mendeb.

30:21And that means a second front has now been opened in this absolutely strategic area. Just south and east of there, of course, is that strait, which has become a household name, the Strait of Hormuz on the Persian Gulf, where Iran has been losing some of its control over tanker traffic through that waterway. And so maybe it decided, along with the Houthis, their closest ally, that now was the time to open up this front in the Bab al-Mendeb, the other vital choke point. It's been a possibility for a very long time. So the Iranians, this seems to be a moment where the interests of the Iranians and the Houthis are aligned.

31:02What about an American response to this? There has been reporting in American media that the Saudi Crown Prince, a de facto ruler, did call President Trump and asked him for American air power to attack the Houthis. The reports say that they've not done that. But the head of military command is now in Riyadh. So consultation is going on, and I think it's very hard to say exactly what will happen next. President Trump, as we all know, can be very unpredictable. He may not want to open a second front. He's already too entangled in the Strait of Hormuz and tying down a lot of military hardware. But you remember a few years ago when the Houthis were disrupting traffic in the Red Sea, the Americans and the British were both attacking territory in Yemen controlled by the Houthis.

31:51So we don't know yet what the Americans will do. And interestingly enough, the Houthi spokespersons, as we just heard, are being very clear. They're not going to disrupt all maritime traffic, just the Saudi vessels. Just briefly, Lise, this comes, of course, in the context of a long civil war in Yemen. I mean, there was a truce, wasn't there, which briefly seemed to hold. Just put this all into context within Yemen itself. So in 2022, the truce was agreed. The Saudis really wanted to get out of this long-running war. So they backed the forces in the south, fighting against the Houthis in the north.

32:30But the Saudis and the Emiratis, who both have their own allies, fell out. And that may have led to a weakening of the government-aligned forces. Our chief international correspondent, Lise Doucette, well, the United Nations says at least 46 ,000 people have been displaced in Yemen since the Houthi fighters launched their offensive last week. It says the number of displaced is rising at an alarming pace. Amna lives in Al-Makhraba camp for displaced people near the Saudi border in northern Yemen. The area is mostly controlled by the Houthis and she fears the worst is yet to come.

33:05We have been displaced three times, not just once. There is fear in our hearts, almost like terror. We are frightened and terrified. When we hear a plane overhead, it fills us with fear. We huddle together because we are scared. If the plane strikes, we will all die together. There is nowhere to run. Alison Bottomley is with the Norwegian Refugee Council in the Yemeni city of Aden. We've spoken with a lot of people that were living in displacement sites and they heard shelling. They grabbed their children and some of them told us they walked for 15 kilometres in the middle of the night. They were hoping to find shelter in another camp, but there's just been a huge wave of displacement.

33:53And even if people can move, there's not that many safe places to go to. Everybody needs shelter. They need water. They need food. They're going to need health care. We hear about people just kind of sitting under trees because they're not quite sure where to go, where they're going to find the level of support they need. Alison Bottomley from the Norwegian Refugee Council. Hussein Al-Bukhaiti is a journalist in the Yemeni capital Sanaa. He's close to the Houthi rebels. And I asked him whether it was true that the Houthis now control the country's entire Red Sea coast. Yeah, they are now in control of the entire coast in the Red Sea.

34:30Before that, they have took control of all the mountain that oversees the West Coast. It took them maybe a few hours to take all the coast because the Saudi-backed forces, they have withdrawn. So there was no fighting at all. So would you say that the Houthis now control, essentially, what comes in and out through the Bab el-Mandab waterway? They were in control what comes in and out of Bab el-Mandab in 2023. So you didn't need to be at Bab el-Mandab. I believe they have now started a strategy to liberate all Yemen. So the main goal is the liberation of Yemen and the West Coast was one of the most important areas because the largest United Arab Emirates and Saudi-backed forces bases were in that area.

35:25So why focus then on that particular area? They have said that they will allow shipping to pass through the waterway unless it's affiliated to Saudi Arabia. Is that then the goal, to put pressure on the Saudis who are backing the government forces through this shipping pressure? No, I mean the control of Bab al-Mandab is not about to put pressure against Saudi. Yemeni has already put pressure against Saudi when they have declared that they will block the Red Sea in front of all their shipping. And Saudi is not now using the south of Red Sea. All their ships, they are going through the Swiss canal.

36:09We've heard reports that tens of thousands of civilians are having to flee the fighting. There is clearly an element of distrust for the Houthi fighters from those civilians who are fleeing the area where the fighting has been taking place. Who have responsibility of the civilians is the Saudi-backed forces. Of course there will be people who will be displaced, but as soon as the fight will stop, those people can come back. Yemeni journalist close to the Houthi rebels, Hussein al-Bukhati. Well, let's turn to Saudi Arabia now. It's relied on the Red Sea for exporting its oil since the Strait of Hormuz was shut down.

36:44And by seizing the port of Mokka, now Perim Island and a couple of others, the Houthis seem to have a chokehold on the Bab al-Mandeb Strait. and so on Saudi's oil exports. So how serious is this for Saudi Arabia? Aziz Al-Gashian is a senior non-resident fellow at the Gulf International Forum on the line from the Saudi capital, Riyadh. I asked him how significant was this Houthi advance? Well, it's, I mean, incredibly significant and it's significantly concerning. I think firstly, for Saudi Arabia directly, I think any kind of increase in Houthi-gained territories will simply just expand the scope and the breadth of the attack zone that the Houthis can use against Saudi Arabia.

37:28I think just the more territory there is, the more difficult there is to manage this threat. So that's when it comes to Saudi Arabia, of course, directly. But when it comes to the Bab al-Mandeb Straits, I think this is not exclusively a Saudi concern. This is clearly an international concern. And I think even coming from the Saudi rhetoric, it's clear that this is really what they're communicating. And even they've been communicating this message since they started their campaign in 2015 in Decisive Storm. They've been saying that, listen, the Houthis are a problem that will pose an international threat.

38:07So I think this is quite significant and it's very concerning. Well, how significant is it that as it's being reported in the United States, the crown prince has asked President Trump specifically to take military action against the Houthis, and that hasn't happened? Yeah. Well, this is part of, I would say, one of the themes that has taken place in the Saudi-American relationship right now that's been coming, that's been shedding or having something shed light on, which is basically this Saudi frustration regarding the dedication of American dedication to Saudi infrastructure and Saudi security.

38:52Quite frankly, I've always said this, that for a long time, one of the characteristics of the Saudi-American relationship has been either friendship, strategic relations, frustration, but there is anxiety. And I think when it comes to this situation, it's very clear that sometimes American operations lead to, you know, whenever, sometimes the United States wants to enter into a war like what they did in February when the Saudis wanted to go against that. it really puts the Saudis against their, it goes against their interests. But now, since the reverberations of that war is increasing, the United States is not there.

39:41And that's part of the frustrations that Saudi ruling elite have had with the United States. In other words, kind of American adventurisms, while the Saudis and others in the region inherent the strategic ramifications of this. So a big headache for Saudi Arabia. A big migraine. A big migraine. Well, but what? What is going to happen next? Because Arab states are going to Oman on Monday to meet Iran to discuss the Strait of Hormuz, the other front in all of this. How is Saudi Arabia going to react to Iran's demands for tolls or levies to get its oil to international markets? I think that is just unacceptable.

40:22And the reason being is that I think the Saudis in the past few years have deduced through their diplomacy that there is just a process of kicking the can down the road, that this diplomacy is not really spilling over into addressing the core security issues that they have with Iran or Tahran and the Houthis. So here, any kind of gesture, financial gesture, any financial commitment, albeit very limitedly or on a small scale, won't be accepted. I don't think they will try to do this because they will find this as some sort of extortion. The Saudis are treating this as basically an extortionist policy, an extortionist approach.

41:09and what the Saudis and others don't want to do is to set a precedent for this to happen again. Aziz Al-Gashyan from the Gulf International Forum speaking to me from the Saudi capital, Riyadh. And just to emphasise the pressure Saudi Arabia's feeling, it's had to shut the east-west oil pipeline it's been using to bypass restrictions in the Strait of Hormuz following attacks which it says have come from Iraqi territory. You're listening to NewsHour from the BBC World Service. a reminder of our top story this hour the united states has been marking the 25th anniversary of the 9-11 terror attacks in which nearly 3 000 people died earlier on the program we heard from the man thought to be the last person to escape from the south tower of the world trade center ron de francesco i remember getting hit on the head and then starting to drift off i woke up three days later in the hospital burns on 60 of my body when i was in the hospital i didn't know that the towers had come down.

42:09I didn't even know it was a terrorist attack. In other news, reports say the Iranian-backed Houthis have seized control of Yemen's entire Red Sea coast, as well as strategic islands in the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, further cementing their grip on a key shipping lane linking Europe and Asia. And the British military says it believes half a million Russian soldiers have been killed since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

42:38You're listening to NewsHour from the BBC World Service. And let's return to our main story today, the 25th anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. In the United States, today there has been a lot of reflection about how the events of that day changed the country in the two and a half decades that followed. But what about the ideology behind the attacks? 9-11 was a spectacular propaganda success for the global jihadist movement. But these days, al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group, which emerged later, seem to have a much lower profile, despite some continued regional successes, largely in Africa. I've been discussing all that with Mina Al-Lamy.

43:15She's BBC Monitoring's chief jihadist media analyst. And we began with the significance of 9-11 for the global jihadist movement. 9-11 really put al-Qaeda on the map in an unprecedented way. And it was really the sheer audacity and the scale of the attacks. It kind of created this shock and awe effect. And for some Muslims who already were receptive to jihadist ideas, or maybe they held a similar worldview or the same narratives, that kind of in a way generated a fascination with Al-Qaeda and drew some towards the group. So we saw in subsequent months and years, Al-Qaeda grew from just being a group in Afghanistan it expanded considerably and it established branches in several parts of the world.

44:03So if you like, 9-11 was kind of a big propaganda and recruitment boost for the movement. And then, of course, we saw the Islamic State group develop as well. And there was a time when it was on the ascendancy. Just talk us through how things have evolved over the past, I mean, I guess, decade and a half or so. Yeah, so the emergence of IS, which was at some point linked to al-Qaeda and then broke ties with the group, there were two parts to it. So on the one hand, of course, it suddenly created a new threat to the world, but also to the jihadist movement, you know, sponsored by al-Qaeda. because on the one hand, of course, they seized territory and declared their so-called caliphate that spanned areas across Iraq and Syria.

44:52And to some extent, al-Qaeda benefited from that, although it was a territorial and ideological challenge to al-Qaeda. But in a way, it kind of allowed al-Qaeda to present itself as the kinder face of jihad. Obviously, it wasn't, but that's how it presented itself and tried to recruit. And IS, of course, their project was very fast, very brutal. It really wasn't sustainable. And of course, they relatively quickly lost their territory. But the presence of al-Qaeda, the appearance of al-Qaeda, really created a key moment for the jihadist movement, a negative one. It really divided the jihadist movement.

45:28And so it survived in some shape or form today. But really, IS, as well as al-Qaeda, They are shadows of the groups that they were before IS, of course, lost its bases in the Middle East, in Iraq and Syria. And it's really been pushed to remote areas in Africa. What about the idea, though, of a global movement? Where is that? Currently, there is a very live and intense debate within the jihadist movement that you could see through books and debates online, especially on Telegram, about whether the group, you know, the jihadist movement groups need to change or else they will become obsolete. The debate really is about whether to become more local and flexible and pragmatic to make political changes.

46:17This debate was really sharpened by HTS or Hey At-Tahrir al-Sham in Syria, which seized power in Syria in December 2024. Now HTS had roots in both IS and then Al-Qaeda, but then it abandoned both. It kind of turned its back on this global jihadist objective. And not only did it seize power in Syria, but it got a lot of support from the international community. So jihadists really started looking at that model with the more, if you like, pragmatic jihadists seeing it as a way forward and the hardliners seeing it as betrayal. You know, there's no way that we can do that because if you do that, that is betrayal of the principles of the doctrine.

46:58But of course, I mean, I think one thing important to say is that the disagreement amongst jihadists, amongst what we call pragmatic jihadists and hawkish hardliners, is not about the ultimate goal. I think they agree that the ultimate goal is to seize power and establish a state ruled by Sharia law, but they differ on how to get there. Where does the Taliban fit into all this? So the Taliban has never really presented itself as a global jihadist group. It's always been, it's always insisted in its messaging ideology, but also its actions, that it is only interested in Afghanistan, that it is trying to, well, of course, now it is in charge of the country.

47:40but during its struggle, during its so-called jihad, it said that its actions were aimed at creating an Islamic state in Afghanistan only and that it had no ambitions beyond the borders of Afghanistan. And of course, Al-Qaeda was there. The Taliban harbored Al-Qaeda, bin Laden, and they suffered the consequences of that. That was Mina Al-Lamy, BBC Monitoring's chief jihadist media analyst, with her thoughts on the evolution of the global jihadist movement in the years following the 9-11 attacks. That's about it for this edition of NewsHour, but we're going to end the programme back in the United States with some of the sounds and the words from today's 9-11 memorial events on the 25th anniversary of the terror attacks.

48:28From all of us here on NewsHour, thanks very much for listening.

48:46My Aunt Maria Teresa Conception Santillian, Tita Meritas. Even though I never met you, I'm honored to be named after you. I hope I'm making you proud knowing you are a great daughter, sister, friend, and much more. I wish you could celebrate my birthday with me tomorrow. Please continue watching over us and know we all love and miss you. God bless America. Ryan Daniel Fitzgerald, beloved and forever missed son, big brother, cousin, and friend, memories of happy times and laughing times with you bring everybody peace and joy every day.

49:32With the events of that morning, 2 ,977, beautiful souls were ripped from our world, and many more died in the weeks and years after horrible, grotesque injuries. so many were sustained. Today we renew the sacred oath that we first swore in their names a quarter of a century ago. We will never, ever forget.

50:37Did America's war on terror work? I'm Asma Khalid, host of the Global Story podcast from the BBC. In the words of a former U.S. official, on September 11th, 2001, the terrorists hijacked not just airplanes, but also the direction of U.S. foreign policy. 25 years on, what were the unintended consequences of the war on terror? For the full story, listen to The Global Story on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.