On 9/11 anniversary, are New Yorkers’ minds elsewhere?

Twelve years after the devastating attacks that brought down the Twin Towers, all eyes seem to be on the mayoral race.

By MAYA SHWAYDER
Twin Towers september 11 370 (photo credit: REUTERS)
Twin Towers september 11 370
(photo credit: REUTERS)
NEW YORK – Twelve years after the day that no one will forget, New York seems to have moved on, even if only a little.
While the events of September 11, 2001, have not passed from memory (the official ceremony with the reading of the victims’ names, and the evening’s “Tribute in Light” event, are scheduled for Wednesday) for current New Yorkers, the results of Tuesday’s mayoral primary vote seemed a little more pertinent.
The race to assume current Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s mantle has been particularly nasty and thus particularly enthralling, with accusations of racism, corruption, millions spent on attack ads, and wild Weiners flying (Stephen Colbert has referred to now twice-disgraced congressman Anthony Weiner as “shockingly- still-candidate-for-mayor Anthony Weiner”).
Coverage of the mayoral and comptroller races – in which also-disgraced former New York governor Eliot Spitzer is running – dominates local papers. With all the entertainment to be had from watching politicians brawl, most of New York’s attention seems, finally, to have drifted.
There is some precedent for this. After devoting most of its coverage to the attacks’ 10th anniversary in 2011, last year the New York Times famously excluded 9/11 coverage from its front page, confining the 11th anniversary coverage to smaller news stories. Times public editor and blogger Margaret Sullivan wrote at the time, “The pain, the outrage, the loss – these never fade. The amount of journalism, however, must.”
Carolyn Ryan, the Times’ metropolitan editor, said that “some anniversaries offer a natural reflection point. In subsequent years, we do have to mark these moments, but it will be in a more modest way.”
Still, many events will take place around the city marking the anniversary of the attacks. In addition to the official citywide ceremony at the World Trade Center site and the annual “Tribute in Light,” when the sites of the two towers will be illuminated, the 9/11 Memorial and Museum will offer free walking tours of Ground Zero.
In addition, the Museum of Jewish Heritage in Battery Park City, near the World Trade Center site, will have free admission all day and host an evening panel discussion on how Battery Park City revived itself after the attacks.
Each borough will have its own ceremonies as well. At the “Postcards on Staten Island” event, borough officials there will honor and read the names of the 274 Staten Island residents who lost their lives, and Bloomberg is scheduled to make an appearance.
Brooklyn will host its own 9/11 candlelight tribute in the evening, and the Children of Abraham Walk for Peace will take its 10th walk, visiting a church and a mosque that provided help for displaced residents during 2012 Hurricane Sandy.
A number of tribute and candlelight ceremonies will take place in Queens, including the “Remember Me” run for the Christopher Santora Scholarship Fund, which is named for a firefighter who lost his life.
A branch of the New York City Public Library in the Bronx will hold a talk and storytelling session for local residents.
In Israel, the Fire and Rescue Services will hold a ceremony on Wednesday for firefighters who died on 9/11. The ceremony, taking place at the Rishon Lezion fire station, was initiated by the Rishon firefighters in memory of the brother of one of their members: the late Danny Levy, a New York firefighter who died in January from a 9/11-related illness.
Jerusalem Post staff contributed to this report.


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