Roger Waters to headline NYC conference challenging 9/11 account

Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters is set to headline a conference in New York City marking 25 years since the 11 September attacks, where speakers will challenge the official account of the events and examine allegations about possible Israeli foreknowledge.

The four-day "Turning the Tide: 9/11 25 Years Later" conference is scheduled to take place from September 10 to 13 at El Museo del Barrio in Manhattan, according to organisers.

The event is being organised by the International Center for 9/11 Justice, a US-based non-profit that advocates a new investigation into the attacks.

Waters confirmed in July that he planned to attend.

His appearance follows a lengthy interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson in July in which Waters questioned the official explanation for the collapse of the World Trade Center towers.

"There is no way the North and South towers and Building Seven came down because of airplanes hitting. Just not possible," Waters said during the interview.

Waters suggested the buildings were brought down in controlled demolitions and questioned who might have been responsible. He also raised the possibility that elements within Israel or the US government had prior knowledge of, or involvement in, the attacks.

The attacks on 11 September 2001, killed nearly 3,000 people after hijacked planes struck the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon outside Washington, while another aircraft crashed in Pennsylvania.

The US government blamed Al-Qaeda for the attacks and subsequently launched its so-called "war on terror", invading Afghanistan weeks later and Iraq in 2003, killing hundreds of thousands of people.

Waters has argued that the attacks were subsequently used to justify US military interventions abroad.

 

 

 

 

View this post on Instagram

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A post shared by Roger Waters (@rogerwaters)

The International Center for 9/11 Justice has also questioned the role of the US government and its allies, including whether Israeli intelligence had prior knowledge of the attacks.

It has highlighted the case of five Israeli nationals who were detained in New Jersey after witnesses reported seeing them apparently celebrating as the World Trade Center was attacked.

The men were investigated by US authorities and later deported for immigration violations. The FBI did not establish that they were involved in the attacks.

The conference will feature dozens of speakers and the premiere of a documentary.

Other participants listed by organisers and promotional materials include former US congressman Dennis Kucinich, evolutionary biologist Bret Weinstein, investigative journalist Nick Bryant, commentator Jimmy Dore, filmmaker Jason Bermas, journalist James Corbett, retired US Air Force lieutenant colonel Karen Kwiatkowski, and journalists Derrick Broze and Ben Swann.

The programme also includes former first responders and witnesses to the attacks, among them retired FDNY captains Richard Patterson and Karin DeShore, former NYPD sergeant Rick Bylicki and William Rodriguez, a former World Trade Center janitor who survived the attacks.

The gathering is part of a wider movement that has questioned aspects of the official account of 9/11 for more than two decades, bringing together campaigners, academics, architects, engineers and some relatives of those killed.

Much of that scrutiny has focused on the collapse of the World Trade Center towers and World Trade Center 7, a 47-storey building that was not struck by an aircraft but collapsed later on 11 September after fires burned inside it for several hours.

Some campaigners argue that aspects of the collapses are consistent with controlled demolition. Official investigations have rejected that explanation, stating that aircraft impacts and subsequent fires caused the destruction of the World Trade Center buildings.