The leader of one group of ۹/۱۱ victims’ families says it has “taken way too long” to hold Saudi Arabia accountable for its alleged support of the terrorists who carried out the September ۱۱, ۲۰۰۱ terrorist attacks, whose ۲۵th anniversary is being observed across the US on Friday.
As that grim milestone approached, Terry Strada – the national chair of ۹/۱۱ Families United – said she felt as if it had “been several lifetimes” for there to be progress in the effort “to achieve a modicum of justice through our court system” in connection with the deadliest act of terror against the US.
But, even as the Saudis deny they had any role in ۹/۱۱, she added that she was as hopeful as ever that “the day of reckoning will come”.
“We will have it,” she said.
Strada’s role with ۹/۱۱ Families stems from the death of her husband, Tom, when terrorists intentionally crashed hijacked airliners into New York City’s World Trade Center, the Pentagon in Washington DC and a field in Pennsylvania, killing nearly ۳,۰۰۰ people.
Tom Strada, ۴۱, was killed at the World Trade Center, widowing Terry, with whom he had three children – including one who was less than a week old.
Terry Strada subsequently became an advocate for people who lost loved ones on September ۱۱ and wanted to be made as whole as possible in its aftermath. She said “getting to the truth and understanding everything” about how her husband was killed was not only the best way she could think of to honor his memory – but to also protect their country.
One of the ۹/۱۱ families’ most visible attempts at accountability for the attacks has been a years-long civil lawsuit alleging that Saudi Arabia supported the al-Qaida terror group operatives who carried out September ۱۱.
Attorneys for Saudi Arabia have denied the lawsuit’s merits, maintaining that the kingdom has helped the US combat al-Qaida, its late founder Osama bin Laden, and terrorism in general.
But in an August ۲۰۲۵ decision that Strada at the time called “another powerful step toward justice”, a federal judge in New York rejected a Saudi effort to dismiss the plaintiffs’ claims against the kingdom.
The judge, George B Daniels, wrote in a legal opinion that an imam and an accountant’s employment by Saudi Arabia probably had links to their support of two al-Qaida members who came to the US in early ۲۰۰۰ to study English and take flight lessons. In his opinion, Daniels said that made the plaintiffs’ claims legally sufficient to proceed to trial, though it had not taken place as of Thursday.
Other defendants named in the litigation – including al-Qaida itself, the Taliban and Iran – have already been found in default after not engaging with the claims.
Regardless, as Friday loomed four days after celebrating her youngest son’s ۲۵th birthday, Strada called on Saudi Arabia to “stop lying and take responsibility”.
ABC News days earlier had reported on recently revealed records purportedly bolstering claims of Saudi complicity in ۹/۱۱. The outlet reported that those records included an alleged video of a kingdom agent casing the US Capitol, which investigators believe was the target of the airliner that crashed in Pennsylvania – and a sketch with calculations for flying a plane toward a ground target.
Evidence of that kind was “strong”, Strada said. “You can’t deny it – and we are only getting more of it.”
Nonetheless, the push to try that lawsuit has only been part of the focus for Strada’s advocacy alongside other kinds of ۹/۱۱ victims.
Strada said she and many others collectively have spent years tracking the proceedings against a group of men who have spent years incarcerated at the US’s Guantánamo Bay detention camp for their alleged roles in the ۹/۱۱ attacks. She said she could hardly believe they were only recently given a tentative June ۲۰۲۸ trial date.
Meanwhile, Strada was also a prominent voice against LIV Golf, the breakaway tour that was backed by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which was launched in ۲۰۲۲ and spent billions of dollars luring players away from the US-based PGA.
One professional US golfer who joined the LIV tour, Brooks Koepka, was asked what he would tell the families of ۹/۱۱ victims about his getting into business with a Saudi venture. He replied, in part, “I think as we move forward from that, we have to look toward the pathway to peace and forgiveness.”
Strada and her allies disagreed with that kind of sentiment.
“These people don’t understand how devastating September ۱۱ was,” Strada said at the time. “My husband was dismembered. We don’t know where all his body parts landed. He has never been identified.
“There was a psychological cruel[ty] that people do not realize.”
All of which has made it a relief for Strada, she said in a moment of honesty, to see LIV Golf enduring deep financial struggles ahead of Friday. The tour filed for federal bankruptcy protection in her home state of New Jersey after abruptly losing its wealthy Saudi investors months earlier.
Accusing them of “sportswashing”, Strada said, “The Saudis … [were] trying to improve their image and have a younger generation view them in a different way. And it didn’t work. There is some satisfaction in that.”
