Photo taken on September 11, 2001 shows the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center burning after two planes crashed into each building in New York. The buildings collapsed on that day claiming 2,753 lives. September 11, 2026 marks the 25th anniversary of this event. Photo by STAN HONDA /AFP/Getty Images

 

"Do not refer to the Sept.11 attacks as terrorist attacks. [Refer to the] longstanding language guidance [on the Sept.11, 2001 al-Qaida attacks]."

"The hijackings led to passenger jet crashes in Washington D.C. Pennsylvania and Manhattan."

"The World Trade Center was destroyed [CBC internal language guide]."

Basem Boshra, senior director, journalistic standards and public trust, CBC News

 

"Refusing to call it an act of terrorism dishonours the victims, their families, the survivors, and the first responders who witnessed the horrors of that day."

"Trying to sanitize or rewrite that history is deeply offensive and does a disservice to everyone who was affected by the attacks."

"[The CBC is redefining] terrorism in a way that downplays the atrocity [of the terrorist attacks]." 

Conservative Member of Parliament Rachel Thomas

 

"It is wholly inaccurate to state our journalists have been urged to declare that this was not a terrorist act."

"[The memo represents a reminder to adhere to the CBC's language guide for] the terms 'terrorist' and 'terrorism'."

"CBC preferences use of these words with attribution to credible sources, a practice shared by many of the world's top journalistic organizations."

Kerry Kelly, CBC public affairs spokesperson 

 

"[Staff will use the terms but they will always be] attributed to government officials, authorities, experts and politicians." 

"But CBC News does not itself designate specific groups as terrorists, or specific acts as terrorism, regardless of the region or the events, because these words are so loaded with meaning, politics and emotion that they can end up being impediments to our journalism." 

Brodie Fenlon, CBC News editor in chief, general manager

 

"[Employees are urged to] exercise extreme caution before using the words terrorist or terrorism [because they can be] highly contested [in some instances and potentially raise questions about the CBC's] consistency and impartiality [in covering other attacks]."

"Terrorism generally implies attacks against unarmed civilians for political religious or some other ideological reason But it's a highly controversial term that can leave journalists taking sides in a conflict."

CBC Language Guide 

Confusion has been swirling about how CBC News journalists use the words 'terrorist' and 'terrorism,' particularly in connection with the al-Qaeda attacks on New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania on Sept. 11, 2001. (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

 

Al-Qaida, the Islamist fundamentalist terrorist group operating under the late Osama bin Laden, is listed as such under Canada's terrorist list. The United Nations lists the group as terrorists. There is little doubt that  al-Qaida is acknowledged as a terrorist group almost universally, many of the Arab countries of the Middle East as well, including Saudi Arabia where it was formed, with 'radicalized' Saudi Arabians their operatives in the suicide mission that killed almost three thousand people in the aerial attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and Pennsylvania.

 

Canada's once-respected public broadcaster, under its current administration -- well infiltrated by noxious Islamist figures that also occupy positions of trust and authority in many other Canadian institutions under the Liberal government that has seen fit to transition Canada from a nation wedded to social justice through democratic order and Western values to one that accommodates itself to the transformative presence of Muslim Brotherhood adherents -- now carefully sidesteps naming terrorism for what it is, implying in the manner of its coverage that there is room to excuse the excesses of baleful violence against the West in sympathy with the 'oppressed' of the world.

 

In that atmosphere of submission to an alternative view of Islamist jihadists where to name them as such is to burden Canada's Muslim population with institutional 'Islamophobia' which must at all costs be avoided, the CBC's operational chiefs see the value of soft-peddling Islamist extremism expressed in terrorism's slaughter of those opposing Islamic conquest, including innocent civilians who are used as proxies-for-slaughter in lieu of more prized goals such as Western officials viewed as Islam's enemies, even those who compromise themselves by their eagerness to cull favour with their growing Muslim populations.

 

The despicable position taken by the mealy-mouthed expositors of journalistic 'balance' and 'neutrality' in the face of the evil represented by barbarian hordes of Islamist jihadists whose mission is to kill, to instill fear and apprehension in the minds of those they terrify tests our civilizational mores and certainties. Prostrating themselves before the alter of accommodation, they have lost the confidence of the public who judge the public broadcaster on the quality of the journalism they place on display and find it wanting. Those same Canadians would be satisfied to see the CBC defunded by taxpayers and for it to become as totally defunct as it is morally.

 

That the CBC, under pressure applied to Prime Minister Mark Carney by Opposition leader Pierre Poilievre, by a threat made by the American Federal Bureau of Investigation over the outrage expressed by its director Kash Patel, and by the reaction of ordinary Canadians, offended and horrified that their public broadcaster is loathe to name the obvious for what it is, reflected on its original decision-making and recanted this latest order, is telling. Telling also that its withdrawal of the order not to name the 9/11 horror as a terrorist attack, and that this rescinding of the memo is to apply only to 9/11.

 

And not to CBC's regular 'neutral', non-subjective reports on the terrorist attack by Hamas on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, and the resulting invasion of Gaza by the Israel Defense Forces, in a defensive move to destroy the terrorist group controlling Gaza once and for all for which it is universally condemned by its erstwhile allies. The CBC reportage on a tiny nation fighting back against Islamist jihadists whose terrorist death-cult agenda cannot rationally be denied, is shameful, and it will continue; no slack given to public outrage over that since it is too controversial in and of itself, impacting for the present time, only Canadian Jews, not the overwhelming presence of Muslims now living in Canada. 

 

 

 

Basem Boshra, CBC

 

"...To be clear, CBC News has never said what happened on Sept. 11, 2001, was not terrorism, as some commentators have stated in recent days. We have reported fully and accurately on the reasons and motivations for those attacks as determined by police, governments and an independent commission. We've just made sure to do it with attribution."

"Clarity and understanding are at the heart of our journalism. The leaked excerpt without context or explanation has raised more questions for the public that we must now answer."

"After reviewing our current language guidance, we have decided to adjust it to clarify that direct attribution is not required for describing the historic events of 9/11 as terrorism." 

"We are doing so to remove what has unfortunately (and unintentionally) become an impediment to clarity and public understanding."

"At the same time, as new acts of politically or ideologically motivated violence occur in our world, we will continue to follow the journalistically sound practice of attributing causes and motivations to officials and experts."

Basem Boshra, Senior director of journalistic standards and public trust