Here’s a real kick in the shin: chances are 9/11 mentor Khalid Sheikh Mohammed will get the COVID vaccine before you do.
Accused terror mentors such as KSM and others detained in Guantanamo Bay will begin receiving the coronavirus vaccine, the Pentagon confirmed on Friday, although the United States continues to experience a severe shortage of the miracle vaccine.
A Defense Department spokesman confirmed that authorities have signed an order that will consider COVID-19 vaccines “offered to all detainees and prisoners”.
Vaccines can be applied as early as next week.
“It will be administered on a voluntary basis and according to the Department’s priority distribution plan,” spokesman Michael Howard told the Post.
Forty detainees remain in the United States military prison in Cuba, including the man accused of planning the worst attack on American soil, which claimed 2,977 innocent lives on September 11, 2001, and has since been linked to thousands of other deaths.
The order was signed on January 27 by Terry Adirim, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for health affairs who swore an oath as appointed by Biden on the day of the inauguration, a Pentagon spokesman confirmed.
The move immediately sparked outrage among New Yorkers, who survived and helped bring New York back from its darkest day.
“You cannot make this up. The ridiculousness of what we received from our government. They will apply the vaccine to the villains of Guantánamo Bay before all residents of the United States can. It’s the theater of the absurd, ”said Tom Von Essen, who was the city’s fire commissioner during 9/11 and lost 343 firefighters on 9/11.
“It’s crazy,” he said of KSM having received the vaccine before most Americans did.
John Feal, a demolition supervisor at the Ground Zero pile after the attacks, who has a number of 9/11-related illnesses and has not yet received the vaccine, was surprised by the news.
“The fact that the 9/11 community cannot get the vaccine and the terrorists can show how backward our government is,” he told the Post. “It’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. It is an insult to the people who ran to the towers and were killed and to those who worked on the pile for months and are sick ”.
The average person who responded to 9/11 was 38 at the time and is now aged 58 to 59, just before the deadline for receiving the vaccine in New York, said Feal, who runs the Feal Good Foundation, a group defense of those who responded to 9/11 and who helped pressure Congress to permanently extend the 9/11 Victims Compensation Fund.
Brian Sullivan, a retired special security officer with the Federal Aviation Administration, said: “I’m furious. It is totally outrageous. I’m 75 years old. I didn’t get my COVID vaccine. Will they give Khalid Sheikh Mohammed? “
Sullivan added that it is a scandal that terrorists have not faced justice near the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. “This news adds insult to injury. It’s a slap in the face for the families of 9/11 victims, ”said Sullivan.
“This year will be the 20th anniversary and the terrorists are still in Guantánamo. And now we are going to apply the COVID vaccine. It’s just crazy. “
Two other men, accused of being complicit in the bombings at a Bali nightclub in 2002, which killed 202 people, were also in line to receive vaccines under the order of the Department of Defense.
The Pentagon’s decision comes as states like New York complain that their lockers are empty, forcing them to cancel a mass vaccination program, and the Biden government warns that the jab shortage will last until 2021.
On Tuesday, The Post revealed that thousands of New York City teachers had their COVID-19 vaccine appointments canceled due to decreased supplies and scheduling confusion.
“It is unforgivable and anti-American that President Biden is choosing to prioritize convicted terrorists in Gitmo over vulnerable American elderly or veterans,” said Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY).
Retired FDNY Lieutenant Michael O’Connell worked on the search and rescue when the towers fell. This left him with sarcoidosis, an autoimmune disease.
“This is a real kick in the balls. It is very disturbing. It’s absolutely disgusting, ”he said of Gitmo’s request for vaccination.
“These terrorists have done damage, but it is the patriots who have to wait to be vaccinated. We responded 10 seconds after the first plane crashed into the building. Here we are a year later [since the COVID-19 outbreak] and politicians can’t get the coronavirus vaccine right. ”
– Additional reporting by Steven Nelson