When the official report of the congressional 9/11 commission was released in 2003, 29 (not, as often claimed, 28) pages had been removed. These pages have now been released. As has been rumored for some time, they do in fact show evidence of connections between Saudi officials and the hijackings. Simon Henderson writes:

It is instantly apparent [upon looking at the passages] that the widely-held belief for why the pages were not initially released—to prevent embarrassing the Saudi royal family—is true. The pages are devastating. . . . The inquiry . . . quotes a redacted source alleging “incontrovertible evidence that there is support for these terrorists within the Saudi government.”

[In a recent] interview, the CIA’s director, John Brennan, [stated that] “there [is] no evidence to indicate that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials individually had supported the 9/11 attacks.”

That could very well be right. But it still allows for the possibility, indeed the probability, that the actions of senior Saudis resulted in those terrorist outrages. [One need not believe] that the Saudi government or members of the royal family directly supported or financed the 9/11 attacks. But official Saudi money ended up in the pockets of the attackers, without a doubt. . . .

On Friday, the Saudi foreign minister held a news conference at the Saudi embassy where he declared “The matter is now finished.” Asked whether the report exonerated the kingdom, he replied: “Absolutely.” I think not.

Early Friday morning, Israel attacked military installations near the Iranian cities of Isfahan and nearby Natanz, the latter being one of the hubs of the country’s nuclear program. Jerusalem is not taking credit for the attack, and none of the details are too certain, but it seems that the attack involved multiple drones, likely launched from within Iran, as well as one or more missiles fired from Syrian or Iraqi airspace. Strikes on Syrian radar systems shortly beforehand probably helped make the attack possible, and there were reportedly strikes on Iraq as well.

Iran itself is downplaying the attack, but the S-300 air-defense batteries in Isfahan appear to have been destroyed or damaged. This is a sophisticated Russian-made system positioned to protect the Natanz nuclear installation. In other words, Israel has demonstrated that Iran’s best technology can’t protect the country’s skies from the IDF. As Yossi Kuperwasser puts it, the attack, combined with the response to the assault on April 13,

clarified to the Iranians that whereas we [Israelis] are not as vulnerable as they thought, they are more vulnerable than they thought. They have difficulty hitting us, but we have no difficulty hitting them.

Nobody knows exactly how the operation was carried out. . . . It is good that a question mark hovers over . . . what exactly Israel did. Let’s keep them wondering. It is good for deniability and good for keeping the enemy uncertain.

The fact that we chose targets that were in the vicinity of a major nuclear facility but were linked to the Iranian missile and air forces was a good message. It communicated that we can reach other targets as well but, as we don’t want escalation, we chose targets nearby that were involved in the attack against Israel. I think it sends the message that if we want to, we can send a stronger message. Israel is not seeking escalation at the moment.