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Zeshan Hamdani, who lost his older brother Mohammad Salman Hamdani in the collapse of the North Tower, described the current political climate surrounding the 25th anniversary as one in which Islam itself is being hijacked, according to an interview he gave the BBC on September 11, 2026. The anniversary events have been complicated by calls from former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and others for Mayor Zohran Mamdani to refrain from participating in the commemoration. Mamdani, who took office as the city’s first Muslim mayor, has responded that his focus remains on the families who lost loved ones and the first responders who sacrificed on that day, a Democracy Now report published September 9, 2026, stated.
Mohammad Salman Hamdani, a 23-year-old Pakistani American who served as an NYPD cadet and trained emergency medical technician, left his job at Rockefeller University on September 11, 2001, to assist victims at the World Trade Center after seeing the towers burning from his train, according to accounts compiled by his family and detailed in a 2013 CNN opinion piece written by his mother Talat Hamdani. His remains were recovered months later, and reports from the time indicated they were found in 34 pieces near the North Tower. A Newsday investigation published September 10, 2026, noted that Talat Hamdani continues to campaign for her son’s explicit listing among first responders at the National 9/11 Memorial, arguing that his exclusion represents an injustice to both his memory and the broader Muslim community.
Initial investigations after the attacks listed Hamdani as a possible person of interest because of his faith and Pakistani heritage, leading to media speculation that proved unfounded once his heroic actions were confirmed, according to a September 9, 2026, Democracy Now segment on post-9/11 Islamophobia that referenced the Costs of War Project at Brown University. Congress later recognized him in the Patriot Act for his bravery, and then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly publicly hailed him as a hero. His mother told CNN in 2013 that the family endured months of uncertainty, initially hoping he had been detained rather than killed while trying to help strangers regardless of their background.
The September 11 attacks killed nearly 3,000 people, among them roughly 60 Muslims including first responders and office workers, according to compilations referenced in a 2011 Al Arabiya report and a Harvard University blog post from the same period that listed dozens of names. In the years that followed, the United States launched wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere that a Costs of War Project assessment at Brown University placed the death toll at close to 1 million people across those regions. A Pew Research Center portrait of Muslim Americans published September 3, 2026, documented that FBI figures show anti-Muslim hate crimes spiked to 481 incidents in 2001 from 28 the year before, with annual totals fluctuating but never returning to pre-attack levels.
Talat Hamdani told Newsday this week that her son’s sacrifice challenges one-dimensional views of Muslims that emerged after 9/11, a perspective echoed by Michigan State University professor Mohammad Hassan Khalil, who produced a documentary on Hamdani titled “American Jedi.” Khalil argued that anyone trained as a first responder who chooses to save others deserves recognition irrespective of faith. The family has also highlighted how Hamdani carried his Quran on the day of the attacks, underscoring his personal devotion while serving the public as a cadet and research analyst.
Zeshan Hamdani’s comments to the BBC come as online petitions and public statements have questioned the participation of elected Muslim officials in anniversary events, a pattern that a 2026 Democracy Now report linked to broader rises in Islamophobia documented since the original attacks. His family has consistently maintained that Salman Hamdani acted in the best traditions of both his adopted country and his faith when he ran toward danger on September 11, 2001. Public tributes, including a Geo.tv retrospective published in 2021 that drew on family interviews, continue to portray him as a young man who dreamed of becoming a doctor while already dedicating himself to emergency service.
