Bush attends 9/11 memorial event

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EAST MEADOW, N.Y. -- In the face of Democratic criticism about his campaign's use of September 11 images, President Bush yesterday participated in a groundbreaking ceremony for a new memorial about 30 miles from ground zero.

The president bowed his head as a rabbi and a Roman Catholic priest led a short prayer at the site of the planned memorial, located at Eisenhower Park in Nassau County, home to 281 persons killed in the nearby terrorist attacks that claimed nearly 3,000 lives.

Although Mr. Bush made no remarks at the ceremony, he said earlier in the day that the September 11 attacks had stunned the United States.

"It was a devastating blow, a blow to our psychology," he said at an auto-parts plant. "This nation rallied. It rallied in large part thanks to the citizens of the great state of New York, because they refused to be intimidated by terror."

Monsignor Thomas Hartman offered a prayer "that those who come here might be inspired not to terrorism or violence, but rather to love and to peace and faith."

Rabbi Marc Gellman said the memorial is significant because "in the end, it is more important to build a memorial near the places where they lived than it is to build a memorial near the places where they died."

After shoveling a scoop of dirt in the ceremony, the president, accompanied by New York Gov. George E. Pataki, a Republican, and former New York City Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, a Republican, spent more than 30 minutes shaking hands and taking photos with relatives of those who perished in the attacks.

The president's re-election campaign has come under fire from Democrats and some victims' families for using images from September 11 in commercials. The ads show a demolished World Trade Center tower building behind an American flag and firefighters carrying a flag-draped coffin.

Patricia Perry of Long Island, who lost her son, John William Perry, said she respected the president's decision to attend the ceremony yesterday and was not offended by the ads.