RUTHFULLY YOURS

It is outrageous that a man who helped facilitate and support the 9/11 terrorist attacks will be released from a German prison later this year. In fact, he’ll walk out earlier than his release date.

Mounir el-Motassadeq, a Moroccan, was the money guy, so to speak, for Sept. 11 hijackers Mohamed Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi, who commandeered planes that departed from Logan airport and flew them into the World Trade Center in New York City.

The three were friends when they lived together in Hamburg before the attacks. El-Motassadeq has admitted attending a terrorist camp of Osama bin Laden’s in Afghanistan.

German courts had found that el-Motassadeq was aware of the plot to hijack and crash commercial flights into targets — though he may not have been aware of the specific targets — and so he was charged and found guilty of being an accessory to murder of the 246 people aboard the planes. He was sentenced to 15 years in jail. That would have put him behind bars until 2019, but he’ll be sprung in mid-October, for a reason not known.

Fifteen years for complicity in the 9/11 terror attacks. Incredible.

And so the German government coughs up another one and a terrorist goes free. Far from the wholesale incompetence seen in the handling of the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre, but still quite egregious, our European ally will send el-Motassadeq back to Morocco this fall.

Our government should do everything in its power to compel Morocco to ensure that Mounir el-Motassadeq continues to be held accountable for his part in the facilitation of the worst attack ever on American soil. Morocco has been a good partner to the United States in the war on terror, and let’s hope it rises to the challenge again.