By Ben Feller, AP White House Correspondent

President Barack Obama, accompanied by Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, and others, meets with police officers and first responders at the First Precinct before visiting the National Sept. 11 Memorial at Ground Zero in New York, Thursday, May 5, 2011. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

NEW YORK — Marking Osama bin Laden’s death where the terrorist inflicted his greatest damage, President Barack Obama soberly laid a wreath Thursday at New York’s ground zero and declared, “When we say we will never forget, we mean what we say.”

The president closed his eyes and clasped his hands at the outdoor memorial where the twin towers of the World Trade Center once dominated the Manhattan skyline. He shook hands with 9/11 family members and others dressed in black at the site where the skyscrapers were brought down by planes commandeered by bin Laden’s followers. Nearly 3,000 people were killed.

Earlier, the president visited the firefighters and police officers whose response to the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, turned them into heroes and symbols of national resolve, but also cost them heavy casualties on that horrific day.

Months before the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, and days after bin Laden was killed in Pakistan by U.S. commandos, Obama’s visit was giving New York its own moment of justice.

Click here for more 9/11 coverage and to read about the first responder reactions to the death of Osama bin Laden.

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