The 9/11 families are closer to the truth than ever before.

A federal judge in Manhattan is expected to rule anytime now on Saudi Arabia’s appeal to toss a lawsuit against the Kingdom, but if this landmark case goes forward, long-buried secrets of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks will be exposed.

“This is the closest thing you’re going to get to a smoking gun,” said Brett Eagleson, who was 15 years old when his dad, Bruce, died while working at the Twin Towers on 9/11. “The public needs to see this.”

Eagleson tells the Boston Herald that lawyers have obtained a video that allegedly shows a Saudi suspect “casing the Capitol” in the summer of 1999, pointing out where Congress sits. Eagleson also says a companion sketchbook painstakingly shows “an aviator’s algorithm on how to hit a target on the horizon when flying a plane.”

He credits British officials for obtaining both pieces of “incredible” evidence and retired FBI agents for assisting 9/11 families who refuse to give up on seeking justice nearly 23 years after the ruthless kamikaze jet attacks on New York City, the Pentagon, and in Shanksville, Pa.

Federal Judge George Daniels of the Southern District of New York now holds the key to this case. The judge must decide whether this lawsuit against Saudi Arabia moves ahead or is forever thwarted.

“If we lose, it’s a dagger,” Eagleson told the Herald Friday night after putting his kids to bed, adding, “But what more do you need?”

The Saudi government’s latest appeal states no government officials “senior or otherwise — gave any ‘direction’ to Omar Al Bayoumi or Fahad Al Thumairy to ‘assist’ … 9/11 hijackers.” Any contact, the Saudis add, was “innocent motives … to help fellow Saudis” new to San Diego.

Those Saudis, Nawaf Al Hazmi and Khalid Al Mihdhar, were the first 9/11 hijackers to set up shop in America after landing in Los Angeles, according to multiple reports. Bayoumi and Thumairy, both Saudi officials, are accused of assisting them, court documents allege.

That is the crux of this case — with this final showdown decades in the making with a focus on the former Southern California al Qaeda cell, as the Herald has reported.

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