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May 13, 2004
Nick Berg Beheading Video
[update:] News on the most recent hostage situations can be found here
[update:] For those of you looking for news on the beheading of American Eugene Armstrong, please go to my new site, as this one has moved.
I don't really have the energy to write about the full incident because, (a) I have seen the video and it isn't pleasant, (b) I have heard the audio and it is awful, and (3) the way people are actually "spinning" it disgusts me (both right and left).
That being said, I felt like it couldn't just be left alone, so I will direct you to the more coherent posts/articles I have read on the subject so far.
Right Wing News
A Small Victory
Outside the Beltway
Oliver Willis
Pandagon
Poliblog
Jivha - the Tongue
Please understand what you are looking at when you go to see the video. As mentioned in the link below, "BIG DISCLAIMER: Let's put it this way... There is no easy way to behead a guy"
The Video
Video Link 2
Video Link 3
More Video Mirror Sites
Even More Mirror Sites
[Update]: More information on the Berg story.
[Update]: A good post with a very comprehensive set of links (over 50).
[Update]: As I am now experiencing, the Nick Berg story's popularity is through the roof. It has actually caused a side story of its own:
Outside the Beltway
Hot Abercrombie Chick
Wizbang - Post 1 - Post 2
Backcountry Conservative
Also, apparently the top ten searches on the net now consist solely of Nick Berg related requests:
nick berg video
nick berg
berg beheading
beheading video
nick berg beheading video
nick berg beheading
berg video
berg beheading video
"nick berg"
video nick berg
[Update]: More pictures of Saddam's torture methods to be released?
[Update]: And, in what appears to be a sick copycat crime, another American hostage has been beheaded. This time it is the recently captured Paul Johnson who beared the brunt of a terrorist hissy fit. Al Qaeda of course documented the incident, and though there isn't presently a video, there are some pictures.
As with the Nick Berg video, please realize what you are going to be looking at.
In the world of the blogs I am late on this, as per the usual, and also per the usual, a great deal of better writers have taken their first shot at trying to put this horrible incident into words. You can check out their reports below (for further updates please check here as my site has moved):
Outside the Beltway - - Al Qaeda Beheads American Paul Johnson
Backcountry Conservative - - Another Beheading Video?
Wizbang Blog - - American Hostage Paul Johnson Beheaded
Dean's World - - BULLETIN: Saudi Militants Behead Hostage Johnson
Poliblogger - - Another Beheading by al Qaeda?
Pictures:
Drudge Report
Northeast Intelligence Network
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» Latest beheading video especially graphic from Dear Free World (politics, world affairs, debate)
I'm hope this means I won't be seeing more right-wing vandalism (photo) in response to this beheading as there was the last time. [Read More]
Tracked on Jun 18, 2004 6:17:32 PM
» Latest beheading video especially graphic from Dear Free World (politics, world affairs, debate)
I'm hope this means I won't be seeing more right-wing vandalism (photo) in response to this beheading as there was the last time. [Read More]
Tracked on Jun 18, 2004 6:18:42 PM
» Nick Berg Beheading Video from Rooftop Report
Check out today's Morning Bang. I don't really have the energy to write about the full incident because, (a) I have seen the video and it isn't pleasant, (b) I have heard the audio and it is awful, and (3)... [Read More]
Tracked on Sep 21, 2004 3:53:07 PM
Comments
can your give me Nick Berg Beheading Video
please
Posted by: nick at May 14, 2004 4:00:35 AM
We should find out who did this and do the same to every member of their family... Then give 24 hours notice to the people of Iraq to get out... Level it and start over... Those people are animals and deserve to be slaughtered....
Posted by: at May 14, 2004 8:17:43 AM
I blame this solely on the media's public display of the men in the pictures, if the pictures were never displayed for the public and the nations eye Nick would have never had to die like he did. I am very angry for the video the pictures and all the media and press write and display, there are some things we should never see and that applies. The media killed Nick in my opinion.
Posted by: at May 14, 2004 9:27:08 AM
nuke em till they glow, shoot em in the dark...
kill em all, let GOD sort them out!!!
Bring our troops and my HUSBAND home
Posted by: at May 14, 2004 9:32:12 AM
It Wuz Some Shit
Posted by: at May 14, 2004 11:12:01 AM
i agree with the person that wrote the comment that it was the media that is at fault for nicks death had the pics of all those prisoners not been shown he would not have died. i feel that that whole country needs to be bombed and turned into a pretty sheet of glass...but that wont happen because we need their precious oil.. bring back all our troops and bomb the shit outta them!!!
Posted by: cv at May 14, 2004 11:54:54 AM
i say we fucke those faggots up and keep gay marriage illegal
Posted by: Chris Allen at May 14, 2004 12:18:59 PM
I think this is just the beginning of what is soon to come. Judgment is happening all over the world. California will be the next victim.
Posted by: cryingout at May 14, 2004 12:53:45 PM
C-Allen,
I deleted two of your comments because they were exact duplicates of your initial one.
If you think that was unnecessary then so be it, but I think your statement is ridiculous enough to convey its message with only one post.
Posted by: at May 14, 2004 12:58:19 PM
why did you guy's do this.
Posted by: at May 14, 2004 1:01:28 PM
cnn wants money for video i have looked for 8 hours and can not find a free video cut all the news ass holes heads off i want to see it
Posted by: jimmy at May 14, 2004 2:38:13 PM
Poor Nick, I seriously cant imagine what his parents are going through. Those arab SOBS should be tortured until an unpleasant death. Why didnt the b******* just put a bullet in him(if it was needed at all) instead of giving him immense pain. Then again, this is only one side of the story, maybe they did this as revenge for all the kids/innocents the US/British has mowed down :/. The world is a scary place... Why they chose Nick makes me wonder. Also, he was due to leave but the US wouldnt let him....
Posted by: Redge at May 14, 2004 3:25:29 PM
I think many of your comments are sick, angry and stupid. What happened to Nick was awful...what is happening in Iraq is awful. But we can't fight this violence with violence--that will only bring more violence and it will never ever end. We have to fight this battle using our strength -- money. We have more of it than any of them do. If we focus on technology that eliminates the use of oil we can leave the middle east altogether. Terrorism is financed every time we get in our cars and drive. If we didn't drive, they'd have no guns or long sharp knives or video cameras to tape sick beheadings. We can outsmart these people without defying god.
Posted by: Dave at May 14, 2004 4:57:37 PM
well, i live in israel, and this "inncident" happened the same day armed palestinians took the head of an israeli soldier's body..and played soccer with that. of course, it wasn't allowed to be shown at the media. the similarity of both cases is creepy, arabs got no god, no respect for life. kill al muslems! this murder is a religious thing, it doesn't have to do with the iraqy prisioners abuse!
Posted by: ortal at May 14, 2004 4:57:52 PM
Arab linguists have said the man posing as the Jordanian Zaraqawi did not speak with a Jordanian dialect. Others have suggested the man reading the written statement may not have been a native speaker of Arabic.
Zaraqawi was missing one leg and had been outfitted with an artificial leg that did not fit or function properly. He was unable to walk or stand normally with his ill-fitting limb. No man in the group showed evidence of such an infirmity.
Numerous indigenous sources have said Zaraqawi was killed by a US helicopter attack months ago when he was unable to move quickly enough to escape the targeted house. While others managed to exit the house in time to survive, he died in the collapsed building.
As any surgeon will testify, the alleged beheading was a fake. A beheading would result in a tremendous amount of spurting blood. There would have been blood everywhere had an actual beheading taken place. When the executioner holds up Berg's head immediately following what is represented as an actual decapitation of a living person, there is no significant blood flow from the neck or blood splatters showing anywhere on the executioner. Furthermore, the cut was simply too neat to have been done crudely and with such amazing speed by a man wielding a knife. Anybody who has ever carved a turkey knows there is something wrong with the supposed beheading. The suspended head looks more like Berg had been neatly beheaded by a guillotine.
The orange jumpsuit was standard US military issue to men in custody. It is unlikely Berg would have continuing wearing a US custodial uniform if he had been released by the military as they claim. The fact he was still wearing the suit is both anomalous and suggestive. One is forced to speculate as to whether there was an immediate transfer of Berg from the US military to unknown persons, thusly preventing Berg from discarding his US prison garb.
Several of the men in the film were fat by Iraqi standards. If they were Feyadeen or mujahadeen, they probably have been living underground since the first days of the occupation. Tens of thousands of Iraqis have been shown on news stories as they have marched and demonstrated. One would be hard pressed to point out a single fat man among these thousands.
Some men had what can only be described as pasty-white hands. Once again, one would be hard pressed to find Arab men with pasty-white hands.
The lack of spurting blood suggests Berg was already dead at the time of the alleged decapitation. It is possible Berg's dead body was displayed with his head already partially or totally severed. In any case, he almost certainly was killed before the staged beheading. If so, it suggests the captors had no stomach for an actual beheading of a living person, and they opted to fulfill their assignment quietly and with the least amount of gore.
The scream that is heard has been interpreted as a woman's scream by many viewers. Videotape cognoscenti have further said the scream was amateurishly added to the tape.
The U.S. government translation of one statement made on the film is: "Does al Qaeda need any further excuses?" This is a falsification. The actual statement urged fellow insurgents to get off their hind ends and do something. One assumes the translator being used by the US military is a native speaker of Arabic, so this cannot be explained as an innocent flub. This suggests the US government wanted to inject an alleged al- Qaeda group into the murder of Nick Berg.
Iraqis who have seen the videotape on Arabic news broadcasts are universally saying the men in the film are not Iraqis. Are they saying this partly because the speaker does not employ an Iraqi dialect? Where does their certainty come from?
Firearms experts have stated the AK-47 carried by one man was a "Gilal." This actually is an Israeli-made weapon that improves on the famous AK- 47. Feyadeen and other insurgents almost universally use AK-47s.
The man in the videotape who is purported to be Zarqawi is wearing a gold ring. This is absolutely proscribed by Islamic law.
The US military has stated that Berg was never in US custody and that he had been in custody of the Iraqi police. The Iraqi police adamantly deny he was ever in their custody. On April 1, an e-mail from Beth A. Payne, the U.S. consular officer in Iraq, was sent to the family of Nick Berg. It stated that Ms. Payne had located Nick, and he was currently in custody of the US military. We have to conclude that either the email was bogus or the US military has been lying.
The chair that Berg was seated in during the filming was a standard issue military chair of the exact same kind as seen in a color photo taken at the Abu Ghraib Prison. The chances a terrorist cell would be using this same chair are minimal at best.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by: tom at May 14, 2004 6:16:07 PM
to think of such a thing happening to me is unbelievable...although i am only 15 years old i still can have a opinion on this whole subject...i don't have any word to discribe the pain that i went through just by watching this video...i'm completly speechless...how can people do this to another human being? that's the only question i have...i may be young but i still have a opinion....and i have the right to say that the people who did that to poor nick should go to hell...and i'm saying that on behalf of my whole family...i don't even know the guy but i still feel like crying over the pain that him and his family have to go through...
Posted by: ashley at May 14, 2004 7:03:30 PM
We are all being misled in order to hype us up for war...This was planned...and not by Iraqis...Its a bunch of white guys with masks on....CIA....Before you call for the nuking off a whole country try and understand the facts...this is all very horrible and more violence will not solve it, it will only make it worse...
Posted by: WARRIOR at May 14, 2004 7:30:33 PM
And behold I come quickly and my reward is with me to give every man according as his work shall be. I am Alpha and Omega the beginning and the end, the first and the last. Surely I come quickly. Amen even so come Lord Jesus.
Take heart he is at hand believe in him and fear no man!
Posted by: Dean at May 14, 2004 8:28:09 PM
How about we blame the terrorists that struck us? What ever happened to them and the way we felt on 9/11? Nuke the country and let us move on - Bush/Cheney 2004
Posted by: Jeremy at May 14, 2004 8:53:28 PM
These shocking violent acts are not new. The way we all can see them IS new. We should take advantage of this opportunity to watch, learn and witness the depravity of our enemy. Never in the history of the USA has an opposition party (Democrats this time) sought so fiercely to undermine the incumbent president simply for the sake of re-election. This time its more serious than ever. The democrats and media are aligning themselves with the terrorists by seeking to destroy the President in this critical time. Democrats should be ashamed by their selfishness. Look at your children and promsie them the world will be safe with Democratic Liberals facing pure evil that will hack your head off without flinching. Can you keep eye contact with your child? Do you really believe its true? Get ready to defend yourselves if Kerry gets elected. Fill your house with weapons. Because Kerry will not protect you. He will be the first president to drop frustrated into a fetal position as Al Queda crawls through our cities and towns killing handfuls at a time....
Posted by: Christine at May 14, 2004 9:42:32 PM
the world sucks!!!! i hate it all
Posted by: james u at May 15, 2004 12:14:08 AM
I think the video was sick and disgusting and I feel Nick was already dead when they did cut off his head because there were screams while they were still reading and then all of a sudden they pulled the knife out and started cutting. God forgive them for they know not what they do! Jesus Jesus Jesus
Posted by: Patricia at May 15, 2004 12:22:36 AM
I can't believe the idiocy of some of these posts. But everyone gets an opionion, and Jeremy's is just plain stupid. We are all dumber for reading your post Jeremy.
Posted by: smarty at May 15, 2004 12:39:00 AM
I say we kill them...every man ,woman, and child. The way I see it, the men could be terrorists, the women are screwing the men and are giving birth to the children that could be future terrorists (take no chances). End the cycle now...up until a few days ago I was not this pissed...now I say Kill 'em all and allah sort them out.
Posted by: DW at May 15, 2004 1:53:19 AM
Terrible, Just Terrible.....I prayed for Nick Berg and his family. How horrible it must have been to see your child brutalized in such a way. Aren't there suppose to be some kind of Rules of Engagement? And what about the idiots posing with the Iraqi Prisoners where this beheading supposedly stem from, what kind of "FOOL" would pose with naked people piled on top of each other anyway. Somethings really gone wrong with our country....So Very Sad.
Posted by: BS at May 15, 2004 5:15:06 AM
