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http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2009/11/07/2009-11-07_maj_nidal_malik_hasans_.html#ixzz0WCs7r4IsFORT HOOD, Texas - An Army psychiatrist who authorities say went on a shooting rampage at Fort Hood was so conflicted over what to tell fellow soldiers about fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan that a local Islamic leader said Saturday he was deeply troubled by it.
Osman Danquah, co-founder of the Islamic Community of Greater Killeen, said he was disturbed by Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan's persistent questioning and recommended the mosque reject Hasan's request to become a lay Muslim leader at the sprawling Army post.
Danquah said Hasan never expressed anger toward the Army or indicated any plans for violence, but during the second of two conversations they had over the summer, Hasan seemed almost incoherent, he said.
"But what if a person gets in and feels that it's just not right?" Danquah recalled Hasan asking him.
"I told him, `There's something wrong with you,'" Danquah told The Associated Press during an interview at Fort Hood on Saturday.
"I didn't get the feeling he was talking for himself, but something just didn't seem right."
Authorities accuse Hasan of firing more than 100 rounds Thursday in a soldier processing center at Fort Hood, killing 13 and wounding 29 others in the worst mass shooting on a military facility in the U.S. At the start of the attack, Hasan reportedly jumped up on a desk and shouted "Allahu akbar!" - Arabic for "God is great!"
Hasan, 39, was seriously wounded by police and is being treated in a military hospital. The military has said Hasan was scheduled to deploy to Afghanistan, but family members suggested he was trying avoid serving overseas.
Hasan's relatives who live in the Palestinian territories have said they had heard from family members that Hasan felt mistreated in the Army as a Muslim.
"He told (them) that as a Muslim committed to his prayers he was discriminated against and not treated as is fitting for an officer and American," said Mohammed Malik Hasan, 24, a cousin, told the AP from his home on the outskirts of Ramallah, a Palestinian city in the West Bank.
"He hired a lawyer to get him a discharge."
The Army major also had previously questioned the U.S. war on terror. A former classmate has said Hasan was a "vociferous opponent of the war" and "viewed the war against terror" as a "war against Islam."
Dr. Val Finnell, who attended a master's in public health program in 2007-2008 at Uniformed Services University with Hasan, said he told classmates he was "a Muslim first and an American second."
"In retrospect, I'm not surprised he did it," Finnell said. "I had real questions about what his priorities were, what his beliefs were."
Danquah said his conversations with Hasan occurred following two religious services sometime before Ramadan, the Islamic holy month that started in late August. He said the soldier, who transferred to Fort Hood from
Walter Reed Army Medical Center in July, regularly attended services at the
Killeen, Texas, mosque in his uniform.
During his talks with Hasan, Danquah said he told him that Muslims were fighting each other in Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Palestinian territories and that American soldiers with objections to serving overseas had recourse to voice such concerns.
"As a Muslim, you come into a community and the way you integrate normally - I didn't see that kind of integration," he said. It was not immediately clear if Danquah had informed the Army about his concerns. Most of the wounded from Thursday's attack remained hospitalized, many in intensive care.
Former President George W. Bush and his wife, Laura, visited wounded soldiers Friday night at the post hospital.
A Bush spokesman said the couple spoke with family members of the wounded and personally thanked hospital staff members and Fort Hood leaders. Texas Gov. Rick Perry said Saturday after visiting with the wounded that he was humbled by the conversations he had with soldiers.
He said at a news conference that he told the wounded soldiers that the entire state is behind them, and that "there's 24 million Texans praying for them and wishing them well."
Hasan was transferred Friday to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, about 150 miles southwest of Fort Hood.
Army officials late Friday gave no indication of his condition except to say he was "not able to converse."
My heart and prayers go out to all the victims, their families and friends.
ReplyDeleteFrom all the news reports it appears this Major is a career military man and that in his current position for less than a year and was not going well. He did not want to be deployed and in fact wanted out of the Army, so he paid back his military student loans and hired an attorney.
The reason may have been that he was being harassed and called names like “camel jockey ”. I guess all that sensitivity training for those with bigotry tendencies are all for not. (Can training real change the way you were brought up?)
Another reason is called PTSD by proxy, the stress of treating PTSD in other soldiers make you go a little crazy yourself. Its even more stressful because most of the higher ranks don’t even believe in such thing as PTSD. Their denial prompts them to tell suffering soldiers to “drink it off.” Some civilians in the defense dept feel the same way no doubt IMO, it’s why hardly anything is mentioned of PTSD until one of these violent episodes occurs. These people see PTSD as a cop-out or an excuse. First we need to have an understanding that PTSD actually is real before we can ever hope to help treat it (does anyone believe that being shot at or killing your fellow man is not going to affect you in some way either then or in the future?). I guess with the high soldier suicide rate before and after deployment kinda takes care of the complaints from coming in (so those who said he should have just killed himself, well that’s already happening ). What real ticked me off when I heard that the military was trying to say that some soldiers coming back from this war with PTSD or other psychological disorders had “Pre-Existing Conditions” and that the military would not pay to treat them, I think it has been corrected but what a bunch of asses they break you and don’t want to pay.
The final issue is why does the military want to keep people in their ranks that no longer want to be there is it just sheer number? I mean is it ten percent, twenty percent. Is it that it is the only contract in the US that you can’t get out of unless to kill yourself or kill your fellow soldiers? It does not make any sense to me.
I guess the Major could just be another wacko like Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nicholas, of course McVeigh was executed and apparently because Nicholas became a Christian he received a life sentenced. I real think if he gets that far the Major will get the former and not in a million years the latter.
This is so messed up, hopefully they will make some changes that make sense.