When Doctors Kill: Who, Why, and How
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A few days after renting his apartment, Major Hasan bought an FN Herstal 5.7-mm pistol at a popular local weapons store for more than a thousand dollars.
Guns Galore, was conveniently located midway between the base and the Islamic Community of Greater Killeen mosque, which he began attending in early September 2009. Osman Danquah, the co-founder of the mosque, recalled that Nidal had asked him how he should counsel young Muslim soldiers who object to the war. Danquah, a retired sergeant and a veteran of Persian Gulf War, told him that unless they were applying for discharge as conscious objectors, voluntary soldiers must honor their obligation and do their job. Danquah also told Dr, Hasan that there was something wrong with him, though he could not quite put his finger on it.
In late October 2009, less than 2 weeks before his murderous rampage, Major Hasan took leave of Syed Ahmed Ali, the imam of the Greater Killeen mosque, deceptively stating that he was leaving for Virginia to be with his family. On Wednesday, November 4, the day before the shooting, Major Hasan gave a neighbor all of his belongings including a Koran, bags of vegetables, a mattress, clothing, and odds and ends from his almost bare one-room flat. He told her that he will not need them as he was to be deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan. On the eve of the shooting he had dinner with Duane Reasoner, an 18-year-old Muslim who prayed at his mosque and whom he befriended, at the Golden Corral, their favorite restaurant. Reasoner said that this was the first time that their discussion veered away from the religious discussions that they usually had into politics. Mr. Reasoner recalled that Major Hasan was visibly upset and “he didn’t want to go to Afghanistan. He felt he was supposed to quit (the military). In the Koran, it says you are not supposed to have alliances with Jews or Christians, and if you are killed in the military fighting against Muslims, you will go to Hell.”
In the early morning of the next day, Dr. Nidal Malik Hasan left his apartment at 6:00 AM to attend prayers at the brick mosque near Fort Hood. After the prayers, he said goodbye to his friends and asked forgiveness from one man for any past offenses. “I’m going traveling,” he reportedly told a fellow worshiper, giving him a hug. “I won’t be here tomorrow.” He then went to buy some things at a nearby convenience store where a security camera captured him wearing traditional, white, Arab clothing and a white cap at the counter at about 6:20.
Around 1:00 PM Major Hasan walked into a processing center at Fort Hood where soldiers were getting medical attention before being deployed overseas. He had shed his Arab garb and was now wearing his camouflage battle dress uniform.
According to witnesses, at first he sat quietly at an empty table. At about 1:20 PM
he bowed his head for several seconds, as if in prayer, stood up, and drew a firearm while shouting “Allahu Akbar.” He then opened fire on the unarmed crowd.
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He systematically circled the room, sparing some people while firing point blank on others several times. In all, he fired more than 100 rounds. The room became a chamber of horrors with the floor soaked with blood, survivors hiding behind flimsy tables and chairs, and dead or wounded victims slumped over chairs or lying motionless on the floor. All but one of the dead were soldiers.
Two responding civilian police officers, Sgt. Kimberly D. Munley and Senior Sgt.
Mark Todd, arrived at the scene and found Major Hasan chasing a wounded soldier outside the building. They engaged the assailant and in the exchange of fire, Hasan received multiple gunshot wounds and was disabled. Munley was also hit several times.
There is some controversy as to which officer felled the assailant, but this is largely academic (except for the fact that this must be figured out prior to the made-for-television movie). The fact is both are heroes and their quick actions saved additional lives.
The incident was over at 1:27 PM. The entire carnage took only 7 minutes.
Hasan was transported to a local hospital where he was placed on life support apparatus. Eventually he recovered consciousness, but was left paralyzed from the waist down from his wounds. In this particular case, being wheelchair bound will likely not engender much sympathy from a jury when he goes to trial.
The military authorities and the FBI started an immediate investigation into the horrendous attack. On November 12, 2009, 1 week after the killings, Major Hasan was charged by the Army with 13 counts of premeditated murder of 12 military personnel and one civilian. He can face the death penalty on each count. The mass media conducted its own investigation into the background of the accused and the circumstances leading up to the attack, producing a wealth of mostly accurate information. Although some stations offered a “fair and balanced” assessment of the situation, other agencies appeared to tow a more politically correct line. At the risk of upsetting some readers, we have placed Dr. Hasan in the chapter on terrorists and we believe our position is very defensible. Like other terrorists in this chapter, he fits the profile of an Islamic extremist.
Consider the fact that he identified himself as a Palestinian rather than as an American, though he was born here. His bitter complaints to other worshippers at his mosque about the “oppression” of Muslims in America speak volumes about his ideological and religious identity. Hasan also allegedly placed militant Islamic messages on the Internet. In one posting ascribed to the physician, he compared the heroism of a soldier who throws himself on a grenade to protect fellow soldiers to the suicide bombers who sacrifice themselves to protect Islam. In addition, allegedly Hasan
“once gave a lecture to other doctors in which he said non-believers should be beheaded and have boiling oil poured down their throats” and actually “was attempting to make contact with people associated with al Qaeda.” Interestingly, a search of Hasan’s apartment several days after the shootings found a box of his business cards that bore Hasan’s full name, his medical specialty (psychiatry), and the initials SoA.
Several sources have suggested that this may signify “Soldier of Allah,” a name that prominent al-Qaeda recruiter Anwar Awlaki uses to address his disciples. Of note, Hasan allegedly had emailed Awlaki at least 20 times. Alternatively, he may have placed SoA on his card because he was a fan of the Muslim rap group Soldiers of Allah out of Los Angeles. We just report, you decide.
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One obvious question is: “How could the military have ignored all of these red flags?” One possibility is that, based on personal experience, there is a tendency for senior military officers to overlook the flaws of personnel under their supervision if disciplinary procedures may make their own lives more difficult. Colonels in particular do not like to “rock the boat” by launching investigations into the behavior of their junior officers. Doing so can adversely affect their chances of becoming generals or coasting into a smooth, honorable retirement. So if a senior officer can look the other way when an Army resident states that he admires the “single mind-edness of purpose” of the shooters at Columbine High School or a junior officer can get away with giving forensic pathology lectures while wearing a butcher’s apron over his uniform, are we really surprised that Hasan’s disturbing activities were brushed under the rug?
Granted, Dr. Hasan’s situation was more grave than the ones described above and it defies logic that something was not done. Recently NPR (National Public Radio) reported that two psychiatrists who had worked closely with the gunman at Walter Reed stated that he could be belligerent and belittle colleagues without provocation. “When I heard the news about Hasan, honestly, my first thought was,
‘That makes a lot of sense. That completely fits the person I knew.’” Another individual familiar with Major Hasan emphatically stated that he would not trust Hasan to be in a war in the same foxhole with him. Clearly there was something the matter with the doctor that was bad for morale.
Let’s assume for a moment that Dr. Hasan was just unpleasant to work with and the aforementioned statements merely represent the subjective impressions of two c
olleagues. Is there anything more concrete that should have been acted on? Well, there were the email exchanges with Anwar Awlaki, the al Qaeda recruiter. These associations were apparently explained away as necessary for Hasan’s psychiatric research on the attitudes of Muslim soldiers at war with other Muslims. Interestingly, days after Major Hasan’s murders Awlaki praised him as a “hero” and a “man of conscience” stating: “ The only way a Muslim could Islamically justify serving as a soldier in the U.S. Army is if his intention is to follow the footsteps of men like Nidal.” Sort of sounds like they were on the same page.
There was also Hasan’s attendance at the Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Virginia in 1991, a mosque which had been the haven of three of the 9/11
bombers. Granted, attending this mosque is not a crime and many devout Muslims worship there. But given the circumstances in this case, one must wonder who Dr. Hasan chose to lay his mat next to.
The Massacre at Fort Hood may have significant implications for Muslims serving in the military. Dr. Hasan’s rampage may well incite harassment against Muslims serving in the armed forces and increase the stress they are already under. It may also result in subtle racial profiling manifested by covert background checks and invasions of the privacy of certain racial and religious groups serving in the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines. It will be a great misfortune if innocent soldiers, air-men, sailors, and officers are marginalized because of the extremism of this one disgruntled, disillusioned, and misguided psychiatrist. On the other hand, one must wonder if there are other terrorists serving in the armed forces at home or abroad Doctors as Terrorist Leaders
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willing to commit treason for their religious beliefs. If this one doctor killed or wounded over 40 people in 7 minutes with a couple of handguns; what could a sleeper terrorist cell of four or five of our own soldiers do to the rest of their unit during a battle against al-Qaeda warriors?
Doctors as Terrorist Leaders
Some physicians have traded the gratitude of patients, financial well-being, and preferential social standing for leadership positions in terrorist groups. Dr. Ayman Muhammad Rabaie al-Zawahiri (1951–), an Egyptian surgeon by training, is unquestionably the foremost figure among doctor-terrorists. As a leading member of al-Qaeda (the number two man, after Osama bin Laden) he has masterminded many of its terror operations. He has been referred to as the “real brains” of al-Qaeda by bin Laden’s biographer no less! Dr. al-Zawahiri enrolled in his first fanatical group, the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, when he was only 14. This is not surprising as racial, ethnic, and religious hatred is virtually always a home-grown product and al-Zawahiri’s father, Dr. Mohammad Rabi al-Zawahiri, was also a Muslim Brotherhood enthusiastic follower. The younger al-Zawahiri managed to complete medical school in between episodes of terrorist attacks and prison.
In his elective time, he directed a number of rebellions designed to overthrow the secular Egyptian government. He eventually joined Islamic Jihad, which assassinated Egyptian president Anwar Sadat in 1981, and he spent time in prison on charges related to that murder. After Sadat’s death, Islamic Jihad split and Dr. al-Zawahiri became the leader of one of the splinter groups. Hard pressure from the Egyptian government forced him to seek refuge in Afghanistan where he met and worked closely with his future commander and friend Osama bin Laden. In the early 1990s al-Zawahiri was smuggled into United Stated under a false name and succeeded in raising more than half a million dollars for his terror organization.
In 1998, the doctor engineered the simultaneous bombings of U.S. embassies in the East African capitals of Dar es Salaam (Tanzania) and Nairobi (Kenya) in which hundreds of people were killed. Zawahiri was sentenced to death in absentia by an Egyptian military tribunal in 1999 for his role in the 1997 “Luxor Massacre” in which 58 foreign tourists and four Egyptians were gunned down or hacked to death.
The United States is currently offering a reward of $25 million for information leading to his arrest.
There are other physicians, including many Palestinians, who occupy important positions of leadership in terror organizations including:
• Dr. Abu Hafiza is another high-level al-Qaeda operative. A Moroccan psychiatrist, he was the mastermind behind al-Qaeda’s devastating terror attacks in Spain in that left 191 dead and almost 2,000 injured on March 11, 2004. He was hoping that this attack would be such a blow to the European psyche that a “domino effect” would ensue leading to the removal of several Western leaders including 146
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Britain’s Tony Blair. Although this phase of his plan didn’t quite work out, 3 days after the bombings Spain elected a new Prime Minister and all of their troops were removed from Iraq within 3 months. He also provided “counseling” to the 9/11 killers.
• Dr. Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi, a Palestinian pediatrician, was the co-founder and spiritual leader of the militant Palestinian organization, Hamas. He was targeted and killed by an air-to-ground Israeli missile.
• Dr. Mahmoud al-Zahar, an Egyptian-trained surgeon born to an Egyptian mother and a Palestinian father, is also a Hamas co-founder and leader. He was appointed Foreign Minister of the Gaza strip region controlled by Hamas in 2006 by Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh. He has stated in the past that he would like to see the Gaza strip become “Hamaston.” Some sources suggest he became the leader of Hamas after Ahmed Yassin was assassinated in 2004 but the organization would not confirm this rumor out of fear of Israeli reprisals. He also teaches medical students.
• Dr. Fathi Abd al-Aziz Shiqaqi (1951–1995), co-founded the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) faction in the early 1970s, was also a pediatrician. He was an early advocate of and creative genius behind suicide bombings. In the 1990s he repetitively visited Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi who promised to help finance Shaqaqi’s group. He was also financially supported by Iraq and Hizballah. In 1995, a lone man (probably an agent of Mossad, Israel’s Secret Service) walked up to Shaqaqi as he was returning to his hotel in Malta and shot him with a gun equipped with a silencer. Over 40,000 people attended his funeral.
• Dr. George Habash, a pediatrician and Christian Palestinian, founded and served as chief of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), an influential group second only to Yassar Arafat’s Fattah movement. His group created and mastered the tactic of skyjacking for political gains. The PFLP’s first major success was the hijacking of an El Al plane in 1968. Two years later, he masterminded the hijackings of four Western airliners over the United States, Europe, the Far East and the Persian Gulf. The aircraft were blown up after the passengers and crews were forced to disembark. Perhaps his medical training resulted in this unusual act of compassion for a terrorist. Dr. Habash was also behind the hijacking of an Air France plane to Uganda which was resolved after Israeli commandos stormed the airport in Entebbe. Fortunately, he died of a heart attack in 2008 in Amman, Jordan and is no longer practicing.
• Dr. Wadih Haddad was second-in command to Dr. Habash in the PFLP and worked out many of the details of its terrorist operations. Little is known about his background. The famed assassin and terrorist “Carlos the Jackal” worked closely with Haddad and the PFLP to perpetrate skyjackings and other terrorist attacks. The 1968 skyjacking of the El Al flight by PFLP was Haddad’s debut on the terrorist scene. Haddad also planned the assassinations of several of the Arab world’s oil ministers including the Saudi Arabian Oil Minister. He died of cancer in East Berlin in 1978.
The world is apparently fated to suffer the scourges of terrorism for many years to come. We do not have and we cannot devise a reasonable way to deal with the Doctors as Terrorist Leaders
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terrorist problem because with extremists their way is the only way. Negotiations and diplomacy simply don’t work with people who are committed to killing you even if it means killing themselves. This does not mean that we cannot take measures to protect ourselves. Western governments can make determined efforts to u
proot centers of hateful indoctrination, punish their proponents, deny any funding to terror organizations or countries, and dedicate staff and money to developing means of detecting terroristic activities. Weakness is not an option against these folks. Doctor-terrorists will continue to surface, particularly in countries that combine education with religious fanaticism. These physicians will kill more people in a fraction of a second than any other doctor will save in a lifetime.
Chapter 15
Guilty Until Proven Innocent
Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved
innocent.
– George Orwell
The Sam Sheppard case may never be resolved. Based solely on the final outcome of his appeal, however, it would appear that he may have been unjustly accused of murder. He was not the first nor will he be the last physician to suffer this ignominy. As recently as 2005 one such case caught the national spotlight.
Katrina and Dr. Pou
Hurricane Katrina was the costliest and one of the top five most devastating storms in the history of the United States. After crossing Florida as a category 1 hurricane, the newly christened Katrina gained strength over the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and then slightly weakened before making a second landfall in Southeast Louisiana.
The most severe loss of life and property damage occurred in New Orleans, Louisiana which was extensively flooded after the levee system catastrophically failed. Eventually 80% of the city and much of the neighboring parishes were inundated with floodwaters that lingered for weeks. At least 1,836 people lost their lives during the hurricane and in the subsequent floods making it the deadliest U.S. hurricane since the unnamed 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane. The storm was estimated to have caused damages exceeding $81 billion dollars. All levels of government, federal, state, and local, inexcusably failed to provide effective and prompt help.
For days dead bodies were decomposing in the infested waters, residents were trapped in their flooded homes, and hospital patients had to wait for a belated evacuation in sweltering heat, without electricity and with little drinkable water. This is the background against which homicide charges were brought against Dr. Marie Anne Pou, a respected ear, nose, and throat surgeon, and two hospital nurses.