Poor Ahmed Latif, killed in Fallujah this week for throwing his slipper at a US patrol. News reports are calling Latif a copycat of Muntadhar al-Zaidi, on the occasion of the Iraqi shoe thrower’s release from custody. Reporters are also suggesting Latif was “mentally disturbed,” instead of simply profoundly disturbed, by a development that might disturb you too.
First however, a disturbing aspect of this incident which reporters are downplaying and which Latif lived but only briefly to experience. The US soldiers fired on Latif because they thought he’d thrown a grenade. What he threw never exploded, and in fact we only know it was a slipper because bystanders saw it, and because Latif had only one slipper when he was taken to the hospital. The American soldiers couldn’t confirm the account themselves because they hadn’t even looked for whatever came at them that didn’t explode. When the soldiers fired on Latif, he ran. Eventually their bullets overtook him.
What disturbed the now late Latif, enough to prompt him to defy the US soldiers with his slipper, was seeing an American patrol drive down the streets of Fallujah.
Maybe we think that indignation at US occupiers is commonplace in Iraq, and that Iraqis should be practiced by now at repressing their proud urge to throw down insults at hair-trigger Americans. Why now? Why Latif?
The thirty two year-old Latif was so angry to see the American patrol in Fallujah, because he thought that Iraqi cities were no longer under the jurisdiction of American troops. You probably thought that too.
Yet here they were patrolling Ahmed Latif’s neighborhood. Have you been told the US soldiers are still patrolling Fallujah? If Latif’s death can count for something, it can at least serve to alert you that American in Iraq have not moved out of the cities. But the media telling of the late slipper-thrower’s deed, are not elaborating on that detail.
He should have minded his own business, the iraqis’ know what they should and should not do. We are already on edge over there. I have seen children place IED’s right in front of us… no we did not shoot them, we just called EOD to remove the IED. However, had someone thrown something at me after I was involved in a firefight or a bombing or had a friend/ comrade killed recently.. I would shoot that person with the quickness. Sometimes the Iraqis’ test us to see what their limits are.. hopefully this gives them insight that there limits are about as far as you can throw a shoe!
Yes, the Iraqis know that they should never Challenge the Occupying Master Race. If they do, the Occupiers have the “right” to kill or torture them and or their entire families.
“Their” Limits?
Dude, it’s THEIR fucking Country.
I guess that’s the Freedom your “giving” them, right?
Just like the “freedom” we get as a gift from the Colorado Springs Gestapo Department.
That’s not “freedom” bubba, that’s just a longer chain. If you’re going to talk about “giving them freedom” but with conditions set by Your Dictatorship then you’re lying.
A lot of people are using the word “freedom” really loosely, meaning “freedom to do what WE command you to do”.
Oh, and he was running away. That’s real “clear and present danger” there.
Sounds like you do what your Police Counterparts routinely do and shot him In The Back.
Be “Proud” of it, Soldier.
Some of your Komrades in the Tea Party say they have the right to do the same thing to Americans IN America for the so-called crime of “testing” them.
They already lynched Bill Sparkman just over a month ago for the “crime” of doing part time work for the Census Bureau and lynched Briseña and Raul Flores for the crime of having Spanish Surnames and dark skin.
Briseña was only 9 years old. In case you’re wondering what your fellow Imperialists are doing on the Home Front.