In an unfortunate miscalculation, US forces accidentally saved the life of an anti-American reporter who will no doubt turn around and bite them as soon as he gets a fresh latte, evening with a young male prostitute, shave and a haircut, decent night’s rest and this Sunday’s Guardian:

A British man kidnapped in Iraq and held for five days by armed men who threatened to behead him was rescued last week by American special forces and astonished to discover that no one had noticed he was missing.
[...]
One of Sands’s captors told him, in Arabic, that if he was a soldier, or helping the occupation, he would be beheaded. He was made to record a video urging the British people to remove Tony Blair from office. The same thing had happened to Ken Bigley, the hostage from Liverpool executed in Iraq in 2004.

But the US army, on a routine mission, came to the rescue. He recalled: ‘I was in bed and heard helicopters, which I assumed would move on. But then there were footsteps and a banging at the door. It burst open and two young American soldiers came in with flashlights. They woke up my guard and shone a torch in my face. One of them said, “What the f**k?” I said: “I’m a Brit, dammit.”‘

My, how that nationalism comes in handy when you need it. The reporter in question, one Phil Sands, originally took off to Iraq so he could be a useful idiot/”human shield” for Hussein:

“In all our rooms, there is a picture of the great man – we sleep under him,” says Sands, whose cot is in spartan staff residence house No. 37, at the Doura Oil refinery on the southern outskirts of Baghdad. Painted on the front patio in large letters are the words: “We are here.”

But he goes on from the same Christian Science Monitor piece:

Shades of gray

The experience has been an eye-opener for many Westerners here, unfamiliar with Iraq’s authoritarian regime. “A lot of shields were thinking it was black and white, and that we were on the side of good like Che Guevara,” adds Sands.

On hearing the “good news”:

Sands’s parents, David and Jackie, were in a state of blissful ignorance throughout, as were the authorities. They spoke to their son on Christmas Day, then went on holiday. David said last night: ‘We were fortunate that we didn’t go through the nail-biting anxiety of knowing he was missing. I feel fairly philosophical about it, and so does my wife. He loves that place and I’m sure he’ll be going back.’

If there’s any justice left in this world, praise be to Allah, let’s hope so. For the knife’s sake.

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 15th, 2006 at 6:05 pm and is filed under Bedwetting Leftists, Islamofascism. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.