Al-Zarkawi Death: Amazing response from a terror victim's father

Technorati tags: Terrorism, War, Violence, Forgiveness

One of the Al-Qaeda Most-Wanted, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, as we know, perished in a bomb attack in Iraq on June 7, 2006 (last Wednesday). Most have received this news with joy, for one reason or another.

Read the following exchange, between CNN anchor Soledad O'Brien and the father of one of al-Zarqawi's victims of terror, Michael Berg (note: a gruesome video was posted on Islamic Web sites in May, 2004, depicting a man believed to be al-Zarqawi beheading Nicholas Berg, an American businessman who was working in Iraq.):

O'BRIEN: Mr. Berg, thank you for talking with us again. It's nice to have an opportunity to talk to you. Of course, I'm curious to know your reaction, as it is now confirmed that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the man who is widely credited and blamed for killing your son, Nicholas, is dead.

MICHAEL BERG: Well, my reaction is I'm sorry whenever any human being dies. Zarqawi is a human being. He has a family who are reacting just as my family reacted when Nick was killed, and I feel bad for that.

Read the rest of the short interview, posted on the CNN.com website here. It's really quite amazing, and you should give it a read. Below is a CNN file picture of Nicholas Berg the victim of al-Zarqawi's menace.

Walski was really taken aback by this interview. How many parents do you know who would react in such a way? Compare this unreserved and unconditional compassion, to the bloodlust some of us Malaysians display in asking for the death penalty to be retained. Like the following, for example, which is a reader's letter to The Star, published yesterday:

Keep the death penalty

THE BRUTAL murder of seven-year-old Ho Ping, “Kidnap horror” (The Star, May 22), further reinforces my belief that the death penalty must stay.

There had been many calls in recent months to abolish the death penalty, but this recent case proves that we need a strong deterrent to other would-be perpetrators.

True, the death penalty cannot bring back Ho Ping; but there needs to be justice not only for the victims but also for their families who must somehow carry on with their lives despite their personal tragedy, loss and grief.

I am really against wasting good money rehabilitating criminals, only to let them out later to inflict more crimes on other innocent victims.

MUM OF TWO,
Kuala Lumpur.

The only true justice is to be able to bring back Ho Ping, no more, no less. And we all know the impossibility of that wish. What justice do you get by taking another life? Yeah, take away the bastards' right to live their lives normally and put them away without any possibility of parole. Walski doesn't mind his tax ringgit spent on that.

To paraphrase (and misquote) what Mahatma Gandhi supposedly remarked once upon a time:
An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth will eventually leave us blind and our gums bloody.

Or will the taste of blood finally quench the deepseated & subconscious bloodlust many Malaysians have but will never admit to?