(Washington Post) Caryle Murphy and Khalid Saffar - Iraq's hottest new television program is a reality show. All the characters on "Terrorism in the Hands of Justice" are captured suspected insurgents. For more than a month, they have been riveting viewers with tales of how they killed, kidnapped, raped, or beheaded other Iraqis, usually for a few hundred dollars per victim. "I watch the show every night...because it is very revealing," said Abdul Kareem Abdulla, 42, a Baghdad shopowner. "For the first time, we saw those who claim to be jihadists as simple $50 murderers who would do everything in the name of Islam. Our religion is too lofty, noble, and humane to have such thugs and killers. I wish they would hang them now." Broadcast on al-Iraqiya, the state-run network set up by the U.S. in 2003, the show has become one of the most effective arrows in the government's counterinsurgency propaganda quiver.
2005-04-07 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive