Posted on 05/29/2004 4:43:14 AM PDT by Raebie
Posted on Fri, May. 28, 2004 Berg's sister confused over Moore's taped interview
BY WILLIAM BUNCH
Knight Ridder Newspapers
PHILADELPHIA - (KRT) - The sister of Nick Berg, the contractor from the Philadelphia suburbs who was beheaded earlier this month in Iraq, says she's dumbfounded by reports that liberal icon Michael Moore had filmed an interview with her late brother for his new anti-war film.
"I'm very skeptical of this," said Sara Berg, a Virginia attorney whose brother's beheading sparked a global uproar.
But she said there was no way to confirm that Moore had sent a tape of the reported 20-minute interview to their parents' home in West Chester, as the filmmaker suggested in a statement Thursday, because the couple has been away.
Moore's acknowledgment that he had interview footage of Berg that had been shot - but not used - for his highly controversial "Fahrenheit 9/11" documentary may be the strangest twist yet in the increasingly weird saga of Berg and his Iraqi travels, which led to his slaying.
The initial story that touched off the controversy appeared Thursday on the online magazine Salon.com.
It said the interview took place in the United States late last year, before Berg, a radio-tower technician, made the first of two trips to Iraq seeking work there as a private contractor.
So, how would a completely unknown young wannabe contractor like Berg come to the attention of Moore, whose anti-President Bush screed "Dude, Where's My Country?" was the best-selling book in the nation at the time?
Stranger than that: Why would Moore or his crew interview Berg for "Fahrenheit 9/11" for 20 minutes, when Berg's family insists the slain contractor was pro-Bush and supported the American military action in Iraq?
The film, which just took top honors at the Cannes Film Festival, blasts Bush and shows graphic war footage from Iraq.
We may never know the answers, because Berg is dead and Moore says he has no plans to release the interview footage to the public.
"We have an interview with Nick Berg," Moore's terse statement said. "It was approximately 20 minutes long. We are not releasing it to the media. It is not in the film. We are dealing privately with the family."
Friends of Berg, the Henderson High School grad, say he was an adventurous, inventive and perhaps naive young man who simply wanted to help in the rebuilding of Iraq but disregarded safety warnings, traveling solo and in private taxis.
Berg was arrested by Iraqi police on March 24, held in custody for 13 days, and released - only to disappear again on April 10. His headless body was found on a Baghdad overpass on May 8, three days before the video of the decapitation was posted.
Despite some contradictory evidence, the CIA claims the execution was done by an al Qaeda terrorist, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Since then, some have questioned why Berg had been in Iraq, as well as some of his strange connections.
The FBI questioned Berg in 2002 to find out why his e-mail password had ended up with an Oklahoma terror suspect linked to al Qaeda terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui.
In Iraq, Berg partnered with an ex-Philadelphia Iraqi expatriate who'd been convicted in a Russian-exile crack-vial ring before becoming the highly visible leader of an anti-Saddam Hussein group backed by the Bush administration.
I think your assertion has merit because he seeemed so calm when he was giving his name, rank, etc. in the video. Even before I knew anything about his dad and his politics, I thought his [Nick's] demeanor was really odd for someone about to be beheaded. It just didn't compute.
I believe only a portion was shown at the Cannes festival.
Not necessarily damaging to us in a military sense or even morally...just not politically expedient to talk about during an election year...probably much more damaging to the Bergs(can one say treason!?)
you sew the wind and you sometimes reap the whirlwind...I think that was has happened with the Bergs!
I think so, too. The orange suit stands as a factor. This was to demonstrate what an Iraqi or Afghan prisoner looked like...The "murderers" changed scripts midway!!
I don't think so.
A much more likely explanation is that the leak of the existence of the tape was not planned and the tape itself is damaging to "The Cause", namely the defeat of George Bush in 2004.
Time will tell if this theory is correct. If it is then the Berg family, Leftist Scum that they appear to be, will not allow it to be released. One can safely assume that Moore would anticipate this result and would use it for cover and a natural excuse for not disclosing the content of the 20 minute clip. On the other hand, it is hard to believe that someone not perfectly loyal to Moore will have seen the footage and the content, if not the actual video itself, will eventually leak out and escape the control of the Moore Spin Machine.
Who knows, but IMO, moore's belated admission seems like a premptive strike in what may be a future court case. Four people were arrested by Iraqi authorities about Nick Berg's murder on or around May 21. A week after moore releases the news about the taped interview in a friendly to moore source, Salon magazine(May 27th). Maybe the Iraqi supsects have some information on moore.
Remember on April 14th, moore said that he had two people in Iraq and that the people fighting our troops were "freedom fighters". Two of the suspects it was reported were fedayeen, moore's freedom fighters.
Seems like a plausible scenario to me.
I've only been following the Nicholas Berg story half-way, interested in the peculiarities of it and why a young man would meet such a horrible fate. With this Moore connection I'm wondering if he was working for and funded by Michael Moore, in some way?? Does that make sense to anyone?? Could Moore have paid him to install some kind of electronic surveillance/radio/wi-fi devices so Moore could try to get info for his so-called documentaries?? Moore has already said he "smuggled" cameras and film into Iraq, to get "the info that our government doesn't want you to know".
Could Berg have been "duped" by his captors and made to think that their filming was something that Moore's associates wanted to record, part of his "movie" and that's why he displays such a calm demeanor during most of it.......and the "edits" that appear during his murder film??
I somehow don't think that Berg as a gov't agent/CIA, whatever, makes that much sense.........it all seems so stupid......but Berg, hooking up somehow with an idiot like Moore, a big-mouth BS'er with ALOT OF MONEY AND NO BRAIN, makes sense....remember MICHAEL MOORE IS A DIRECTOR..........HOLLYWOOD.............HE DIRECTS BS.......and I think these morons got WAY in over their heads.......could it be????
Two of the detainees were subsequently released.
At least some of the suspects were former members of Saddam Hussein's Fedayeen paramilitary organization, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. They were arrested May 14 in a house in Salaheddin province, north of Baghdad. The province includes Tikrit, Saddam's hometown.
The group that was involved in the killing of Berg was led by Yasser al-Sabawi, a nephew of Saddam Hussein, the security official said. He said American intelligence had asked Iraqi authorities to hand over the suspects, but they were still in Iraqi hands. Al-Sabawi was not among those arrested, the Iraqi official said."
You have got to wonder what a jewish kid was doing in Iraq in the first place. And wouldn't his parents be sweating it out with a kid in such a dangerous place?
Sara Berg said she did not think it odd that her brother would be interviewed for an anti-Bush documentary. "I'm sure Mr. Moore talked to people with all kinds of different opinions," she said.
Now, what grabs my attention is the interview was done, before Nick went to Bagdad. How did MM find out Nick was going to Iraq?
I am now considering that daddy used Nick in Iraq to pass messages without Nick being aware of his role.
"None of this makes sense, unless the M&M is completely lying."
I hate Michael Moore so much I had a comment I posted about him pulled by the Mods. But I do not see why he would make this claim if it wasn't true. He's got to know the family would ask to see it, esp. since none of them seem to know about it; and he has to expect the Feds are going to ask for it too. Because they are.
And, as we've been noting, this story is of all things being underplayed by the media, so why would he say it if it weren't true?
Maybe I'm mistaken and the family did know about it. Maybe Moore got hooked up with Berg via his father, the leftist.
Me now thinks that the father has a guilty conscience and is doing everything he can to place the blame on Bush, exonerating himself and Moore. After all, he didn't stop his son and was his business manager....but I think if we look a little farther, we will find that Daddy "owned" the company (was his son's backer) and unknowingly, set up his son via Michael Moore.
The Cannes award was Saturday, May 22.
I think the tape exists and SOMEONE has info on it and it will get to the press somehow.
What does Berg's father do for a living??i.e, before he became his son's business manager.
The company was started in 2000, about the same time that the terrorists were active here...and the name of the company...strange name for a company...Greek mythology...Hmmmm
With all the fervour in my heart though, no matter what, I grieve for those who loved Nick and must live with this vivid image of Muslim "Peace".
Interesting stuff, but it confuses me even more. I don't want to belabor all this stuff surrounding Berg, he should be allowed to rest in peace, but his father is a surreal-kook who was the first in politicizing this, and now each tidbit of info that is released is done so, I believe, in an attempt to balance the scale against the imbalanced mutterings of his father. In other words, if his father hadn't waxed enthusiastically about what potential great friends the butchers were to his son, all the info to date showing the butchered Berg in a suspicious light would not be out there.
As some have speculated, it may damage the left. On the otherhand, it may be harmful to the right.
This assumes that daddy knew who Nick would come in contact with for your theory to hold water. I doubt that would be the case with a radio technician.....of course unles prowar Nick was the double agent speculated in other responses here. then that would make him something less than the prowar guy he is deemed to be.
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