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"If you don't stop crying, I will shoot you'
The Times (UK) ^ | 9/4/04 | Jeremy Page

Posted on 09/03/2004 5:35:31 PM PDT by saquin

[Pupils were lured by chocolate then starved and threatened by terrorists]

WHEN their chance of freedom came with a massive explosion that shook School No 1, many of the children found that they could not escape.

Forced to strip to their underwear and sit shoulder-to-shoulder for three days with their knees tucked under their chins, their legs were numb and would not respond to the instinct to flee.

Hungry and dehydrated after being denied food and water by their captors, they stumbled aimlessly and weakly, their way further hampered by the debris and dust from the blast falling all around them.

The stronger ones reached the windows and began to break the glass with their fists, cutting and scratching their hands, arms and faces in their frantic efforts to get out.

And as they ran, crying and fearful, gunmen in the upper floors of the school began shooting at them.

Fatima, 15, dazed and clearly in shock, seemed to know little of her escape. “I don’t know what caused the blast, I just remember a huge bang,” she said.

“I tried to get up but I couldn’t walk or see anything. Somebody grabbed me and then I cannot remember anything until I got to hospital.”

Vitaly Makiyev, 11, was shaking as he told how policemen carried him from the building. When the gunmen arrived on Wednesday morning, Vitaly had run back into the school building, thinking he would be safe there.

“They held us for three days and they didn’t give us any food or water,” he cried.

Rosa Dudiyea told the Kommersant newspaper that the hostage-takers had at first pretended to be Russian and lured some children into the building with sweets.

“A military lorry appeared in front of the school building. People wearing camouflage and masks jumped out — I could see only their eyes and beards,” she said.

“They opened fire, everyone started running about. Some people, including myself, managed to hide behind a fence.

“Several gunmen stayed outside, near the entrance. They started screaming in very good Russian, ‘Russians, Russians, come here, don’t be afraid!’ One of the terrorists tried to lure children with chocolate.”

A woman teacher who was freed with her three-year-old daughter on the second day of the seige, but forced to leave her older children behind, said that as many as 1,500 people had been in the school when the siege began.

“It happened within two or three minutes,” she told Izvestiya newspaper. “We had begun to form a line in the school yard to listen to the headmistress’s September 1 speeches when suddenly we heard shots.

“We were herded into the sports hall. The doors into the hall were locked. People in masks broke the windows and leapt through them and then they broke the doors down. In the hall they ordered us to sit on the floor and began quickly to mine the room.

“Two large explosive devices were put in the basketball nets and then through the hall they led wires that they attached to smaller explosive devices. The whole place was mined within ten minutes.”

Atsamas Ketsoyev, 14, told The Times: “There were bombs laid out all around the gymnasium — some were hanging from the ceiling and there was one big bomb in the middle of the room. There were two women wearing explosive belts. There was also a man standing with his foot on something like a pedal or a button.”

Around this, said Atsamas, the half-naked children were forced to sit, crammed together “with our knees under our chins”.

It was hot and many had difficulty breathing even after the hostage-takers — who never removed their masks — ordered male hostages to smash windows.

The teacher who was freed said that the terrorists had frequently fired shots to stop children crying and prevent people talking. “The younger classes were terrified. They often asked to go to the toilet. They took them to the toilet in groups. If the younger ones cried the fighters shot in the air and shouted at them to be quiet. Then the young ones were silent.

“There were six or seven fighters in the hall. Two at one end, two at the other. Two or three walked around the hall. I can’t say how many there were, although when we went to the toilet I saw in the corridor there were many of them — some lying down, some walking around.

“On the first day they brought a few buckets of water from the loo. People in masks gave the babies powdered milk in cold, unboiled water.”

The teacher said that women with very young children were later moved upstairs because the crying of the babies irritated the gunmen.

She said: “A frightened child in the hall made a noise and one of the fighters seized a child and threatened to kill it if the noise didn’t stop.

“One of the terrorists grabbed a child who was crying and said ‘If this noise doesn’t stop I’ll shoot you’.”

She continued: “The terrorists said that they only demanded one thing — that troops should be taken out of Chechnya. In general they spoke little and mostly in whispers, but we heard that.

“Mostly they explained things with gestures. By their speech it was possible to make out there were Chechens and Ingush among them.”

The teacher said that during the night some of the children became more frightened and would wake crying from fitful dozes. She added: “The young ones began to cry every now and then, and the fighters shot into the air and enforced silence.

“In the morning they told us they wouldn’t give us any more water because the authorities were refusing to negotiate. When the children were taken to the loo some tried to drink from the tap. The fighters stopped this.”

Some children among those who escaped said they had become so thirsty they drank their own urine. Others had ripped leaves off pot plants in the school and eaten them.

Male hostages were held apart from the women and children and some were forced to “work” — boarding up windows and throwing out the corpses of those killed when the school was seized.

One teenager escaped when he jumped from a window out of which he had just thrown a body. He broke his leg but managed to hide until nightfall when he crawled to safety.

Hostages said they believed that the terrorists had murdered some of the wounded.

Zalina Dzandzarova, freed on the second day of the siege, said she believed that two suicide bombers had killed themselves on Wednesday, detonating their explosive belts in the corridor, where male hostages were being kept. Mrs Dzandarova said: “They took some of the injured out of the gym and finished them off right there.”


TOPICS: Extended News; News/Current Events; Russia
KEYWORDS: beslan; cair; cairsilentonchechnya; caucasus; nocaircondemnation; nukemecca; ossetia; russian; silenceissupport; silenceofcair; terrorists; whereiscair
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To: iThinkBig

"Last time I heard of even something remotely so grotesque was Adolf Hitler."

That's the first thing my dad said when he heard about this. He was a soldier in WWII, was overseas for 3 years.


141 posted on 09/03/2004 10:51:09 PM PDT by Cedar
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To: PeoplesRep_of_LA

As much as like to smile at the thought of the terrorists being vaporized, wiping out 200,000 Chechnians to hopefully kill a couple hundred terrorists will not work to the benefit of Russia or the United States. I wish I had an easy answer. The only thing I could think of is something I am sure is already happening:

Both countries rebulding their advanced spy networks which diminished during the 90's. With that, you can find the groups of perps and execute them systematically.

I think some other barbaric, but necessary covert tacticts such as the destruction of mosques that teach the Jihad message could be a start.


142 posted on 09/03/2004 10:57:01 PM PDT by iThinkBig
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To: Cedar

I love WWII history! Your Dad and his generation had giant balls! Without people like your Dad, this world would already be overthrown by people like Hitler. I hope our generation can do the same with this threat. We have a ways to go and have only recently woken up.


143 posted on 09/03/2004 11:02:15 PM PDT by iThinkBig
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To: iThinkBig

I haven't appreciated his war stories until the last few years (aren't children always slow to appreciate their parents?).

Now I'm really interested. When I rent movies about WWII, Dad does a running commentary of the situation.

(And he'll also point out spots where Hollywood gets things wrong.)


144 posted on 09/03/2004 11:07:47 PM PDT by Cedar
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To: Max Combined
The Russians brought this upon themselves.

And you are a complete freakin moron .... come on defend shooting children in the back some more.

People said that same thing about 9/11 ... nice company you keep with your opinions.

145 posted on 09/03/2004 11:11:54 PM PDT by Centurion2000 (Truth, Justice and the Texan Way)
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To: Max Combined

The Russians brought this upon themselves.

Come on, DEFEND THIS, I FREAKIN DARE YOU !

146 posted on 09/03/2004 11:14:42 PM PDT by Centurion2000 (Truth, Justice and the Texan Way)
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To: Cedar

The Nazis were brutal and Hitler was the worst, often times killing his own people when he felt "they let him down". Murdering millions of Jewish women and children meant nothing to him.

The Japanese were very ruthless on civilian populations they invaded, often raping and murdering entire villages and towns. Your Dad probably knows all about the "Rape of Nanking".

Both of these satanic goverments had the same ambition for global dominance as the Islamic terrorists. Hitler had a wierd 1,000 year reign of aryans evil-type religious thing going on.


147 posted on 09/03/2004 11:19:44 PM PDT by iThinkBig
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To: iThinkBig

Yes, I've read articles before that brought out the facts about Hitler himself being involved in the occult.


148 posted on 09/03/2004 11:26:12 PM PDT by Cedar
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To: iThinkBig
wiping out 200,000 Chechnians to hopefully kill a couple hundred terrorists will not work to the benefit of Russia or the United States. I wish I had an easy answer.

Yes, it does sound like an easy answer, and perhaps you are correct, but my feeling is that something big must be done to Islamicists, something intimidating, something harsh. Posting a picture of a nuclear bomb I would certainly judge to be internet ramblings, but I assure you I have thought a lot about this recently and put it for only as a suggestion.

I have been reading alot of Islam lately, and I am astonished at how far back their violent history goes back, the truth about the "prophet" Muhammad and his self serving pyramid scheme, the truth about Allah not being based on the God of Abraham but on the pagan moon god illal of Mecca, (Al meaning The, illal meaning God=Allah) and the general untrustworthiness and amorality of the Muslim culture.

There is no Arabic word for "fair play". One is not judged as a wrong doer unless they are caught, the ends justify the means in Muslim culture. We truely are very different peoples. I've seen this with my own eyes, but more importantly is what we all know. Islam, for whatever reasons anyone wishes to cite, has attacked Christians, Jews, Hindus and Buddhist mercilessly, very recently and on a mass murdering scale. Not armies of those religions, not missionary crusaders in hostile zones, but innocent civilians who's only crime was being different.

You and I both know that "intelligence spending" is as much of a cop out as anything. When we say that we reduce ourselves to the liberal mentality of throwing money at a problem and hoping it will go away. We have difficult decisions on the horizon, we simply will never be able to go into terrorist-friendly neighborhoods in southern Russia and snipe the actual participants, we'll never be able to penetrate all the organizations.

Did we wait for the best intelligence of the enemies location when we bombed Germany in WWII? Certainly killing more than the Imperial Amry's members in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was Truman's goal. He knew we had to shock the enemy into submission or they would fight to the last man.

Today we are left with similar decisions to make. I don't want to fight to the last man and have kids in an LA school have to go through this because our intelligence couldn't read minds. We must take drastic measures, and I hope Putin has all military options on his table, because I think the time has come for the deployment of WMD against these Islamofacists.

149 posted on 09/03/2004 11:49:34 PM PDT by PeoplesRep_of_LA (The (Swift Boat vets for) Truth will set us free.)
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To: Cedar

Big time occultists. SSDD.


150 posted on 09/04/2004 3:18:53 AM PDT by SirLurkedalot ("I think the Americans are serious this time" Uday Hussein, 9th Circle of Hell)
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To: Centurion2000

I was being sarcastic. I though it was obvious.


151 posted on 09/04/2004 8:22:44 AM PDT by Max Combined
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To: Centurion2000

"People said that same thing about 9/11 "

Right. I was being sarcastic. The post I was replying to was also being sarcastic.


152 posted on 09/04/2004 8:23:44 AM PDT by Max Combined
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To: 1_Inch_Group

"Just like we brought on 9-11?"

That was what I was implying, but I was being sarcastic. The post I was replying to was being sarcastic, so I didn't think a sarcasm tag was required.


153 posted on 09/04/2004 8:27:27 AM PDT by Max Combined
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To: Max Combined
I was being sarcastic. I though it was obvious.

No, I'm afraid it wasn't. There have been a lot of apologists in here in the last 36 hours. If it was sarcastic then please disregard the insult and have a good day. It's just that this is infuriating.

154 posted on 09/04/2004 8:46:19 AM PDT by Centurion2000 (Truth, Justice and the Texan Way)
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To: SilentServiceCPOWife

I think there IS a purpose in righteous anger. And in naming Evil for what it is. It provides the energy/ clarity/ adrenaline to DO SOMETHING, to push past the default lethargy barrier of "we are victims."


155 posted on 09/04/2004 8:54:53 AM PDT by bboop
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To: iThinkBig

Your point has some merits but honestly, when was the last time you EVER heard of an attack directly on a school full of children? Last time I heard of even something remotely so grotesque was Adolf Hitler.
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
The 1974 slaughter at an Israeli high school comes to mind. Bombings and attacks on houses of worship and buildings containing school functions have also occurred a number of times:

1963 16th Street Baptist Church bombing. A member of the Ku Klux Klan bombed a Church in Birmingham, Alabama, killing four girls.

1970 Nahariya/Avivim School Bus Attack by Palestinian PLO terrorists

1974 Maalot massacre at the Maalot High School in Northern Israel by Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine Palestinian terrorists

Good listing of terrorist events in recent decades:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorist_attack


156 posted on 09/04/2004 12:14:50 PM PDT by Blue_Ridge_Mtn_Geek
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To: iThinkBig

Actually, the United States did condemn the harshness and brutality of the Russian Chechnya operations. However, we learned after 911 that once a group of terrorist begin using an entire country as a base, the entire country may become a target to find and destroy the few hundred enemies out of potential millions of innocents. It comes down to which innocents we choose to allow to die, ours or theirs. The Russians have known this for years now.

Their is no other way to get these murderers. I side with that other poster who pointed out that the Chechnians had their chance at their own country, like Arafat and the Palis, they blew it.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
I agree that much of the Western criticism of the Russian handling of Chechnya has been oblivious to Russia's legitimate concerns about the rise of pan-Islamic insurgencies throughout the region, and this has weakened the impact of the criticism. At no time, however, has Russia recognized the independence of Chechnya; there were some negotiations in that direction in the mid-1990's but never to any conclusion.
http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/History%20of%20Chechnya

Throughout the post-Soviet period, Russia has claimed authority over the region, and has exercised it in a way which has steadily increased the pool of potential recruits to the pan-Islamic cause.
http://www.hrvc.net/main.htm

It is good that the West, slowly but increasingly, recognizes that we are in the opening stages of World War IV, and that we do have implacable enemies who must be defeated rather than "bought off" in some less decisive way (since these adversaries have made it plain that it is precisely what we offer in the way of "goodies" that causes them to plot our destruction).

However, prosecuting the war in such a way as to increase the resolve, and the appeal of the enemy's cause, to large groups of people who have previously been indifferent to it, will not bring it to a successful conclusion, and may in fact seriously delay it. This may seem a minor point to those of us who realize that this war is likely to stretch on for decades, quite possibly beyond our lifetimes, but it is a point which should not be forgotten in plans for responding to the challenge of defeating those who are resolved to establish a global caliphate.


157 posted on 09/04/2004 12:57:20 PM PDT by Blue_Ridge_Mtn_Geek
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To: laconic

Haven't heard a peep out of the subhuman Muslim filth at CAIR; don't expect to, either. Surprised?


158 posted on 09/04/2004 1:02:09 PM PDT by 7.62 x 51mm (• Veni • Vidi • Vino • Visa • "I came, I saw, I drank wine, I shopped")
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To: Dick Vomer
Gee, I feel all warm and fuzzy about our Muslim brothers and sisters.... someone should have a meeting about this and ask the Germans and French how this should be handled. Then maybe appoint a commision to see how the United States should handle the situation if this occurs in our country.... nah!!! The Muslims don't really want to hurt us... just ask the Democrats.

What's the matter with you!!?? You want to go completely around Kofi Annan and the whole UN?

159 posted on 09/04/2004 1:10:46 PM PDT by VadeRetro
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To: paulsy

"Selective outrage will simply amplify the bloodlust and madness."

GOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!! LET'S have it out NOW. Molly Manners ain't cuttin' it; the future of everything is what is at stake. If you can't see this then JOIN the other side. It's no shameful thing to wish for an end to evil, to unbody it at the core. Don't confuse my bloodlust with the empty causes of those who wish harm on innocent children, because despite your idealistic musings, there is no nexus between them. Sometimes killing is the only way to root out evil. That's what war is, and they want war, they want to spill the blood of children. Their means of expressing is absolutely despicable. Anyone who directs even a sliver of compassion to their cause, whether directly, or vicariously by leveling the ideologic playing field, is an enemy of mine.

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
The problem with blindly attempting to kill "all the sinners", is that no one survives. If that is your goal, you are indeed an enemy of mine as much as the individuals who perpetrated this outrage - - your thoughts along this line are quite in accord with the thinking of the Islamofascists, you know, who have once again demonstrated what they are willing to do to press their cause. They will kill anyone who gets in the way of their vision, and apparently you will too.

I realize more than you can imagine that "everything is at stake" in this struggle. It is not idealistic, but merely sensible, to pursue the struggle (including the tracking down and killing of these pereptrators, and whoever equipped trained and supplied them) in a way which does not destroy "everything" that makes the struggle worthwhile, and which brings it to a victorious conclusion with as little mayhem as possible. Nuking cities and indiscriminate slaughter of large civilian populations will not accomplish this. It will, however, tempt large numbers of previously indifferent or neutral people, both out of fear and anger, to perpetrate similar outrages in the direction of those they believe to be responsible. Without flagging in our pursuit of defeating and killing perpetrators and those who train, motivate, and equip them, we must resist the temptation to emulate their behavior.

http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/History%20of%20Chechnya
http://www.hrvc.net/main.htm


160 posted on 09/04/2004 1:30:41 PM PDT by Blue_Ridge_Mtn_Geek
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