2 hikers released from Iranian prison return to US (left wing activists released for 500K EACH)

Yahoo News ^ | 9/24/2011 | Yahoo News

[Dallas59]

NEW YORK (AP) — Two Americans held for more than two years in an Iranian prison on accusations of spying returned to the U.S. on Sunday, ending a diplomatic ordeal that began with what they called a wrong turn into the wrong country.

Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer arrived at Kennedy Airport in New York City at about 11 a.m. (1500 GMT).

The two were released from prison last week. They arrived Wednesday in Oman under a $1 million bail deal and were embraced by relatives.

[Dallas59]

What a way to redistribute wealth.

[Freedom_Fighter_2001]

That’s almost five green job’s worth!

[ken21]

lol!

[july4thfreedomfoundation]

The one million dollars wasn’t “bail”.....it was ransom.

[Dallas59]

Shane Bauer. is a UC Berkeley grad who has written for the far-left The Nation and “reported” for the Terrorist News Network a/k/a Al-Jazeera.

He lives in the Muslim Mid-East, speaks Arabic and his Berkeley degree is in “Peace and Conflict Studies”–typical far-left degree for Jimmy Carter groupies.

He lives and is based in Damascus, Syria–a nation for whom he’s toed the party line. From his Damascus digs, he’s written articles for left-wing media outlets about how Muslims in Syria love Obama but need to see him change American foreign policy toward Israel and the Islamic world. Sound like an “innocent hiker” to you?



Joshua Fattal, also a Berkeley grad is an environmental activist who hosted a “resistance” radio show. Media reports say his father is Iraqi, and he said he was traveling there to get in touch with his roots.

He earned a degree in environmental economics and policy. He also taught high-school students in Berkeley and worked in New Hampshire.
> He most recently worked and lived at Aprovecho Research Center in Cottage Grove, Ore. The nonprofit facility is located on a 40-acre ranch and is focused on sustainable living skills, sustainable forestry and organic gardening, its Web site states.

At Aprovecho, Fattal held a position as internship coordinator. He was a graduate of the program himself and traveled to small towns in Oregon and Guatemala to implement some of the sustainable living ideas taught at the center . . . .

While Fattal was at Aprovecho, he co-hosted a weekly radio show, “Rhythms and Resistance,” on the center’s community station.





Sarah Shourd is an anti-Israel “journalist” who lives in the Middle East (probably in Damascus, Syria, from which she’s written some of her articles), writes sympathetic pieces about terrorist-host state Syria, attacking Israel, and taking her Syrian patrons’ false point of view that Israel’s Golan Heights is “occupied territory.”

She also writes about how Israel oppresses the Syrians. Hilarious. I mean, no biggie that Bashir Al-Assad cuts his people apart limb by limb, like his father did to journalist Salim Al-Lawzi, that Syria has an atrocious human rights record and tortures dissidents, let’s concentrate on blaming the Jews. That’s her strategy. Here’s a tip for Ms. Shourd: Israel annexed the Golan Heights years ago–you know, when Syria attacked Israel, went to war, and lost. Shourd lies and claims that Israel forced Syrian inhabitants of the Golan Heights to become Israeli citizens. Nauseatingly false. I have many Druze friends with family there. The Druze Arab inhabitants love the freedom they have as Israelis–of not having to worry if a conversation they have on the street will result in their limbs being amputated without anasthesia. The formely Syrian Druze of the Golan Heights rue the day when Syria gets it back (as Obama–and before him, Bush–have been pushing).

Shourd describes herself as a “ teacher-activist-writer from California currently based in the Middle East.” Well, we know for whom she’s an activist and writer–the Iranians-sponsored Syrians and other Islamic terrorists. I’m just worried about whom she is teaching.

[Chi-townChief]

These guys ever say what they were doing “hiking” over there?

[Vasilli22]

I read where one of these leftists made the comment that he hopes to raise awareness for political prisoners that are being wrongly held in Iran AND the United States. Huh? Idiot leftist.

[Vasilli22]

I read where one of these leftists made the comment that he hopes to raise awareness for political prisoners that are being wrongly held in Iran AND the United States. Huh? Idiot leftist.

[Vasilli22]

I read where one of these leftists made the comment that he hopes to raise awareness for political prisoners that are being wrongly held in Iran AND the United States. Huh? Idiot leftist.

[Track9]

Thank heavens for Spicoli.. s/

[chris37]

I could see the liberalism on their faces almost like it was tatooed.

Another case of -genetic democrats-.

Personally, I would have just left ‘em in Iran and kept the money.

[C210N]

Sound like an “innocent hiker” to you?

Given the leanings of the zer0 regime, seems to me the Iranians were tricked. Their claims of espionage are right on the money - that's probably exactly what the three were doing. When they were released, they referred to the millions of innocents in American jails.

[Cicero]

I wonder who came up with the bail money. Was it family, friends, or the Sultan of Oman? Or maybe tax dollars? The article shows no curiosity about that.

Since it is, as several have already said, ransom rather than bail, to an enemy country, it seems doubtful that any bail bondsman would have agreed to get involved.

[bgill]

Yeah, I always go hiking along the border of war torn countries who don’t like my country.

Those 30+ Mexican troops who were out sightseeing somehow got lost crossing the brand new huge international bridge the other day but they just had their humvees directed back south. We should have ransomed them. Naw, Mexico would have said we could keep them and then they and half their cousins would be on the dole for the next 50 years.

[Yardstick]

The Iranians probably have hours of tape of the backpackers backstabbing the United States. I can just imagine how they probably sucked up to their captors. Yes, we agree America is an imperialist bully!

[gusopol3]

Bauer proposed marriage to Shourd while they were in jail.

well, at least Bauer didn't propose to Fattal; that's the one fact that's come out about them that gives me the slightest bit of empathy. Meanwhile, the media seem to have made the iron rule not to report who came up with the bucks for the ransom. Another Freeper informed me it was from stimulus slush funds, but I'm going a little demented, so I was afraid to ask if that was satire that I couldn't distinguish as such.

[Sarah Barracuda]

The only comment I agreed with Bill O’Reilly on is when those two idiots got released and the first thing that they did was trash our country, Bill said maybe Iran can take them back for us

[Ken522]

... When they were released, they referred to the millions of innocents in American jails.

Didn't you know that prisons in America are full of innocent people??/s

[Surrounded_too]

Enemy propagandists and we pay to get them out.

Waiver statements should be signed upon leaving for danger areas that they understand we will not be coming for them for engaging in foreign policy actions for or against the United States. More of Obama’s World Citizens.

Same for missionaries who enter known hostile territories. They will have given up their lives in God’s cause and let God reward them.

[GAB-1955]

And what will they have learned from this? Nothing, I fear.