Posted on 08/27/2006 8:48:04 AM PDT by TaxachusettsMan
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Two FOX News journalists were released by their kidnappers Sunday, nearly two weeks after they were taken hostage in the Gaza Strip.
Steve Centanni, 60, and Olaf Wiig, 36, left Gaza and have since crossed into Israel after their release. The men left Gaza through the Erez border crossing.
The freeing of Centanni, a correspondent, and Wiig, a cameraman, ends the longest-running drama involving foreign hostages in Gaza.
The two journalists were dropped off at Gaza City's Beach Hotel by Palestinian security officials and appeared to be in good health. A tearful Centanni embraced a Palestinian journalist briefly as he entered, then rushed upstairs as Wiig followed.
Centanni, in a phone interview shortly after his release, said "I'm fine. I'm just so happy to be free."
He recounted how he and Wiig were pulled out of their car on August 14 and taken at gunpoint into another car. The kidnappers blindfolded them and handcuffed their hands behind their backs with plastic ties. They were then transferred to another car and driven to a building that they later learned was a garage.
"We were pushed down onto the dirt-covered concrete floor and we were forced to lie face down with our handcuffs on," Centanni said.
"Olaf was in the same room with me. Our shoulders were wrenched back, very painful."
Both of the men were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint, Centanni said.
"We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," Centanni told FOX News. "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it, but it was something we felt we had to do because they had the guns, and we didn't know what the hell was going on."
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Not me!
"Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam"
Then you're a farging idiot, ya dimwitted media slug.
As for their recent conversion, at the time of their judgement, I trust God will treat them as they should be treated.
As for me, I'll make no judgement.
Actually during WW2 , I have read many Jewish holocaust memoirs , where the Jewish rabbi & ( And Jewish Council ) gave permisson for the Jewish adults & children to be put in Catholic covenants under FALSE Christian papers in France , Poland & Italy. Also the JOINT was aware & helped too ! Many different Jewish rabbi's said to preserve the Jewish race from extinction The Jewish people could pretend to be Christians . In some Jewish holocaust memoirs the Jewish person ACTUALLY posed as A Muslim . If you look at SOME Hungary Jewish memoirs you can find the info !!!
I read your rambling "about" page. It has been my practice to shun those who make attempts at poetry to get their point across. I present this and rest my case.
"Strange, and sad, how relevant this still is, from Jeane Kirkpatrick's speech to the 1984 Republican National Convention:
They said that saving Grenada from terror and totalitarianism was the wrong thing to do - they didn't blame Cuba or the communists for threatening American students and murdering Grenadians - they blamed the United States instead.
But then, somehow, they always blame America first.
When our Marines, sent to Lebanon on a multinational peacekeeping mission with the consent of the United States Congress, were murdered in their sleep, the "blame America first crowd" didn't blame the terrorists who murdered the Marines, they blamed the United States.
But then, they always blame America first.
When the Soviet Union walked out of arms control negotiations, and refused even to discuss the issues, the San Francisco Democrats didn't blame Soviet intransigence. They blamed the United States.
But then, they always blame America first.
When Marxist dictators shoot their way to power in Central America, the San Francisco Democrats don't blame the guerrillas and their Soviet allies, they blame United States policies of 100 years ago.
But then, they always blame America first.
The American people know better.
They know that Ronald Reagan and the United States didn't cause Marxist dictatorship in Nicaragua, or the repression in Poland, or the brutal new offensives in Afghanistan, or the destruction of the Korean airliner, or the new attacks on religious and ethnic groups in the Soviet Union, or the jamming of western broadcasts, or the denial of Jewish emigration, or the brutal imprisonment of Anatoly Shcharansky and Ida Nudel, or the obscene treatment of Andrei Sakharov and Yelena Bonner, or the re-Stalinization of the Soviet Union.
The American people know that it's dangerous to blame ourselves for terrible problems that we did not cause.
They understand just as the distinguished French writer, Jean Francois Revel, understands the dangers of endless self- criticism and self-denigration.
He wrote: "Clearly, a civilization that feels guilty for everything it is and does will lack the energy and conviction to defend itself."
With the election of Ronald Reagan, the American people declared to the world that we have the necessary energy and conviction to defend ourselves, and that we have as well a deep commitment to peace.
And now, the American people, proud of our country, proud of our freedom, proud of ourselves, will reject the San Francisco Democrats and send Ronald Reagan back to the White House."
I started thinking about this convert-or-die business vis a vis the Muslims way before 9/11, don't know what brought it about really. Something in the news at the time triggered it.
Many fled to this country already to avoid having making that choice. There was a way out for them. Some were not so fortunate as worldly eyes would view it.
And there are no "moderate moslems", because there is no moderate koran.
Relax said the nightman
We are programmed to receive
You can check out any time you like
But you can never leave
Thanks to you both for what you have posted...I agree completely with the both of you...
So you promote Islamist propaganda AND you find Jeane Kirkpatrick "rambling". Some FReeper.
"We were forced to convert to Islam at gunpoint," Centanni told FOX News. "Don't get me wrong here. I have the highest respect for Islam, and I learned a lot of good things about it, but it was something we felt we had to do because they had the guns..."
Coward.
When told to convert or be shot, the only correct response for a Christian is "Go ahead and shoot".
What the hell happened to Western manhood? What the hell happened to "death before dishonor"? During the Roman prsecutions, Christians were willing to be lit up as human torches and torn apart bit by bit by lions rather than burn one tiny pinch of incense at the altar of Caesar. Today, we can't even stand up to some smelly barbarian with a gun!
Look, a bullet to the brain is an easy way to go. A lifetime of guilt and recrimination would be a far worse fate. Peter had to suffer the pain of his denials for the rest of his life.
Of course, that's assuming a man has a sense of honor. In today's end-justifies-the-means world, any behavior is acceptable as long as one gains a few more days of "life". Personally, I'd rather die than live with the knowledge that someone caused me to betray with words the one Person I love the most.
Death isn't he worst thing that can happen to a man. I pity these two spineless beings.
At gunpoint!!!
I think it a better question about whether you make an insincere statement to crazy nuts you don't mean and then you get to live and go back later to help identify and kill them all.
Works for me.
Yeah, but post-Christian Europe is Muslim.
Very perceptive. A religion that preaches genocide!
Rather than allowing one's self to be used as a blood sacrifice to the satanic god allah, far better it be to get safe and then proclaim the lie of islam.
Fox should do a day long special news program on how Islam 'converts' by force and intimidation. How it is not a religion , but a political system focused on putting unquestioned power in to the hands of Muslim men.
Islamofascist; Radical Islam is an insane death cult, and 'moderate' Islam is it's Trojan Horse in the West World.
Islam is not a religion; it embodies no concept of spirituality.
Islam is a political system.
The 'peace of allah' is the peace of ultimate submission, never having to question, never having to decide, just to do as you are told; the peace of the hive, a queen named allah and her many drone workers. Hence their need for five times a day periods of brainwashing.
Islam is a system of coercion.
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