Hasan Called War on Terror an Attack on Islam, Classmate Says

Source: Bloomberg

By Justin Blum

Nov. 7 (Bloomberg) -- Major Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist accused of a shooting spree that killed 13 people at the Fort Hood Army Base in Texas, called the war on terrorism “a war against Islam,” said a doctor who was in a graduate program with him.

While studying for a masters degree in public health in 2007, Hasan used a presentation for an environmental health class to argue that Muslims were being targeted by the U.S. anti-terror campaign, said Val Finnell, a classmate.

“He was very vocal about the war, very upfront about being a Muslim first and an American second,” said Finnell, 41, a preventive medicine doctor in Los Angeles, in an interview yesterday. “He was always concerned that Muslims in the military were being persecuted.”

Hasan, 39, opened fire on fellow soldiers at the Fort Hood Army Base on Nov. 5 before he was shot several times, Lieutenant General Robert Cone, the base commander, told reporters. In addition to those killed, 30 people suffered wounds that required their hospitalization, Colonel John Rossi, the base’s deputy commander, said at a press conference last night. Rossi said 23 of the wounded remained hospitalized.

Military officials and the Federal Bureau of Investigation are probing what triggered the attack by the physician at a crowded medical processing center on the base. Hasan was moved yesterday to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio. He “was intubated and not able to converse,” Rossi said.

‘Upset and Angry’

Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, a Texas Republican, said she was told by Fort Hood authorities the suspect was about to be deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan and had been “very upset and angry” in the past few days.

Hasan’s family doesn’t know what prompted the shooting, said Nader Hasan, a cousin who lives in Virginia, in an e- mailed statement yesterday.

“We cannot explain, nor do we excuse or understand what happened,” the statement said.

The Virginia Board of Medicine listsNidal Hasan as a licensed physician. He received his medical degree from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Maryland, in 2003. He completed a residency in psychiatry at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington in 2007 and a fellowship in disaster and preventive psychiatry in 2009.

Hasan was getting his masters degree in public health in 2007 and 2008 at the Uniformed Services University as part of his fellowship, said Bill Bester, vice president for external affairs at the school. Bester said he was unaware of comments Hasan may have made during the program.

Shocked, Not Surprised

Finnell said he remembered Hasan “vividly” and said of the shooting: “I’m not surprised, based on the things he said in the past. I’m shocked that it happened, but not surprised.”

In conversations, students challenged Hasan on his statements and he would become “visibly upset, sweaty, nervous,” Finnell said.

Toward the end of the program, in 2008, Hasan gave a presentation that was billed as a survey of the climate for Muslims who serve in the U.S. military, Finnell said.

“It wasn’t really very objective,” Finnell said. “It was like he was trying to prove a point.”

To contact the reporter on this story: Justin Blum in Washington at jblum4@bloomberg.net