BERSERKER: Army Shrink Massacres 12, Wounds 31

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LOS ANGLES TMES: Reporting from Ft. Hood, Texas, Washington and Los Angeles — An Army psychiatrist who was about to be deployed to Iraq allegedly armed himself with two guns and opened fire Thursday afternoon on the grounds of Ft. Hood, the country’s largest military base, killing 12 people and injuring 31 others. Officials said that fthoodshooter.jpgsoldiers and civilians ripped apart their clothes to make bandages for fallen colleagues, many of whom were waiting at the base’s Soldier Readiness Center for medical and dental exams before deployment. The attack shocked the country and raised questions about base security. The suspected gunman, who initially was thought to have died, was wounded and in stable condition under guard at a hospital. Identified as Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, 39, he worked at the Darnall Army Medical Center, Ft. Hood’s hospital. The facility has an extensive program to help soldiers deal with the stress of returning from war. MORE

UPDATE: A solider suspected of fatally shooting 12 and wounding 31 at Fort Hood in Texas on Thursday is not fthoodshooter.jpgdead as previously reported by the military, the base’s commander said Thursday evening. A civilian officer who was wounded in the incident shot the suspect, who is “in custody and in stable condition,” Army Lt. Gen. Robert Cone told reporters. “Preliminary reports indicate there was a single shooter that was shot multiple times at the scene,” Cone said at a news conference. “However, he was not killed as previously reported.” The suspect, identified as Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, opened fire at a military processing center at Fort Hood around 1:30 p.m., Cone said. Three others initially taken into custody for interviews have been released, Cone said. MORE

WASHINGTON POST: He prayed every day at the Muslim Community Center in Silver Spring, a devout Muslim fthoodshooter.jpgwho, despite asking to be discharged from the U.S. Army, was on the eve of his first deployment to war. Yesterday, authorities said Maj. Nidal M. Hasan, a 39-year-old Arlington-born psychiatrist, shot and killed at least 12 people at Fort Hood, Tex. In an interview, his aunt, Noel Hasan of Falls Church, said he had endured name-calling and harassment about his Muslim faith for years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and had sought for several years to be discharged from the military. MORE

RELATED: Major Nidal Malik Hasan, age 39, was born in Virginia. His parents immigrated to the US from Jordan.[8] He served as an army psychiatrist, who had transferred to Fort Hood in July from Washington’s Walter fthoodshooter.jpgReed Medical Center.[1] Before being transferred, he had received a poor performance evaluation.[9] He joined the army immediately after high school, and in exchange the army paid for him to go to college and medical school.[10] Hasan graduated in 1997 from Virginia Tech, where he was a member of ROTC,[11] with a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry and in 2003 from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences with a medical degree (M.D.), and later finished his residency as a psychiatrist.[12][8] In 2009, he completed a fellowship in Disaster and Preventive Psychiatry at the Center for Traumatic Stress.[13] According to Hasan’s aunt, he had sought for several years to receive a discharge, due to harassment relating to his religion, Islam. MORE

RELATED: In a post on the website scribd.com that appears to be from May, a writer named “NidalHasan” likened fthoodshooter.jpga suicide bomber to a soldier who jumps on a grenade to save the lives of his fellow officers in that both were sacrificing their lives “for a more noble cause.” That cause, he wrote, “is to help save Muslims by killing enemy soldiers. If one suicide bomber can kill 100 enemy soldiers because they were caught off guard that would be considered a strategic victory. Their intention is not to die because of some despair. The same can be said for the Kamikazees in Japan.” MORE

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