if he were a jew, yes they would have written it considering that the number one group hate crimes are directed at in the US are jews. they're followed by the blacks, the gays then us the muslims. but yeah i do agree with you that they shouldn't have written the word "Muslim" since they are insinuating something by the label, even if it's not the issue nor the point at hand. someone went on a killing spree, does it matter what his religion is? apparently to the idiots, yeah.

British Media had better start changing the way it handles news especially when it comes to Arabs and Muslims especially at such tough times! we don't need any more troubles in our country because of an ignorant newspaper or journalist! freedom of speech still means respect to others!

wow Begad!!!! thats sooooo stupid! The article has nothing to do with his religion! First of all his job is a hard one, they say that psychologists have the highest rate and are most likely to kill themselves or go crazy.... I would too if I had to help all the soldiers with their problems and see and hear war stories...everyday!Its very unfortunate, but may God help him, but it has nothing to do with religion!

i that matter is criminal more than terrorist my opinion like any other story happen in the world because all the people live in America like this country we can get all the safety needed so i thing this man become crasy as his job

Yes Zuzu you are correct, psychiatric have the 2nd highest suicidal rate in the USA.

HOWEVER, we live with ignorant people in this country and they will put that aside and say it was because he was a Muslim. Thats what makes me angry.

If it was a white man that committed the shooting they would say "Bob Smith goes on a shooting rampage" they wouldn't say "Christian man Bob Smith goes on a shooting rampage".

Nicely written article H.A.R. Very thought provoking. The American media is up to it's old tricks again with yet another smear campaign of arabs and particularly arab muslims. All of a sudden being called a muslim is considered slanderous, case in point when politicians began calling Obama a muslim like it was such a terrible thing to be. This is just proof of the fear that some people have for a religion that they don't even take the time to understand. The fact that he was a muslim man had absolutely nothing to do with anything. He was just a mentally disturbed man who just happened to be muslim. Once again the media is perpetuating the stereotype that muslims are violent murderous people. It's just a shame that some Americans actually believe the crap the media and polticians tell them. This is proof that the media IS Biased and people shouldn't be so quick to believe them without questioning HOW they are reporting the news.

EDIT: I was refering to the British and American media outlets who mentioned the man's religion. I spoke only of the U.S because I'm an American and I can only speak from that perspective of how I percieve the media here.

Anybody other than a white male would have been identified by something, "female," "African/Amrican", "Asian/American"... and the white guy would have been identified too had he been associated with any extremist group. (As defined by popular media.)

Many Americans know the media is biased but many Americans also want someone to blame, are looking for more reasons to get out of the wars in Afghanistan/Iraq or more reasons to bomb the area into a sandbox AND the subject is great fodder for the talk shows.

because the american media is sooo islamaphobic and can't wait to take a punch at muslims.
he only did it because he was scared and felt helpless, i don't agree with it at all, but his reasons were totally not related to islam! dr phil on larry king was good about this though...
i really wish he hadn't done it...although he is in a coma, he is not going to suffer as much as muslims in the west will as a result of this.
why don't they blame the army for having a war in the first place?
if it had been a jew and it was revealed he had been getting flack for being jewish, they would have cried anti-semitism and felt sorry for him...or never mentioned his ethnic background in the first place!

BUt some people like to know if he is muslim or christian or jew or something else, I dont think that it is a problem to write muslim.

what appalls me most in this case is the american muslim association's reaction...they have condemned this heinous act..it's somehow a way to confirm the killer religious affiliation which sticks the knife in deeper...

I frankly would have prefered them to shut their mouths ...and if they wanted to talk, the best would have been to denounce the American media's racism ...

Nooooo gentlemen of the American Muslims association, you had nothing to say but to shut up...by intervening you only gave a religious dimension to this unfortunate act of an emotionally and physically overtired person...

religious orders must remain in their places of worship and not to venture...

we all have the same god

He was actually due to be deported to Afghanistan, not Iraq.

But it's fairly obvious why they stated that he's a Muslim & originally Palestinian. Because Palestine is occupied & Afghanistan is occupied; therefore he is sympathetic to the cause. One would imagine that he is against the wars, but wanted to earn a living. Being confronted by it would have been an entirely different experience.

Contributing factors obviously pushed him, i.e. bullying & God knows what else. Perhaps being unmarried & without kids created a void for a man of his age. Stories from his parents, patients...

Whether one wants to associate religion or not, you must understand that in Islam one of the biggest sins is to contribute in what some may deem as a Holy war, or others as colonialism or occupation against the Muslim brother or sister. Like it or lump it...It is part of the foundation of what being Muslim is.

The media in the West tends to treat Muslim loyalty as a crimincal offence or as a shameful act, as do some non-Westerners now. And this is all for their gain. They depict us as being untrustworthy to the Western home country that takes us in, protects us, employs us...etc. Fair enough perhaps, I'd pick my religion given half the choice.

Another thing Western media do, is conceal the non-Muslim populations within Arab countries. That way they make their stereotypes more resolute & their convincing is easily accomplished.

God knows the truth though, it's not easy believing anything or anyone nowadays. The news is just as warped as as action movies.

You shouldn't waste your time reading or spending money on the 'The Times' anyway, it's a Rupert Murdoch broadsheet paper, thus a supporter of Israel. He happens to be Australian though, so neither British nor American. He own A LOT of Newspapers and Tv channels globally. Avoid him if you can, his medias will only whindy you up further because they only seek to manipulate and are painfully selective on what they choose to report.

Guns are bad, it's obviously too easy for people to get their hands on guns in the usa, in all instances.

in america, if you aren't christian/jewish american born, then you must be a terrorist..i remember a comedian was saying that if aliens will land on american soil (during the bush years), the president would declared them as terrorists lol

USA should deport all muslim from USA. the ungrateful peoples

Maxwell maybe the USA should deport you for being ignorant and un-educated....how about THAT enno ma3oul...

alright other than maxwell's ignorant comment there was not a single comment saw the other side of this horrible act!

before we go tooting our islamophobia horn! what we have her is AN UNGRATEFUL PALESTIANIAN:

1 whose family was given a home by a very generous country at a time when LEBANON was sticking thing in concentration/refugee camps.

2 who was given a life and a promising career by the US ARMY at the age the 17!

3 They put him through collage and MEDICAL SCHOOL.

what i see here is a LOWLIFE that bit the hand that fed him after 23 years! he deserves to be damned and condemned by every muslim and arab in the US and outside!

sorry and to answer your question Why the press screams muslim!

1 he walked around US military base in a Jalabaya and scull cap on his days of.

2 tried to convert patients and colleagues all the time.

3 screamed alah-o-akbar when he started shooting innocent people.

BEFORE WE GO BLAMING ZA JOOZ OR THE MEDIA, we should take a long look at ourselves and see this horrible act of betrayal for what it really is!

I can understand the anger here. When I saw the headline my first thought was "Oh, I hope this wasn't a Muslim involved". The second set of headlines only had his name, not his faith. I just checked FOX, most notorious, and there is no mention of Muslim as an adjective even today.

Condemning the crime, and not the news that presents it, will do more to prevent a hardening of hearts against Muslims.

As an American Christian (living in the Middle East), I can guarantee you that all acts of violence perpetrated by those who claim to be Christian in the US will have mention of it in a headline (pastor, priest, sunday school teacher, home-school mom, born-again zealot).

The secular media is just as quick to create a synopsis of character with religious overtones of Christians as Muslims.

The BBC and British media now use the term "Asian", but everyone knows what they mean.

Yet, this man's internet ramblings show a strong connection between his belief and his act. The TX homeschooling mom who killed her kids after hearing voices also had a connection between her belief and her act. Her community failed her, this man's community failed him.

Dealing with the failures in our mutual faith communities, watching for those at risk as both were, is a much more productive use of effort.

It Is Soo Simple...as long as they consider us(Muslims) as terrorists and gays and ....... !!Why they accepted to work with him from the beginning and when any thing happened that has NO relation to the religion they remember SUDDENLY that he is Muslim.I dun doubt that he is Guilty but Not because of his religion Muslim, Chris or Jews!!!!!!!!

By The Way ,I Like what u said Brigitte and Kinzi and it is Soo RESPECTFUL:)

oh great my girlfriend doesn't want me anymore!!! because of that incident. that guy did it cause they force him to go to fight his own brothers and sisters in iraq so he got angry and then he shoot everybody. and its not my fault!!. American are are such idiot and don't realize that my girl dumped me :( because am arab and muslim :(. leih??!!
leih kida ya nass???

And u still angry Ahmed that ur Gf dumped u even if u know the reason!! ??:)

12 innocent people killed and you Muslims are angry that the perpetrator is described as Muslim by the press ? I don't know how it is possible, but some of you don't understand yet that outside the Ummah, all people from all nations have come to see Islam as a violent threat to anyone who is not muslim. Why ? Just tally up the terrorist killings in the last 20 years and see which group is responsible for 98% or so. I am sure you do not agree, but you must become aware that regardless of what you think is right, Islamic terrorism has taught us all to watch ourselves around you.
How many Islamic nations are NOT in armed confrontation with at least one neighbor ? Please tell me this

baldwin i guess ignorance is bliss! the hundred years war was not in damascus!

but to quantify death would make me just as ignorant as yourself! YES the whiners here are overlooking the gravity of this horrendous act and are clinging on to incidentals! but painting with board stroke brush is not the answer, it only fuels the fire that perpetuates the hate machine!

I would guess that yelling "Allahu Ahkbar!" after jumping on a desk right before murdering over a dozen people might have something to do with his identification in the press as a Moslem.
Typically, that's what terrorists say before they kill people. N'est pas?

Baldwin responds with :

Surah IX, verse 5 :
"Then when the sacred months have passe,slay the idolaters wherever you find them, and take them (captive) and besiege them and prepare for them ambush"

You guys are really pleasant to be around

wow baldwin if we quote scripture we can ALL GET IN TROUBLE!

when you're not busy obsessing over islam take a look at the 'god' of the old testament and tell me what you think?

imho, i think you just love the attention us towelheads/mooslum give you!

The man yelled "allahu akbar" before killing all those men.
He "suddenly" became all religious days before the shooting and they're saying that he got bullied for his religion.

How can you even wonder why they make it so important that he's a muslim.....this has EVERYTHING to do with him being a muslim.....

damn don't write about politics, it's not your thing. Keep it easy and write about celebrities, that's what you guys are good at....

@Rami---so just becuase a deranged zealot screamed what the right wing calls 'the muslim battle cry' that we should paint everyone with the same brush?

@Alaine NRM

All I'm really saying is that there is a relevance in them mentioning what kind of religion he had.
The journalist isn't saying it's BECAUSE he is a muslim that he did this. I'm just sayin, and I know where you're comin from n totally agree

The fact is Muslims are not looked at in the highest regard in the U.S. to be or act surprised it just naive. 9/11 changed everything for Islamic Americans. The way we're looked at. The way we're treated. Everyone incorporates violence with being Muslims, and he just gave them another reason to think that.

I don't agree with what he did. I think it was very cowardly of him. If he didn't want to live anymore then he should have taken his own life. He had no right to shoot others because of his situation. WHY join the American military in the first place if he had no intention on being deployed.

I was pissed off when i heard he was Muslim, and the fact he is a psychiatrist. A MENTAL HEALTH EXPERT. he should have known better. When you're Muslim in this country your actions reflect on your people.

I'm at the point in where we're never going to move away from this social stigma that's attached to middle eastern people.

someone here mentioned that no one was condemning this guys act, and i think that is wrong, we are all condemning the act as muslims, non-muslims in the west or in the middle east...our main issue is the stigmatizing of all Muslims which will likely result from the singling out of this man's religion.
what he did was clearly not solely motivated by his faith...and if you think it was then you must understand that both you and him have gravely misunderstood the religion.

also, someone quoted an ayah from the qur'an and frankly this makes you look really ignorant. no singe ayah can be understood in isolation, this ayah was revealed in a different context and it is up to those who read the qur'an (or chose to quote it, like yourself) to understand this context, otherwise your use of it is completely useless and should and will be overlooked.

i personally don't believe he said Allahu akbar and if he did then he clearly had a mental breakdown and at this time could not separate his own fear from his clear misunderstanding of Islam. at that point, he clearly fell into the stereotype of islam which he was probably bombarded with while working in the military.

i do not sympathize or commend his actions whatsoever... Islam does not promote this reckless and irresponsible behaviour contrary to some of your beliefs/understanding...

but i DO sympathize with innocent and proper muslims, like myself, worldwide who WILL suffer dearly in the eyes of the media and the world as a result of 9/11 and this man's irresponsibility...

Mr. Hasan was not the object of harassment because he was a Muslim. It was his comments to his fellow officers and and advocacy positions that bothered his peers but were ignored by the brass. His fellow collage classmates reported him for professing his allegiance to Islam over that to the US. A violation of his oath to defend the constitution. Yet he was promoted. A year and a half a gao he told a group of Army Physicians, Muslims should be granted Conscientious Objector status. O form he filled out for his overseas deployment he listed his nationality as Palestinian. The fear of being accused of bigotry by the PC leftists led to 13 deaths and a man facing the death penalty. Although the witnesses to the shooting clearly heard him yell Allah Akbar, as usual you leftist deny reality to fit your ideology. Can you imagine if a Jew did this to protest Obama's pressure on Israel. Leftist would be organizing the buring of Hillel Centers and Synagogues on or near their campuses.

Well as an Arab American there is no way to just dismiss the fact that most terrorist attacks are carried out by Muslim Arabs. When I heard the story I was embarrassed when I heard that he was a Arab and Palestinian and a Muslim. I am so tired of having to people that I am Arab and thank God I am not a Muslim but a Christian. Seems to me there is a lot of denial in the Muslim community. If the Muslim and Arab world stopped blaming the world for all their problems perhaps they can advance like the West. The Arab and Muslim world so desperately needs to be secularized otherwise they will continue to fall behind and get caught up in Islamic fundamentalism. What is up with all the veiled woman even here in the US? I find it completely dehumanizing and reprehensible. I miss the old Arab nationalist movement that was totally secular, think Nasserism.

how is the USA has more muslims than syria if syria has 30 million muslims. alain if you are actually a christian as I read in your other posts, then stop putting your nose in muslim issues, we are not waiting for someone like you to defend us, and if you like islam so much why don't you convert instead of dying as you are and going to hell.

It says he's muslim because he killed those people BECAUSE he's a muslim. he has contacted al qaeda several times and the fbi and cia were aware that he had terrorist tendencies