ABSTRACT
In early May 2004, the website of Muntada al-Ansar, a Iraq-based terrorist group supporting pro-militant Islamic extremism, distributed video material that was to achieve worldwide notoriety. The grubbiness of the setting and poor VHS-style quality of the clip contributed to the dread I personally felt watching this, awaiting what was surely to come. The clip showed Nicholas Berg, a 26-year-old American civilian contractor who had gone to Iraq as part of the infrastructural reconstruction efforts. Berg had been reported missing since the previous month. The 14-minute film began with Berg sitting on a chair, wearing an orange jump-suit similar to those worn by detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Berg identified himself to his interviewer, stating: “My father’s name is Michael, my mother’s name is Suzanne. I have a brother and sister, David and Sarah. I live in Philadelphia.” The clip then skips to a scene during which Berg is seated on the floor, his arms bound behind his back and his feet bound together, in front of five masked men, one of whom (in the center) read aloud a statement in Arabic. The speaker condemned the abuse of Iraqi detainees at the US-controlled Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, during which some American soldiers and contractors engaged in the torture of prisoners. This man was later identified as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq, who would eventually meet his fate by a targeted killing in 2006 after allegedly being sold out by his al-Qaeda comrades.
