Monday, December 1, 2014

Social Justice Project: Watching the News: ABC World News Tonight, November 27th, 2014

ABC World News Tonight on Wednesday, November 27th,  had a frightening story about a group of hostages captured recently by Al Qaeda. I thought this would be interesting because it had to do with an ongoing problem, but was directly associated with the United States.

When US soldiers were sent to an Al Qaeda stronghold in Yemen on Monday to rescue hostages from Al Qaeda, I was genuinely scared for them. The soldiers’ arrival was scheduled as soon as al Qaeda militants were observed lugging hostages covered in blankets into pickup trucks that were then transferred about 68 miles away from al-Saiyer to a cave. There was a shootout in the open with the terrorist group before the  American militants could advance to the mountainside cave. There, they escorted them to their chopper and flew them to safety. If I was in their shoes, I would be terrified. I would be the first to reenter the helicopter and the last to leave it.

Nevertheless, I would probably still have tried to save the hostages, because were I a hostage, I would have wanted someone to at least try to save me. I would have been even more terrified that  I would never come out of there again.

Were I in the shoes of a hostage, I would probably have fought back at first, but ultimately, I would have accepted it and fallen into a deep, sleepless frustration and sadness. I would have tried to comply with my captors so that nothing would happen to me. I would have kept my head down. I would have been scared that I wouldn’t be found and that I would just stay here for years. I would have been frustrated because I would ot have known what to do, much less been able to do it. I would have been hopeless.

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