The Smiling Bali Bomber

by John Hawkins | November 13, 2002 3:53 pm

The Smiling Bali Bomber: You’re looking at the smiling face of the man who helped plant bombs that killed nearly 200 people at a nightclub in Bali. That cheerful grin isn’t just a recent development either. Here are a few details from the article[1].

“Smiling and waving at reporters, a fresh-faced Indonesian who has admitted being one of the Bali bombers, on Wednesday told of his delight at the attacks and said he went sightseeing in the days before the blasts.

…Police chief General Da’i Bachtiar said Amrozi was not in Bali when the bombs exploded on the night of October 12, ripping through part of the famous Kuta Beach tourist district and killing nearly 200 people, many of them foreign tourists.

His work done, Amrozi had already gone back to his home village in East Java.

“After he was there, he heard on the radio there had been a bomb explosion in Bali. He said he felt delighted that his bomb had successfully exploded in Bali,” Bachtiar told a news conference.

“He was certainly happy with the explosion, and hoped it was in accordance with the objective that had been hoped for.”

The bombers wanted to kill as many Americans as possible, Amrozi has previously said, although Australians bore the brunt of the deaths among foreign tourists.

Aussies, Americans, we’re all kaffirs right? It’s not like he was killing Muslims so who cares? Apparently not Amrozi. He’s cheerful now, he was probably cheerful when he went sightseeing the day before the bombing, and I’m sure he was happy as a clam when he planted the bomb at the nightclub. But he did offer an apology — to his family — he’s sorry for getting them into this. But to the families of the people he killed? He had nothing to say to them.

Interestingly enough, SMH[2] reveals an interesting comment by Amrozi that Reuters apparently didn’t think was newsworthy…

“At one point, the Javanese mechanic pointed to Western journalists and said in Indonesian: “Those are the sorts of people that I wanted to kill.”

After that comment, I think there are some poignant questions that need to be asked. For instance, “what did those reporters do to Amrozi to make him want to kill them?” They must have done something right? Isn’t that the line of reasoning we’ve heard from some the anti-war crowd? Also, there are plenty of people in the anti-war left who have pointed out that America’s foreign policy is to blame for the terrorists who want to kill us. So, “what is the foreign policy of the news agencies these reporters work for that has made this man want to kill them?” Noam Chomsky, Susan Sarandon, Woody Harrelson and the rest of the anti-war left, where are you on this one? We need you to ask all those tough questions to those Western reporters…