"The World: Aloft, With a Silent Companion"
".... Six servicemen hoisted the coffin onto their shoulders, solemnly carrying it off the C-130 and loading it onto a waiting truck. Standing in the dark, uncertain of where we were, it seemed time had stopped. We stood at attention and saluted. All of us who had never known this man were, at that moment, thinking about him.
I raised my left hand to my forehead, saw the soldier in front of me salute with his right, and wondered if I, as a reporter, should be saluting at all. I brought my hand down and before I could raise my other hand, the salute was over.
I was told later by a soldier on the plane that he was 20 years old, a specialist stationed in Baghdad. He had been driving to a memorial for three members of his company when his Humvee was hit by a roadside bomb.
What were his parents thinking, his sister or brother, his fiancée — if he had one? I hoped he had died quickly. I wondered what exactly he had died for. And although I did not know him, I felt melancholy as we flew onward, accompanied now by ghosts and memories of loss."
Huh?!
Oh, he DIED for ISRAEL, doncha know?!
And all the Iraqis we have slaughtered, Alissa?
Do you EVER THINK ABOUT THEM?!?!
