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TERRORISM
Barking mad
BY CHRIS WRIGHT

This week, CNN aired footage from recently acquired Al Qaeda videos, including images of three dogs apparently being used to test chemical weapons. The footage — which showed the dogs jerking, groaning, and eventually dying — sparked an outcry from American animal lovers. We polled a few local and national animal-rights groups to get their reaction.

Bob Kalechofsky, Jews for Animal Rights

My reaction was horror, immediate disgust. I saw it with my wife on TV. If they picked any living thing — but picking dogs like that has an added thrust, a completely innocent thing and they killed it. That the dog dies in such a sad, painful way is added terror. There’s a saying in Judaism: choose life. It seems to me that Al Qaeda is choosing death. It was a terrible thing, but probably not inconsistent with their general outlook, which is an acceptance of death.

Debbie Lavinio, Animal Action

It made me disgusted, but it also brought home that this kind of stuff goes on in research labs across the country — hopefully, this will bring attention to that kind of treatment. It didn’t surprise me that that kind of group would do that. It showed Americans the awful things [Al Qaeda] are capable of doing. I think it was a ploy: if we can do this to an animal, we can do it to you. It makes you more afraid of them, which is part of their intention, so they did achieve that.

Peter Wood, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals

We’ve received a lot of e-mails and phone calls from folks expressing outrage, disgust, sorrow, what have you. The response has been overwhelming. There was one interesting e-mail, someone saying, " You take on McDonald’s, so why don’t you take on Al Qaeda? " I basically wrote back and said, " We have; we put out a press release last winter saying bin Laden ran a tannery in the Sudan. " We’re not really too worried about Al Qaeda coming after us.

Dr. Kenneth Shapiro, Psychologists for the Ethical Treatment of Animals

I heard of it. It’s not ethical and not necessary. We [the US] also have used dogs for various kinds of experiments. After the rat, the dog is the species [most commonly] used for toxicity testing. So this is not off the wall. The difference is that here we’re usually trying to diminish toxicity in products we use, to test for toxicity that might kill people, where they [Al Qaeda] are testing for toxins that will kill people.

Donna Bishop, Alliance for Animals

What bothered me was that the animals were obviously not even remotely taken care of — there was no pain medication, no thought at all about the pain and anxiety and suffering. Also, everyone knows what nerve gas is going to do; there was no reason to expose an animal to that kind of torment. I think that what it really shows is that they have no respect for life. It does accomplish something: it shows that they have the weapons and that they have whatever it takes to use them.

Carter Luke, MSPCA

Animals are often used in wartime capacities in completely inhumane ways. I find it appalling that dogs [were] used in such a way. " Appalling " is the only word that comes to mind, except for a few four-letter words. To use innocent dogs like this is disgraceful, a shame on our species. Obviously, this is a group whose consideration for any aspects of humanity has long left them — ach! I won’t watch the tapes; if I do it’ll make me crazy. I’ll watch Drew Carey or something.

Issue Date: August 22 - 29, 2002
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