Executioners

Description: via Instapundit) American Digest chops up a TV interview of Saudi Arabia's chief executioner into stills and makes the experience super surreal. (American Digest credits LGF. The transcript is here.) Actually we've met Mr. Al Bishi (or Al Beshi) before. He was profiled in Arab News - Kingdom's Leading executioner says - 'I lead a normal life.' He's not the executioner who's been profiled in ArabNews so has Ahmad Rezkallah in A Day in the Life of an Executioner. In American Digest one of the commenters wrote: I don't mind beheadings nearly as much as I mind this guy's pride in his work. It's not that I'm against capital punishment - though clearly beheading seems cruel from a Western persective - but these men seemingly do their jobs with a detachment that is scary. (I also have doubts about the rigor of legal protections that are employed to ensure mistakes are avoided.) Still there is a way out of execution. In the case of murder, if the family of the victim is appeased - often by the payment of 'blood money' the condemned may be spared even moments before execution. (The most disturbing account of executions in Saudi Arabia that I read was "Execution day in Riyadh" by Clifford Hallam in Commentary, February 1986.) It's also interesting that Instapundit pointed to an article about the summary execution of a number of Kurds in 1979 by an Iranian tribunal and the story behind the picture that was taken of the killings.