America live-streaming Nidal Hasan’s execution isn’t justice

The Pentagon has confirmed it will be live-streamed (Picture: Win McNamee/Getty Images) Ask most people to name the man who helped plan the Manchester Arena bombing, and they’d struggle. His name is Hashem Abedi. His brother Salman killed 22 people in a suicide bomb attack at an Ariana Grande concert in 2017 – and Hashem is currently serving a minimum of 55 years for murder. When he made headlines again last year, accused of attacking prison officers, it was as another inmate facing another court case – not a martyr whose sacrifice was being recalled. This killer is mostly forgotten, irrelevant and abandoned. That’s how it should be. Instead, America is about to do something very different – they are planning the execution of Nidal Hasan by firing squad, making him infamous. However, that’s not all – the Pentagon has confirmed it will be live-streamed. Yes, streamed live like a TV special. Hasan, a former US Army psychiatrist, murdered 13 people, including a pregnant soldier, and wounded 32 more (Picture: Reuters) But I believe his name should be forgotten the same way the Abedi brothers have been. On November 5 2009, Hasan, a former US Army psychiatrist, murdered 13 people, including a pregnant soldier, and wounded 32 more at Fort Hood in Texas. A month later, Hasan was charged with thirteen counts of pre-meditated murder and thirty-two counts of attempted murder under the Uniform Code of Military Justice – which made him eligible for the death penalty. That verdict will be carried out in December, and now, Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth has vowed to livestream it. To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video ‘We’ll make sure that people are able to watch it,’ he said on conservative network Real America’s Voice News. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. It is to be the US military’s first execution since 1961, and its first by firing squad since the Second World War. That is not something I will be watching, and neither should you. Let me start by saying I have zero sympathy for Hasan. He walked into a building full of soldiers queuing for medical checks before deployment and opened fire. Investigators recovered 146 shell casings inside the building alone. It was a horrific moment in American history, and was the deadliest shooting ever to take place on a US military base (Picture: U.S. Army via Getty Images) He bought that pistol legally from a gun shop near the base, months after the FBI had intercepted his emails to an al-Qaeda cleric. This tells you everything about America’s sick relationship with guns – there were no questions, no waiting period, no licence. It was a horrific moment in American history, and was the deadliest shooting ever to take place on a US military base. The execution has now been set for a Thursday at 1pm at Fort Hood, roughly the day, time and place of the massacre. But a government live-streaming a killing isn’t justice. It’s revenge staged as theatre. What are your thoughts on live-streaming executions? I support it as a means of transparency.Check I oppose it as I find it unnecessary and harmful.Check I'm undecided or have mixed feelings.Check Stay up to date with the stories everybody’s talking about by signing up to Metro's News Updates newsletter. Britain stopped hanging people in public in 1868, partly because the crowds had turned executions into carnivals. Now people like Lee Rigby’s murderer Michael Adebolajo will die in prison. Abedi, who assisted in the Manchester Arena bombing, will be nearly 80 before he can even be considered for parole. But the crucial thing here is that their names barely register. I have to tell you who they are and what they did – and that is precisely the point. Every terrorist craves an audience – they want infamy and attention. Hasan has openly sought martyrdom for years – documents during his 2013 trial revealed he had told military mental health staff he could ‘still be a martyr’ if the government executed him. America is turning this terrorist into a celebrity (Picture: Aaron Schwartz / AFP via Getty Images) So, we should refuse them this audience, and instead let them rot away in a cell, ignored and dismissed. After the Christchurch mosque attacks, New Zealand’s then-Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern vowed never to say the gunman’s name. To this day, she hasn’t, and the terrorist has faded further into obscurity. But America is turning this terrorist into a celebrity. Many victims’ families warned against giving him what he wanted. Keely Vanacker, whose father Michael Cahill was killed at Fort Hood, said on Fox News: ‘He’s already dead to me. It’s been 17 years – he’s just not somebody I think about’. That’s exactly how we should think of him. ‘The firing squad is a little weird to me – I don’t quite understand that, it makes it a circus and brings attention’, Vanacker continued. But Trump and his unserious administration are going ahead anyway. Many victims’ families warned against giving him what he wanted (Picture: Joe Raedle/Getty Images) Hasan was also shot during the attack and is paralysed from the waist down. He isn’t going to match the look of a big scary terrorist that people have in their mind. Instead, he’s going to look like a small, helpless man in a wheelchair, facing a row of rifles. Within minutes, clips will autoplay on the phones of teenagers who never chose to see them, an issue in itself. Then soldiers will be ordered to pull the trigger while the world watches. The young eyes that could witness murder live on screen is psychologically damaging. Every view of that stream is a mandate, every click an endorsement – don’t give it yours. Look away and let Nidal Hasan be forgotten. That’s the most fitting punishment you can give him. Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing Ross.Mccafferty@metro.co.uk. Share your views in the comments below. Arrow MORE: Firing squads and lethal gas — how modern America puts prisoners to death Arrow MORE: Boy, 13, dies in freak accident on playground slide Arrow MORE: Donald Trump doesn’t win Nobel Peace Prize after saying ‘nobody deserves it more’ News Updates Stay on top of the headlines with daily email updates.