By now, you’ve probably read the right-wing Carroll-bashing, where she’s likened to a suicide bomber and said to carrying Habib’s baby. Because anyone who says that she was treated well by her captors is an America-hating terrorist apologist, right?
Well, oops.
Protected by the U.S. military and far from the country where she had been held hostage, Jill Carroll strongly disavowed statements she had made during captivity in
Iraq and shortly after her release, saying Saturday she had been repeatedly threatened.
In a video, recorded before she was freed and posted by her captors on an Islamist Web site, Carroll spoke out against the U.S. military presence. But in a statement Saturday, she said the recording was made under threat. Her editor has said three men were pointing guns at her at the time.
“During my last night in captivity, my captors forced me to participate in a propaganda video. They told me I would be released if I cooperated. I was living in a threatening environment, under their control, and wanted to go home alive. So I agreed,” she said in a statement read by her editor in Boston.
“Things that I was forced to say while captive are now being taken by some as an accurate reflection of my personal views. They are not.”
But I wouldn’t expect an apology from these guys any time soon. After all, Carroll refused to be a shill for the war even as she condemned terrorism, and that just isn’t good enough.
“I want to be judged as a journalist, not as a hostage. I remain as committed as ever to fairness and accuracy — to discovering the truth — and so I will not engage in polemics. But let me be clear: I abhor all who kidnap and murder civilians, and my captors are clearly guilty of both crimes,” she said.