Fort Hood: Pentagon plans to livestream the execution of Nidal Hasas

Hegseth said in a video interview published on Thursday that Hasan will get "a firing squad with soldiers (...) and we will make sure that people can watch, that it is public. People need to see that such actions have consequences."

A Pentagon official said a little later that the execution would be “streamed live” on December 3rd at the Fort Hood military base in the state of Texas.

US President Donald Trump approved the execution - a few days after an execution attempt failed in the US state of Tennessee: According to the authorities, Christa Pike, who was convicted of murder, was given two doses of the drug pentobarbital, but she survived. According to the latest information from her lawyers, she is now conscious again (more on the case here). The case reignited the debate about the death penalty in the USA.

Hasan opened fire on soldiers at the military base in 2009, killing 13 people. 32 other people were injured. The then military psychiatrist was sentenced to death by a military court in 2013.

No remorse evident during the process

According to the New York Times, the attacker stated that he carried out the attack in the name of jihad. He called the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq illegal. The attack occurred at the height of the anti-terror struggle after September 11, 2001. According to US media, Hasan was born in the USA to Palestinian parents and had become increasingly radicalized before the attack.

He was sentenced to death for his crime. He showed no remorse and expressed the wish that he had died in the attack himself in order to be considered a martyr (more on the trial here). According to US media, Hasan is one of four death row prisoners in the military justice system.

Public shootings were used as a deterrent in the USA, including during the American Civil War in the 19th century. The last execution by a US military firing squad took place in 1945.

The last public execution in the United States was in 1936, when a man was hanged in the state of Kentucky in front of thousands of onlookers. Now the live stream of the killing of the Fort Hood attacker is likely to be watched by many more people.