By Jones Gadama
WASHINGTON—(MaraviPost)-Judgment Day has finally come. President Donald Trump has approved the execution by firing squad of former US Army Major Nidal Malik Hasan, the military psychiatrist turned jihadist who walked into a Texas army base and massacred 13 unarmed people while shouting “Allahu Akbar.”
The decision, announced Monday by the Pentagon and first reported by Al Jazeera, will end a 16-year wait for justice and mark the first execution by the US military since 1961.
“Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has recommended — and President Donald J. Trump has approved — death by U.S. Army firing squad for convicted terrorist Nidal Malik Hasan,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell wrote on X, as quoted by Al Jazeera.
“The Secretary of the Army will set the time and place of the execution. Judgement day for Hasan has finally come.”
According to Al Jazeera and Reuters, Acting Army Secretary Adam Telle has now set that date: December 3 at Fort Hood, Texas — the same base where he committed his horror.
It will be the Army’s first execution by firing squad since World War II.
The day America’s own base became a battlefield
Fort Hood, Texas, now called Fort Cavazos, is one of the largest US military bases in the world.
Inside it was the Soldier Readiness Processing Center — a medical building where unarmed soldiers line up for vaccines and dental checks before deploying to Iraq and Afghanistan.
Hasan, a US-born Muslim of Palestinian descent, was an Army psychiatrist who was supposed to be counseling those soldiers. Instead, Al Jazeera reports, he had become radicalized, opposing the wars and communicating online with Al-Qaeda cleric Anwar al-Awlaki.
At around 1:30 PM, Hasan, armed with a laser-sighted FN Five-seven pistol, walked in, jumped onto a desk, shouted “Allahu Akbar — God is Greatest,” and opened fire on his fellow Americans.
For ten terrifying minutes, he hunted soldiers.
He killed 12 active-duty soldiers and one retired Chief Warrant Officer who was working as a civilian, and wounded 32 others.
Among the dead was Private First Class Francheska Velez, who was pregnant and begged for her baby’s life.
As reported by CNN and Al Jazeera, Hasan was finally shot and paralyzed from the waist down by civilian police officer Kimberly Munley.
He showed no remorse. At his 2013 court martial, he represented himself, called no witnesses, and told the jury: “I am the shooter.” He described himself as a soldier who had “switched sides” to protect Muslim insurgents.
A jury of 13 officers unanimously sentenced him to death.
He has been on death row at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas — one of only four inmates on the military’s death row.
Why firing squad now?
Hasan’s execution required presidential approval. President George W. Bush and Barack Obama never acted. President Trump has now acted.
According to Al Jazeera, the move comes after the Trump administration expanded federal execution methods to include firing squad, electrocution and gas, because of growing difficulties obtaining lethal injection drugs.
That difficulty was highlighted just last week when Tennessee botched the lethal injection of Christa Pike — who survived two doses of pentobarbital and is now conscious and speaking in hospital. Pike’s attorneys had actually asked for a firing squad instead.
Pentagon Chief Pete Hegseth replied to the announcement with one word: “Justice.”
If carried out on December 3, Hasan will be the first US service member executed in 65 years. The last was Private John Bennett, hanged in 1961 for raping and attempting to murder an 11-year-old girl.
After 16 years, 13 graves, and 32 wounded warriors, the Army is finally ready to pull the trigger.
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