US consulate in Libya stormed, ambassador killed, US Embassy stormed in Egypt

(battle sounds from video)

That's the sound of fighting outside the US Consulate in Benzhagi, Libya on September 11, 2012.

On September 11th, The US ambassador to Libya and three other Americans were killed during a protest followed by a battle at the US Consulate in Libya. First there was a basically peaceful protest near the Consulate against a hate-filled, anti-Islamic amateur film posted to Youtube by someone in the US. Late in the day a convoy of armed men arived and entered the protest. These men opened fire on the consulate with a variety of weapons, then stormed the building and set it on fire.

By the time US and Libyan government forces were able to recapture the building, the US Ambassador was nowhere to be found. He later turned up at a hospital, dead. Three other Americans were also killed. The Ambassador and his staffers died of smoke inhalation according to one unconfirmed report. Another report says their car was hit by a rocket while they were trying to escape.

Here's what one of the protesters had to say, taken from a video by the UK-based Guardian news:

(clip)

Somehow I have a suspicion that this is about more than just the offensive, hate-filled amateur film the protests were supposed to be about. The civil war in Libya was long and bitter, and I wonder if the real reason for the intensity of the attack on the US Consulate was fallout from that. The Libyan government suspects former Quaddafi operatives, the US claims al-Qaeda was retaliating for the recent death of one of their leaders to a US drone strike.

Cairo, Egypt: September 11, 2012: protesters stormed the US Embassy but harmed nobody, even after warning shots were fired by security forces. Instead of setting fires and shooting rockets, they scaled the walls, tore down the US flag and burned it, and raised a black Islamic flag in its place. Remember, in Egypt unlike Libya, the US and NATO were not combatants in a long, drawn-out civil war.

Mr Barrrack Obama, you will be hearing from many people calling these two attacks "a second September 11th. This time, however, four people were killed, not three thousand. Even though US Embassies are considered US soil, this can't possibly be considered equivalent to a major attack inside two major US cities like in 2001. It is no reason to go to war and kill thousands more.

In fact, now's the time to pull the plug on war in the Middle East. A recent survey shows 2/3ds of the US population saying the war in Iraq was not worth it. By withdrawing from the Middle East and Afghanistan, you can save the lives of US troops AND get ahead of Mitt Romney!