Editor’s note: Journalist, Ricochet.com columnist Claire Berlinski witnessed the immediate aftermath of Wednesday’s terror attacks in Paris. A full recap of her experience, “First-Hand Account From The Terrorist Attack on Charlie-Hebdo” can be read here on Ricochet.com. The following is excerpted from her column and used with permission.
That I’m shaken is of concern to no one; my emotions are not the point. The entire city is shaken. So much that even my cab driver — I had to catch one to get home; the streets were otherwise blocked off — didn’t even ask me to pay the fare. When I said I was a journalist, and in a rush to say what little I knew, his response was, “Forget about the money. Just hurry.”
The assailants are as yet at liberty. I hope they’ll be dead by the time you read this. But if not:. You want me too? Come get me. Because nothing short of killing me — and many more of my kind — will ever shut us up.
And if you don’t believe that now, you’ll believe it very soon. Because there are more of us willing to die for that freedom than those of you eager to take it from us. And soon you will find out that those of us willing to die for that freedom are also much better at killing than you.
So come and get me. Je suis Charlie.
And have a good long look at the cartoon below. Because you may have been able to kill its authors, but you sure didn’t kill what they created. And nor will we ever let you.
There are things I’m not allowed to say on Ricochet. But if I were allowed to say them, this is what I’d say–though I’d add a few other words.
Go ahead. Make my day. Because you’ve got no idea what we’re capable of when we are pushed too far. And you are more than pushing your luck.
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