NBC, msnbc.com and news services
FORT HOOD, Texas – The officer accused of shooting scores of his fellow soldiers was not killed in the rampage Thursday and is intensive care at a Texas hospital. Meanwhile a 13th victim has died as authorities try to determine why the attack happened.
The suspect, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, 39, was on a ventilator and unconscious in a hospital after being shot four times, post officials said.
In the early chaos after the shootings, authorities believed they had killed him, only to discover later that he had survived.
In the weeks before the shootings, the FBI investigated Internet postings by someone with that name, the New York Times reported. The postings "discussed suicide bombings in a favorable light," The Times said, but cautioned that investigators were not certain it was the Army officer who wrote the postings.
Hasan, who was a career soldier and the son of Palestinian immigrants, began questioning his military career after other soldiers harassed him for being a Muslim, relatives told The Times.
He joined the Army after graduating high school, relatives said. The Army paid for his college and medical school, where he became a psychiatrist. As a counselor to soldiers returning from war, he became exposed to – and horrified by – the danger of the conflict, The Times said.
The commander of Fort Hood, Lt. Gen. Bob Cone, told NBC's TODAY on Friday that Hasan was in a "stable condition." He said he would be interrogated as soon as possible.
Cone also said he heard first-hand accounts from witnesses on the scene that Hassan shouted "Allahu Akbar," which means "God is Great" in Arabic, before he opened fire at the Soldier Readiness Center at Fort Hood.
Authorities have not ruled out that Hasan was acting on behalf of some unidentified radical group, the official said. He would not say whether any evidence had come to light to support that theory.
The official spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity to discuss matters that were under investigation.
Officials are not ruling out the possibility that some of the casualties may have been victims of "friendly fire," that in the mayhem and confusion at the shooting scene some of the responding military officials may have shot some of the victims.
The gunfire broke out around 1:30 p.m. at the Soldier Readiness Center, where soldiers who are about to be deployed or who are returning undergo medical screening. Nearby, some soldiers were readying to head into a graduation ceremony for troops and families who had recently earned degrees.
Pastor Greg Schannep had just parked his car along the side of the theater and was about to head into the ceremony when a man in uniform approached him.
"Sir, they are opening fire over there!" the man told him. At first, he thought it was a training exercise — then heard three volleys and saw people running. As the man who warned him about the shots ran away, he could see the man's back was bloodied from a wound.
