A harvest of heartbreak so movingly reported

MADRID, Spain – G.K. Chesterton once wrote that "when your pen is red hot, it draws roses. When it is white hot, it draws stars".

The Spanish press, sharpening its pens into rapiers, has been slashing away at the M-11 (March 11 "massacre") story and its grief-stricken aftermath with both fury and fidelity.

I am in awe of the way El Pais, the leading broadsheet; El Mundo, its challenger in journalism; the ubiquitous ABC; and La Vanguardia from Barcelona report Spain’s tragedy, in which 200 are now dead, 1,500 gravely wounded – and an entire nation of 44 million grievously hurt and angered, not the least of all by their helplessness to strike back.

Every gory, wrenching detail is recorded. Fantastic photographs are exhibited. On the front cover of the tabloid La Vanguardia, a young boy, seeking to conceal his tears with the collars of his windcheaters, is convulsed in inconsolable pain as he bids his dad, Air Force Sublieutenant Felix Gonzalez, farewell. The 52-year old officer perished in one crumpled train – a veteran pilot who had fought with the first contingent of the Spanish cascos Azules in Namibia, served as attaché in Chile. A splendid, patriotic career ended because he innocently took a train to eternity. "Lagrimas por su Padre," (tears for his father), an editorial writer had captioned 11-year old Marcos’s tears, but the gesture stung the heart and brought, surely, a tear to the reader’s eye.

On another page were advertisements reminding readers that 19 de Marzo is Dia Del Padre, Father’s Day. What irony that Marcos’s brave dad would never see another Father’s Day.

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The dailies here not only put faces on the fallen, they tell their stories, poignant narratives of lives so cruelly disrupted, or lovers lost, or boys and girls cut off in the full flower of their youth, all their tomorrows and great expectations extinguished by vicious terrorists intent on creating havoc in pursuit of warped religion or separatist creed.

The newspapers daily publish a Lista de Fallecidos, those who died in those 11 blasts which destroyed coach after coach in three stations, the central Atocha in the heart of Madrid, the El Pozo, and the Santa Eugenia.

Francisco Javier. Here was a 34-year old programmer for Toyota, there 23-year-old Osama al Amrati, an immigrant from Morocco, who just before the explosion had been on his "movil" (cellphone) to his young fiancée, Bea, exclaiming: "Habebe (Dearest) – eres mi vida!" (Beloved, you are my life!). Then, a minute later, even as he spoke, his life was snatched away.

Here was Laura Laforga Bajon, a maestra psicopedagoga, child teacher, 28. a cook named Eduardo Sanz Perez, never to see his unborn child. A 24-year-old Alberto Arenas, aspiring to be a pilot for AirEuropa, Enrique Garcia Gonzalez, an installer of stoves and air-conditioners, next Esteban de Benito, a telephone executive, 39, kissing his two little daughters, aged 4 and 9 goodbye, to board his train for work in Santa Eugenia. Gloria Ines, a Colombiana, 40 years old, a cook, enroute to her place of employment. These were among those whose lives were cruelly ended.

Three Moroccans and two Indians (Bombays, yes) have been arrested. Perhaps, indeed, al-Qaeda had a hand in the bombings?

The bombs were in knapsacks, investigators turned up. Detonated by mobil telephone. Packed with 10 kg. each of Goma 2 explosives, specially powerful. Packed with nails for maximum shrapnel destruction. Someone picked up a phone, punched in the numbers – and boom.

Is there a terrorist in our neighborhood? Beware.

I’ve never bought that stupid declaration that "one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter".

One who fights for freedom does not kill the innocent.

Yesterday, Spain’s people went to the polls. The results will be known within five hours – nationwide. Here I am, covering both elections and terrorism. I hope that those two, in our land, won’t go together.