Shoe-throwing comes full circle
The latest victim of the international shoe throwing trend kicked off by Iraqi journalist Muntazer al-Zaidi in 2008 is… Muntazer al Zaidi! Muntazer al-Zaidi – who became a national hero in Iraq after hurling his footwear at the then US president last year – was speaking at a press conference to promote his campaign for ...
The latest victim of the international shoe throwing trend kicked off by Iraqi journalist Muntazer al-Zaidi in 2008 is… Muntazer al Zaidi!
Muntazer al-Zaidi – who became a national hero in Iraq after hurling his footwear at the then US president last year – was speaking at a press conference to promote his campaign for victims of the Iraq war when a man threw a shoe at him.
Zaidi ducked and the shoe hit the wall behind him. Film footage showed that a scuffle then broke out in the audience. “He stole my technique,” Zaidi said afterwards.
French reports said the attacker was an exiled Iraqi journalist who spoke in defence of US policy and accused Zaidi of siding with a dictatorship.
Other victims of the shoe-toss include Wen Jiabao, Indian Home minister P. Chidambaram, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, and (possibly) Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
PIERRE VERDY/AFP/Getty Images
Joshua Keating was an associate editor at Foreign Policy. Twitter: @joshuakeating
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