And babies, some short of their first birthdays, were thrown into burning fires while their mothers were handcuffed by thugs. The thugs laughed as the babies cried, until those flames silenced them for good and their cries were succeeded by the cries of their mothers. Cries that sounded like their souls were thrust out of their bodies forever.

FICTION: Powerful visceral imagery for depicting atrocity and trauma in narrative work — the contrast of infant cries giving way to mother's cries is a sharp dramatic device.

Khaled A. Beydoun, The New Crusades_ Islamopho…, loc. 666