On September 15 in Xi’an, Shanxi province, an anti-Japanese protest got so out of hand that a Chinese man was partially paralyzed when someone clobbered him over the head with a piece of steel. Fifty-one-year-old Li Jianli’s only crime? Driving a Toyota Corolla with his family. His wife futilely pleaded with the mob, “It was wrong of us to buy a Japanese car. We won’t buy one ever again, OK?”
We knew it was only a matter of time that a video would surface of the attack, and behold, it’s above. Warning: the violence is graphic, a near-front-row view of a crazed man striking Li multiple times with a U-shaped bike lock. While the wife hysterically tends to her unconscious husband who’s bleeding from the head, we hear the sound of thwacking, probably from people who failed to recognize the gravity of the situation and continued pounding the Corolla. One man in the crowd angrily shouts, “Can we first save this guy?” He speaks with a pretty heavy accent, but Shanghaiist’s Kenneth Tan — who first posted this video — translates his next phrase as, “We are all Chinese, have you started to take him for a Japanese?”
Of course we would never wish for someone’s physical injury, even in the name of justice. But we don’t have to care what happens to this guy if — when — he’s found. Pictures of him after the jump. Youku has, unsurprisingly, censored the above video. Update: It’s on ifeng though, embedded after the jump. UPDATE 2, 9/27, 3:36 pm: OK, it’s no longer on ifeng, but there’s a Youku newscast clip.
Best news I’ve read since first hearing about this poor man who was left paralyzed by this savage!
After I saw this video this morning, I truly felt sick to my stomach and kept wondering why no bystanders tried to apprehend the attacker. I could rationalize why not, of course, but that made me sicker.
Pray that some good souls – from behind the safety of their computer screens and keyboards – will now be able to start some kind of justice….
Go get him, Human Flesh Engine Search…I certainly hope the man is identified, arrested for premeditated murder and dealt with to the full extent of the law. There is absolutely no reason at all for this to have befallen this hapless victim of Chinese thuggery.
More importantly, where were the police, the armed police, military? What a despicable society.
This unfettered and on-going thuggery, barbarian behavior and brutishness along with the complacent behavior of the police and military could be the rationale for “Why I Left China,” rather than Mark Kitto’s rather feeble excuse.
I Think just go ahead to put capital punishment for the guy who kill the Toyota driver.If I was the driver, I have to be aware all surrounding area. If any person tries to attack me , I will use any thing to kill that person before he got a chance to kill or I kill at least one or two persons before they kill me. I will revenge any person tries to kill by put the knives in his chest.