Here's a glimpse inside the Moscow theater. It contains the following:

Mark Podlesny, an actor in the show, who had been on stage when the Chechens took over the theater, said the hostages had seen and heard some of the television and radio coverage of the siege, which he said wrongly reported that hostages were being beaten. "Considering the situation, we were treated relatively well," Podlesny said.


The two young women hostages said the same. Both also said that they had talked to the Chechen women who guarded them.


"They all said that the best religion in the world is Islam and that ours is wrong, that 'We have come here to die, we've nothing to lose," Salina said. "They told us about the war in Chechnya, that they've had somebody killed, a mother, a brother, a son, in front of their eyes and they were so tired of all that, that they are used to hunger and cold, to living without food and sleep.


"The most interesting is that we did not hate them, we felt sorry for them. I felt sorry for them. Maybe it is not normal."

Personally, if my religion resulted in that kind of hopelessness, I'd start to feel agnostic.