Officer who killed 12 and wounded 31 people in the U.S. military Fort Hood on Thursday, is not dead as was previously announced, but is only wounded. His current condition is stable, the commander of the base said on Thursday.

The suspect was wounded several times in the incident and is currently “in a stable condition”, General Robert Cone told news reporters.

- First reports said that the attacker was shot several times at the scene. However, he was not killed as earlier reports announced - he added.

The suspect, identified as Major Nidal Hasan Malik, opened fire in the center for processing soldiers in Fort Hood, about 1:30 PM, local time, said Cone. Three other soldiers who were initially detained for questioning, were later released, he added.

The attacker was armed with two pistols, said General Cone. One witness from the base said that the soldiers ripped their clothes to make bandages for the wounded.

- It was chaos - the witness said.

Hasan (39), a psychiatrist who graduated from the Virginia Tech University and a Military School in Bethesda, worked at the Darnall Medical Center at Fort Hood.

 Hasan was “very upset” because of the transfer to Iraq

Prior to transfer to Darnall in July of this year, he worked in the Walter Reed military hospital in Washington. He had difficulty in communicating to patients and he had to take additional counseling, program director for the Walter Reed interns, Dr. Thomas Geiger, said.

Federal officials have said that Hasan was a citizen of the United States and that his origin was Jordanian. Military documents show that he was born in Arlington in Virginia, that he enlisted in the Army immediately after high school, and that he was never deployed outside of the United States.

Hasan was suppose to be deployed to Iraq on November 28 and it seems that he was “very upset” about this, Texas Senator, Kay Bailey Hutchison said for the local TV station KXAN .

The army has not yet confirmed that Major Hasan was supposed to be deployed to Iraq.

He was scared to death

The New York Times had a conversation with his cousin, Hasan Nader Hasan, 40-year lawyer from northern Virginia, who said that Major General Hasan was “scared” to death with the possibility of being deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan.

- He was mortally afraid. People talked to him about horrors they saw there every day - he said.

He also said his cousin complained to him about army bulling because he was a Muslim and that he wanted to leave the army, but could not because he had to pay off the education debts. He also said that Major General Hasan was single and that he turned to religion after his parents died in 1998 and 2001.

President Barack Obama called the shooting “tragic” and “terrible eruption of violence” as he expressed condolences to the families of casualties.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced that the Pentagon would do everything it can to help the Fort Hood community.

Photos from Fort Hood are available here.