I still can’t get over the inflammatory article I read yesterday. I e-mailed the editor-in-chief of the paper and complained. I encourage everyone else to do so as well. As somebody who has worked in different newsrooms over the last seven years, trust me when I tell you that feedback has an impact. Also, upon hubby’s suggestion, I translated the article into English for those who couldn’t read it in Arabic. Part of the article is below, the rest is in the extended section of this post.
Al-Banna family in al-Salt received greetings for son Raed’s martyrdom in an Iraqi resistance operation
Al-Banna family in al-Salt organized a martyr’s wedding yesterday for their son Raed Mansur al-Banna who blew himself up in an explosive-laden car that he was driving in Baghdad in al-Hilla on March 1.
The father of the martyr proudly received the well-wishers in the tribe’s reception hall in central Jada in the center of the city of Salt. The story of Raed is similar to that of many youth from the city that left for Jihad across the globe. Raed’s appointment with martyrdom came on March 1, when he blew himself up inside an explosive-laden car that he was driving in al-Hilla in Baghdad that resulted in the killing of over 133 people, the majority of whom were Americans.
Raed left his house three months prior to the incident and told his parents he was going to Saudi to perform al Umra (lesser Haj). Raed had just returned from Umra a few weeks before, as he went to take part in the anti-terrorism course organized by the Saudi government, according to his bother Ahmad Mansur al-Banna.
Raed, who was born in 1973, got his BA degree in Law from Muta University in 1995. During the events of September 11, 2001 he was working in California, said his brother. He noted that this incident [Sept. 11] changed him from a normal guy to a religiously devoted one, who committed himself to praying in the mosque while standing side by side with the Egyptian preacher Wajdi Ghanim in the mosques of California.
The news of his martyrdom came two days after he committed the martyrdom operation when someone claiming to be part of the guys of Aljazeera called Raed’s brother and told him the news of the Raed’s martyrdom along with another person from Jordan named Safwan al-Abbadi. He said Raed had been martyred two days previous in an operation executed by the Iraqi resistance.
The caller said that in order to prove that Raed did the operation he would tell his brother the names of Raed’s relatives and that Raed had traveled to the US and UK and had earned a BA in Law and had worked as a lawyer for three years in Jordan. He also said that Raed had requested a payment of $100 be made to someone that had business dealings with him in the US. But the caller said that they should wait before they announced his martyrdom just to make sure.
Amir, sorry that statement was not a contradiction i just wanted to give a quick example to linda fo what i disagree with. allow me to clarify
no there are no innocent israelies, all targets are legitamite. when it comes to my disagreements, i disagree simply with their focus on civilians instead of military. all targets are legit but i wud rather them stick to the military. if there are two people fighting u and one of them has a gun, i’ll go with the guy with the gun as he represents the most immediate and demanding of the threats. i however understand in most cases these operations depend on oppertunity. so i disagree with the policy and preperation not the theory of the acts.
ure minor point: yes not all are military trained…it dosnt excuse the fact. if u live in israeli u are living in a country occupying another, u are supporting its survival militarily, financially and just on principle. u are the fuel to fire.
the answer to ure last question? yes. why? because israel thinks this way anyway. zionism is not about a two state solution, the grand scheme as written by the zionists says otherwise.
The full translation of Al-Gahd article
I am not sure if this is translated or not but ……
*the drumb noise one makes after a funny comment*
WOW. The number of comments on this post are going soon to beat the “Turkish toilet” comments. I think that’s where this bomber belongs.
Hubby, you are correct, it was a contradiction, but not deliberate i assure u. i am merely showing you a theory that could be just as easily applicable. what does america have to gain from funding such acts? well what does the resistance? why isolate yourself from your brethern? there is a general desire to put Islam in that negative light, the false beheadings were one example (and the real ones for that matter). but they proved that we cannot put our trust in anything that is being said. More importantly its a matter of what you want to believe. Many want to believe that such and such person is responsible for all these acts and that such and such a religion is also to blame. We form that concept and whenever we hear a piece of news like this we automatically file it in that category. Has this war in the new found media offered enough examples on why we should be weary on who is writing history? should we not question “the truth” that is evidently “out there”? soviet text books in the 60’s taught that Russia had won the first world war. Should we believe that every incident which occurs is traced back to the resistance? How many letters has the resistance sent out to say “hey, we didnt do this, we dont even know these guys”. Why is it we have a tendency to believe a reporter in new york or baghdad for that matter and not a fighter on the ground.
what i am saying, as u summarized, is that these martyr operations are necessary and legit. in most cases i read about there is nothing wrong with them, the rising death toll of americans is proof of that. in other cases they are wrong, the funeral is one example. i am honest enough to say this is right and this is wrong.
BUT (there is always one) when i look at the wrong ones i question them. if they took place in palestine thats a different story, but when i put them in the iraqi context i think to myself why? why would they do this? what was their objective? its just not logical to kill americans and then turn around and turn the gun on iraqis.
from this questioning of the wrong category i draw two conclusions of which either could be credible: either there is another hand at work, or this really is the resistance fighting and a couple have gone astray. i dont have the details so all i have is a reliance on the lack thereof. all i have are questions.
but then i realise….the majority of these operations attack americans but are hardly ever reported unless, as you said, use the tools to search for the truth. the majority of jordanians are pretty good people, but a couple every now and then will commit a crime, though its no reason to generalise.
it is this last conclusion which i am concerned with
Nas – now you are making no sense. First you say that “there is no such thing as an innocent Israeli”, then you say that you are concerned with the “flaw of targetting civilians instead of soldiers”. Well, is it OK to kill civilians or not?
On a minor point, you are speaking in absolutes. Not every Israeli is trained and armed, kids aren’t, and some will never be. I presume you are excluding Muslim, non-Bedouin Israelis (as really only Jewish, Druze, and Bedouin Israelis serve). Still many don’t for physical reasons or the ones that are ultra-religious don’t.
Conversely, should I as an Israeli (one who has never served in the military incidently) then say that there are no innocent Palestinians, because their national movement desire the destruction of our State and their kids can grow up to kill us?
Linda, about iraq, read my last post to hubby.
as for palestine, there is no such thing as an innocent Israeli. to clarify…after a famous islamic battle, i believe it was badr, the prophet pbuh chastised the muslims who had killed an anarmed women from the opposing army who was at the time merely supporting them. a similar event took place during the crusades in which a muslim man told Salah il deen that it was just because of the atrocities those people had committed. To which he replied “they commit atrocities in their name and we follow our religion”
there are rule of engagement in Islam and if we want to compare, they are the strictest rules ever created. but most of them are made for defence in the sense there would be no need for it unless your home comes under attack from a foreign force. when that foreign force occupies u and puts u in the backyard then all bets are off Linda. anyone in the house is there to occupy or to support it.
every israeli is trained and armed. more importantly they are all there to occupy or support it. on principle it may seem “humane” to say this 10 year old boy plays no role, but in 6 years he will be given a rifle and told to go out and kill. hence, all bets are off. i support the palestinian resistance. they do have flaws which i am concerened with, specifically the flaw of targetting civilians instead of soldiers, in the sense that the latter is more urgent, and not working with the PA. but these issues are not so great to disown it
BTW I’d say you’re pretty safe not trusting CNN, Nas. If that’s the basis of your argument I’d say put your finger on the channel changer.
I do know what you mean. But this whole idea that you can’t really divine the real truth of a situation followed by a listing of various stories on the Internet strikes me as a red herring. You can decide for yourself the veracity of a story; the tools are available. You just have to decide to do it.
You trot out various stories and theorems, such as the “Americans might have paid him to do it” idea but then contradict yourself by suggesting that logic helps divine the truth. I would suggest that, applying your rule, logic would say it would make no sense to foster civil war. What good would come to the US if Iraq turned onto itself and ate its own? If for no other reason, there’s a lot of money involved here. The US needs success in Iraq for even the most base financial reasons.
I would also say that you can’t have it both ways here. You’ve said previously that “in theory” you support suicide attacks and you gave various reasons for why they were necessary and how they were just and we couldn’t judge those that committed them. When given specifics such as that in al-Ghad or in the quote here you seem to imply that these could be false stories, that the press is manipulated. Trust no one you say. You’ll not move too far, too quickly that way. You’re going to have to risk something and take a position, not just theorize over a latte. The truth is out there.
Ooooh – “reports on the internet”