"I have to tell the world that if they do not defend us, then we have to defend ourselves with the only thing we have,
our bodies. Our bodies are the only fighting means at our disposal."
-Hiba, 28-year old, mother of five,
-Suicide Bomber Trainee
Women and Terrorism:
Jihad Jane Is Nothing New
She's in her early 40's, a convert to Islam, and under indictment for planning participation in a terrorist attack in Sweden. Her intended victim was Lars Vilks, the cartoonist who, in 2007, created a cartoon disparaging Mohammad
But “Jihad Jane” is not a new phenomenon. Women terrorists have appeared with greater frequency after 9-11 and with the utilization of “profiling” which normally focuses on young men of Middle Eastern decent between the ages of 19-29, we are seeing groups like Al Queda calling for the active recruitment and training of female jihadis.
In 2004 the Strategic Studies Institute published their findings about the issue of suicide bombing. Included in the paper was a discussion about the use of women as suicide bombers:
“Terrorist organizations use women as weapons because they provide:
• Tactical advantage: stealthier attack, element of surprise, hesitancy to search women, female
stereotype (e.g., nonviolent).
• Increased number of combatants.
• Increased publicity (greater publicity = larger number of recruits).
• Psychological effect.”
One of the commanders in charge of recruiting and training suicide bombers summarized:
“The body has become our most potent weapon. When we searched for new ways to resist the security complications facing us, we discovered that our women could be an advantage.”
In 2006, The Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution researched the issue of female terrorists from both a historical phenomenon as well as a current issue. They concluded that over 70% of terrorist acts over the past 75 years were performed by men, with slightly less than 20% being done by women. But they also noted that this has changed in recent years. That 20% figure is now closer to 40% (as of 2008).
In fact, the female terrorist- particularly in the form of a suicide bomber- has increased from eight instances in the 1980's total, to more than 100 since 2000. This doesn't include the statistical data coming from Israel, where there has been nearly a 70% increase in the number of female suicide bombings over the past twenty years.
Theories as to why this is happening abound. Some say it's the hopelessness that many Muslim women feel which compels them to these heinous acts. Others say there could be a mental illness peculiar to Muslim women which makes them more susceptible to being recruited.
But whatever the reason, U.S. authorities are more concerned than ever about this growing phenomenon.
And for some of us this has come very close to home. It wasn't too long ago that a female suicide bomber held an area near my house hostage as she threatened to blow herself, her male companion, and their vehicle, sky high. As it turned out, they had four explosive devices on them which had to be detonated.
A Historical Precedence.
Muslims will decry this activity saying it's “un-Islamic” for a woman to participate in jihad. Those using this argument are ill-informed about Islamic teaching.
There are three instances wherein a woman may actively participate in literal (not spiritual) Jihad:
1- If the enemy invades the lands of Muslims; in this case, it becomes obligatory on every one, male and female, to go out for Jihad and fight for the Cause of Allah.
2- If the Muslim leaders call upon the whole Muslim Ummah to perform Jihad; then it also becomes obligatory.
3- If the Muslim leader appoints certain women to do certain tasks such as monitoring the enemy, lying mines; in this case it becomes obligatory on women to carry out the duty entrusted to them.
A report by the Jamestown Foundation points out that female participation in battle isn't new. And some reports seem to indicate that it was a Christian Lebanese woman, Loula Abboud, who is attributed with the “model” of suicide bombing. In the 1980's Ms. Abboud led a resistance against the Israeli's in South Lebanon. The story goes that she had run out of bullets, was surrounded by Israeli's, and continued firing to help her friends escape. Once she ran out of bullets, rather than be captured by the Israeli's or killed, she blew herself up. Apparently she planned this event in advance.
Again, however, it should be stressed that Ms. Abboud was in the middle of a battle, fighting directly with an armed enemy. She wasn't going into a market and blowing herself up, taking innocent civilians with her.
Others attribute the first female suicide bombing to Khyadali Sana a 16-year-old girl who drove a truck loaded with explosives into an IDF convoy in 1985 resulting in two deaths, including her own.
But centuries before Ms. Abboud, there were the Ismalis Nizari or The Assassins, a group of Muslim fighters who used suicide attacks as a strategy to advance Islam. The Ismalis Nizari considered their own lives to be a sacrificial offering, however, they took aim at particular people and individuals, as opposed to the present practice of taking out groups of persons unknown to the suicide bomber.
A Matter of Semantics?
Inevitably there comes the argument that Islam doesn't allow suicide. This is true. Islam teaches quite clearly against regular suicide:
"O ye who believe!... [do not] kill yourselves, for truly Allah has been to you Most Merciful. If any do that in rancor and injustice, soon shall We cast him into the Fire..." (Qur'an 4:29-30).
It is highly unlikely that the average Muslim, including the ones who commit what we call “suicide bombings” have even remotely considered suicide. I realize the western media has dubbed these attacks as “suicide bombings” but they really cannot rightly be called such.
Suicide implies a despondency which is yet unproven in most cases where these bombings and other self-death attacks have occurred. Studies on “suicide” jihadis, looking into their lives, etc., haven't clearly demonstrated where any were despondency prior to these events. Of course, someone could say “well you have to be mentally imbalanced to do something like this!”
But suicide is defined as the “act of causing one owns death.” The clinician will expound by explaining that “positive” suicide is when one is successful in enacting their death; whereas “negative” suicide is when one escapes, say, by calling 911 and getting help after taking an overdose of pills.
Whether positive or negative, suicide is usually a loners action. It's not intended to be a communal affair, though there have been instances where entire groups- or near entire groups- have committed “mass suicide.” In general, however, they're not intending to take out others with them as does the classic “suicide bomber.”
Could it be that what we consider “suicide” isn't suicide in the minds of those doing it? Given that what we do know about those who commit these acts, they tend to be more religiously devout than those who are more “moderate” in their approach to Islam as a way of life, maybe it's simply a matter of semantics. At least, that's the general thinking.
And, when we see non-jihadis supporting this behavior, including the national exhortation of these “suicide bombers” as heroes in Islamic quarters, then we have to ask if maybe we in the West haven't misnamed these acts as “suicide bombings” when what we mean is “homicide bombings.”
It must be remembered that in many Islamic quarters these bombers (and those who commit “suicide” in other ways, while taking out others) are seen as “martyrs.” A Salafi Manhaj article seems to make this distinction as well. Noting that martyrdom in the “way of Allah” is one of the most noble acts (and in the Quran, guarantees one their portion in heaven), the author stipulates:
"Perhaps the first most important thing to direct the reader’s attention to is the difference between an act of war which involves a suicide (such as a suicide bombing) and an act of war which is apparently suicidal (such is a lone warrior charging the ranks of the enemy in the near-certain knowledge that he will be killed in the process). No scholar disputes the praiseworthiness of the second type of act. It is only the first type of act, the predetermined, intentional taking of ones own life in a clear act of suicide, which remains a subject of contention."
The writer then goes on to mention that suicide “bombings” are under debate between Islamic scholars, with some calling the act “haram” or illegal to perform. The reason being, as the writer points out, that the victims of suicide bombings, etc., tend to be soft-target civilians as opposed to battle-field ops. “Islam forbids the killing of innocents.”
With the portal of possibility open, the semantics begin. Just who is an innocent person? Who is a martyr? Is it suicide or homicide or battle-related casualty?
Just one year after the 7/7 attacks in London, a poll showed that some 13% of UK Muslims believed that suicide bombers were “martyrs.” This should alarm the authorities in the UK. But it should also alarm the rest of the world as well.
While the 2007 Pew Research poll showed that the majority of American Muslims eschewed such violence, a strikingly large number (particularly among the younger population) believed that violence was sometimes a necessity. The data showed that, among young Muslims some 26% felt that “suicide bombings” were justified on various levels. That may not sound like much- it's on 26% of the 1,050 young adult Muslims interviewed. But we're talking about 273 people who think there's some justification for this activity. Out of those, 1/10 could be a female.
POSING A DILEMMA
The Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights 2005 report on Female Suicide Terrorism cited one of the counter-terrorism issues this increase in female participation creates:
“Concern is raised that in conducting investigation into these attacks fundamental
human rights may be at risk. As women increasingly are seen as actors, law enforcement
officers will have to focus their attention more on women. When police
conduct searches, house or body-searches certain concerns have to be kept in mind
and respected.”
The above “western” solution to dealing with female jihadis affords them a respect that may ultimately prove a hazard. One would think that innocent Muslims would have no problem with such simple things as body scanners in airports. However, even the “moderate” Muslims are already complaining on a worldwide basis and refusing to allow the technology to be used on them for “religious reasons.” And, with the help of “civil liberties” groups, we could easily expect to see more, and possibly more violent, attacks in airports or on airplanes.*
Another dilemma posed by women jihadis is that they can- and often do- don attire which allows them to interject themselves into the target area almost virtually unsuspected. For those unfamiliar with traditional Islamic attire for women, a brief rundown and description:
Hijab. Probably the most known of the traditional styles worn by Muslim women, it consists of a large swath of cloth, sometimes patterned and gilded, sometimes not, which covers the entire head, neck and shoulder region. Sometimes an under scarf is also worn to keep hair in place.
Jilbab and Abaya. These are both loose-fitting outer garments which covers everything except the head and hands.
Niqab is a face-veil which covers everything except the eyes.
Burka is another head piece which covers the entire face with a screen allowing the woman to see but not allowing her to be seen.
Khimar is a billowy head piece which ties under the skin and flows like a cape around the upper torso. **
Is it likely that these styles could cover a bomb? Certainly.
A 2008 report from the Department of Homeland Security mentioned the use of camouflage by Muslim women, including the use of pregnancy prosthetics, which would go completely undetected underneath the loose fitting clothing worn traditionally by Muslim women.
In 2005, twenty-year-old Wafa Samir Ibraim Bas was stopped at the Erez crossing in Gaza carrying over 22 pounds of explosives. Scanners did pick up this amount of explosives, however, they were not being carried in a bag. Bas carried them inside her abaya.
Israel also reported, in 2005, that since 2004, more than fifty instances of female “suicide” bombings have occurred in that country alone. Do we really think that Israel is alone in this situation? It would seem that the rest of the world is seeing what Israel has had to deal with for over thirty years.
FEMALE TERRORIST PSYCHOLOGY.
Is there something to be observed about women who commit terrorist acts that makes them in some way different from their male counterparts? The presupposition seems to be that because of their low status in Islamic teaching and culture, these women feel compelled to commit these acts as a way of elevating themselves to the same level as their male counterparts. There are other “theories” as well, but this seems to be the predominant one and it hinges on the idea that these women are suicidally depressed.
But a 2008 article in Foreign Policy in Focus took exception to the theories proposed in media and within the rank and file of a far removed pop-psychology approach. Instead, the article sets aside the “gender-based” explanation for something more practical.
To begin with, they explore the fact that there hasn't been any real geographic done on this population. The women are not all poor, uneducated, nor even necessarily deprived of their freedom. Some were raised Muslim; others were not. There's no specific psychological strand that runs throughout the women. The motivations are as varied as the women who have them.
Secondly, what research there is out there, doesn't explain why there has been an increase in the number of women who have become suicide bombers. This poses a problem for a west which is trying to balance the need for screening and safety with an equally strong desire to maintain cultural and religious freedom for all people, regardless of race, religion or gender.
One thing that is known, is that the training these women receive- if they receive any- usually lasts no more than four or five days. Too much time through training means time the person could have to rethink their destination. Wearing the mantle of “martyr” may not seem quite so grand if one has time to really think about it.
A Possible Solution?
So what's the solution? Airplanes aren't the only place where women have been involved in terrorist acts. In fact, airplanes see the least likely target- perhaps because they are in the forefront of screening.
And lately, we've been seeing a great deal of complaining from the Muslim community over the topic of the “right” of a Muslim woman to wear her particular style of clothing. Some have argued, therefore, that these items should be banned. But would that necessarily stop an ideology?
Some have proposed that feminism could solve the problem. Those who make this suggestion haven't grappled with the issue of semantics. When you or I think of feminism, we think of women who don't have to wear a hijab, but want to wear it and have the right to wear or not to wear.
But the term Muslim Feminist could also imply the “right” to participate in jihad just as the men do. In his paper on Palestinian female bombers, Yoram Schweitzer noted that Wafa Idris, a female bomber who killed two and wounded more than fifty others in Jaffa, was...
“...crowned a hero throughout the entire Arab world and was portrayed as a symbol of the new Muslim feminism.”
In the West Bank and Gaza, parades declare the women who have participated in terrorist activity, whether as suicide bombers or otherwise, are celebrated as heroines. Families talk with praise about their daughters.
Logic would seem to dictate that if we simply make Muslim women realize their worth apart from Islamic teaching, that somehow we can change their minds. But that would be a misplaced logic, in my opinion.
In the past two months alone, there have been three arrests of Muslim women who were involved with terrorist attack attempts. Last month it was Kimberly S. Al-Homsi, a convert to Islam with a track record of erratic behavior and specifically terrorist behavior and threats; and then this month, Colleen R. LaRose, aka, Jihad Jane, and one of her cohorts, Jamie Paulin-Ramirez, also a convert to Islam.
I suspect we will see more of these in the future, in particular as so-called human rights groups, like CAIR and the MSA, complain about Muslims being the “target” of profiling at places such as airports and other facilities.
I propose something harsher than what we in the West are used to, and that is: we treat the female terrorist no different from the male ones.
I also suggest we stop looking for a “reason.” Ultimately, no excuse is reasonable. And maybe it's time to start looking more closely at converts- particularly women converts- in the west just as we need to look more closely at those males who convert to Islam. Several men are sitting in prison today who converted to Islam and then became jihadists.
So we are going to have to make a decision. Do we keep on the same path, fearful that we'll cross over some unspecified Constitutional “rights” line; or do we get realistic and realize that our own sense of justice, equality and liberty may be being used against us?
SOURCES
http://dailycaller.com/2010/03/10/a-list-of-american-jihadis/
http://www.usnews.com/articles/news/iraq/2008/07/28/the-rising-number-of...
http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub408.pdf
http://www.allacademic.com//meta/p_mla_apa_research_citation/1/5/3/2/8/p...
http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/02/03/are-female-suicide-bombers-the-w...
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/02/15/al-qaeda-looking-recruit-engl...
http://www.nationalterroralert.com/updates/2010/02/15/al-qaeda-recruitin...
http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?pagename=IslamOnline-Englis...
http://www.osce.org/documents/odihr/2005/05/14827_en.pdf
http://www.npr.org/programs/wesat/transcripts/2003/jul/030705.davis.html
http://www.scribd.com/doc/3989813/Martyrdom-in-Islam-Versus-Suicide-Bomb...
http://sweetness-light.com/archive/13-of-british-muslims-call-77-bombers...
American airports offer a person the option to have a “pat down” and exterior scan using the wand. However, it would be easier for a woman to hide a weapon or item from a pat down or wand than from a body scanner. A grown woman could place a hypodermic with a micro-fine needle, in capped casing, between her butt cheeks or under a breast and it would not be picked up by the wand because of the fat layers it's hidden under and a pat down never includes the breast area nor interior of the posterior.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITQkN7I0mrY
Muslim spokesperson, Nihad Awad, proposed that the software be modified so that the images cannot be preserved. Sounds reasonable until you realize that the would-be bomber could get off because of a lack of physical evidence should the image not be kept.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1818185,00.html
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN2244293620070522
http://nefafoundation.org/miscellaneous/FeaturedDocs/JHSA_Femalesuicideb...
** I asked several women to brain storm with me about the types of items which could be hidden under the various types of coverings and clothing worn by Muslim women which might not be easily spotted. The Jilbab/Abaya and Khimar seemed the most likely to cover a bomb or larger explosive device or other firearms, like a hand gun. Knives could also be easily hidden under these types of outer wear as well.
http://www.fpif.org/articles/behind_the_surge_in_iraqi_women_suicide_bom...
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/05/23/60II/main555401.shtml
http://www.labat.co.il/articles/R_M.pdf
http://www.scribd.com/doc/28104790/Indictment-1
