death cult celebrity

Tue, Jun 25, 2002 at 8:35:55 am PDT

Mariam Farahat is a star in the Arab world, because her son murdered 5 high school students.

GAZA CITY -- Mariam Farahat interrupted the somber greetings offered by a visitor. "I don't want condolences, I want congratulations," she said. "I encouraged my son to sacrifice himself. It is a victory." ...

Although most parents of the dead are in the dark -- or at least feign ignorance -- about their offspring's activities, Farahat said she was in on Mohammed's plans from the beginning. She gave him moral support and has the videotape to prove it.

The video, recently beamed throughout the Middle East on Arabic-language television, has made Farahat a celebrity. She has taken on the name Um Nidal, Mother of Struggle. Arab reporters flock to her door (when she is not in hiding, for fear of Israeli reprisals). Her stand in the face of a son's death is a topic of conversation in Palestinian cities already infused with the glorification of death. ...

Farahat's son and other suicide attackers have inspired some others in the Arab world. In Egypt, young men have tried to cross into Israel from the Sinai Peninsula, or even swim along the Mediterranean seacoast to the Gaza Strip, to take up arms. Even those who do not carry out such operations sometimes express their admiration for those who do. In Lebanon, a fashion model graces the cover of a popular magazine with a pledge: "I will be a martyr." In Jordan, youthful demonstrators ape the garb of Palestinian suicide commandos, marching in hoods with fake bombs strapped around their waists.

I’ve started to write something about Bush’s Mideast speech three times already this morning, but just kept coming up against a block. When I saw this article I realized what was stopping me.

The speech marks a huge rhetorical break with past US policy, mostly because it puts the onus directly on the Palestinians to renounce terrorism as a means to achieve statehood, without a hint of moral equivalence. But as large a step as this is, it’s dwarfed by the reality of Arab hatred demonstrated in the WaPo article above.

And that’s why, although it does take a clear moral stand, I don’t believe the speech really changes anything in the bigger picture. The fanatical obsession with Israel (and concomitant hatred of the West) has reached pandemic proportions in the Arab Muslim world. Adoration of terrorists is not simply a Palestinian phenomenon; if the Saudi Arabian ambassador to London feels no inhibition about expressing his love for suicide bombing, this is a clear indication that the death cult mentality has permeated Arab culture to the highest levels. All the President’s words can’t put the evil genie back in the bottle, and sooner or later the United States is going to have to deal with this reality. Statements of principle are all well and good.

But Mariam Farahat is a star.