Salon.com article on Hamas women

Here is my second piece for Salon.com, up on their site today. Once again, if you’re not a subscriber you’ll have to sit through a small ad before you can read it.
Shoot, I forgot to remind them to put something about JWN into the tagline.
My body meanwhile is a little in crazysville. I flew back to Boston Saturday, a seven-hour time difference from Jerusalem. Sunday I did a quick revision of the Salon piece (which I wrote the first draft of, Thursday and Friday). Sunday I also gave a talk for the Cape Ann Forum between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. It was on the theme of “The Perfect Storm” of challenges to the US in the Middle East. I chose the theme long ago– and only when I got there to Gloucester, Massachusetts did I realize that the movie of that name was both set and shot there!
I managed to stay awake, on my feet, and relatively coherent till 9 p.m.
Yesterday I flew back to Virginia and started writing a CSM column to deadline. But my brain stopped working around 7 p.m. so I got up this morning at 5 a.m. to finish it. Since then I’ve taken my first run for three weeks, done laundry, been lying around.
But it’s nice to see the piece up on Salon.

8 thoughts on “Salon.com article on Hamas women”

  1. I want to know if those people her three sons killed in their attack were soldiers on active duty or not. I also want to know, please, if this interview:
    http://www.memritv.org/Transcript.asp?P1=980
    is real. In this interview Mariam Farhat seems insistent on destroying Israel ( “Peace means the liberation of all of Palestine, from the (Jordan) to the (Mediterranean) Sea.” ) and she makes no distinction between civilians and soldiers ( “In addition, these people… You know this land belongs to someone else, so how can you come and live on it? Therefore, all Israelis are considered occupiers of our land. There is no difference between men and women… “). Mariam Farhat here seems completely antithetical to the progressive image of a Hamas to negociate with that you, Helena, have been arguing for. And frankly I find her exceptionally depraved. But Memritv has an agenda and so I don’t know if they can be trusted at all. Helena I was really hoping your article would clarify these disputes about Farhat. But I don’t feel it did, and I was disappointed.

  3. Since this was from a TV interview it can’t be double-checked unless they have a tape and re-broadcast. I have seen this interview publicized elsewhere and I haven’t heard of Umm Nidal (Mariam Farhat) saying she was misquoted.
    I think when the Palestinians and Islamic radicals say they love death as we love life — that they really mean it and that there is some truth to it.
    And I don’t think Mariam Farhat was elected to the Palestinian legislature because of the superior social services Hamas provides. I think she represents the ideals of the Palestinian people, or at least a lot of them. Hamas put her on the election posters because of her popularity. And this means that peace is still a long way away.
    It’s beginning to look as if the Arab-Israeli crisis will not end in a compromise deal, but with something more apocalyptic.

  4. Inkan, none of Muhammad Farhats five (not ten) victims were soldiers. They were all teenagers still in high school. (their bios here: http://www.education.gov.il/children/page_39_b.htm )
    The other sons weren’t involved in suicide attacks at all but were killed while manufacturing and transporting qassam missiles.
    Maryam Farhat and her sons are clearly guilty of “the deliberate infliction of harm upon civilians in acts of violence, with political motives,” Helena’s own definition of terrorism. I don’t see why she’s whitewashed Farhat’s own war crime (incitement to genocide) or those of her children.

  5. [I want to know if those people her three sons killed in their attack were soldiers on active duty or not. I also want to know, please, if this interview: http://www.memritv.org/Transcript.asp?P1=980 is real.]
    I don’t think anybody can help you with this. Although AJ is pretty good, I still trust their info on Israel only after I find confirmation on the Israeli sites.
    Same with MEMRI. Why should anybody care what they say about Hamas without confirmation from the Arab side? So, if you want to know whther all this is true, just check the Arab sites.

  6. Vadim, Warren, like I said I want to hear what Helena herself has to say about Farhat. Particularly to confirm or debunk the assertion that the people killed by Farhat’s son were not soldiers on active duty.

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