Thanks to Donald Douglas, I found this piece from NBC News:
Al-Qaida Leader’s Wife: Women Join Jihad
Terrorists could be facing personnel shortfall
By Robert Windrem
Updated 3:45 AM EST, Friday, December 18, 2009The wife of al-Qaida’s No. 2 official purportedly is urging Muslim women to help militants, even to the point of carrying out suicide missions.
A statement released Wednesday, said to be from the wife of Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden’s Egyptian deputy and second-in-command, encouraged Muslim women to join jihad as an “obligation.”
More at the link. Phyllis Chesler wrote:
Why is Al-Qaeda’s Zawahiri allowing one of his four (or more) wives to take such an active public role? And, why now?
Well, that’s simple enough: Mr al-Zawahiri clearly has a surplus of wives, and he can spare one or two for martyrdom missions, for the cause, you know. I do wonder, though: was Umaima Hassan volunteering for duty herself?
No, I didn’t think so.
Mr Windrem’s article continued to speculate that perhaps the encouragement of female suicide bombers was due to a lack of male volunteers:
(Evan) Kohlmann (NBC News counterterrorism analyst) said Hasan wrote specifically of “martydom” and “how many sisters carried out a martyrdom operation in Palestine, Iraq and Chechnya, and caused the enemy high costs and caused the enemy a big defeat. We ask from Allah to accept them and connect us with them with goodness.”
By asking women to participate in the fight, Kohlmann said, Hasan was asking that women go to combat zones. Kohlmann said it was possible that al-Qaida was facing a personnel shortfall in combat operations.
Perhaps Mr Kohlmann has some hard data to back up what seems like speculation to me, but if so, it wasn’t presented in the article. Who knows? Maybe it’s just women’s liberation and feminism coming to the Islamic world, though I’m guessing that our good friend Amanda Marcotte wouldn’t see it as a particularly good example.
There’s hard data that female suicide bombers are used by Hamas and other Palestinian hardliners, though the Muslims among them are somewhat less doctrinaire than their Af-Pak counterparts. So this is a surprise, and perhaps a sign that we have al-Qaeda freaked?
Well, if it’s women’s lib and feminism coming to the Islamic world, does that mean there are 72 studly, virile virgins waiting for them???
The younger Dana asked:
Not exactly.
I can see it now… some terrorist blows himself up, then…
“Raisins? Raisins? You gave me raisins?!?! Also, why’s it so freakin’ hot, and what’s with the sulfur smell?”
Women helping fundamentalist Muslims is like blue collar guys voting Republican. Just makes me shake my head.
Nan, did you ever stop to think that these women might just be fundamentalist Muslims themselves?
It’s exactly the thought that occurred to me! The women probably feel like part of the holy crowd. A crowd that will no more accept them into their brotherhood than a wealthy industrialist will welcome a truck driver into his. Oh, he’ll accept the truck driver’s vote, and he’ll accept the truck driver’s donation, but that truck driver is never, ever going to be a part of what the big boys consider the Republican Party. And those women will never, ever be more than property, in the eyes of the “real” fundamentalists.
Thanks for the clarification.