by Aaron Klein
Thankfully I was inside a store at the time of the attack, shopping for presents to bring home, but I heard the gunshots, which began about one hundred feet from where I was situated. I emerged when it was all over to bear witness to the deadly mess. Blood was spewed on the streets. The injured were screaming. The body of a dead woman was surrounded by onlookers.
And then I got back to my hotel room and turned on CNN. The gunman was labeled an "activist" from Islamic Jihad, and a story was broadcast against the backdrop of the Israeli army's killing of a Hamas "activist" two days earlier, as if there were some sort of moral equivalence between the two events.
A CNN correspondent was reminding her viewers of the "Israeli occupation, which creates despair in the territories that many say leads to such suicide attacks."
Never mind that there is no historic precedent for any Western nation to resort to terrorism in response to "foreign occupation," humiliation, or poor living conditions.
Even the French, who during Nazi occupation were living under far worse conditions than any current inhabitant of the West Bank or Gaza, never once resorted to terrorism. And the wives and children of German soldiers were exposed and could have been easily targeted.
I asked Abu Ahmed about CNN's claims that suicide bombers are motivated by despair. He balked, actually calling it "Israeli propaganda."
He explained Islam forbids suicide and that a "martyr" cannot act based on feelings of desperation. A suicide bomber, Ahmed said, is motivated by the "will to sacrifice myself for Allah."
Ahmed's recruiter, Ayman, chimed in, agreeing with Ahmed's assertion. Ayman said his Islamic jihad terror group only accepts Palestinians who want to become martyrs for the sake of serving Allah.
"Part of my role is to decide who is really suitable and who is not. And this process demands basically to see who really wants to carry out the operation because he wants to reach Allah as a shahid [martyr] and who wants just to die, to kill himself, or in other words to commit suicide.
"In Islam suicide is forbidden; therefore, we never recruit somebody who just wants to kill himself because of the feeling of vengeance towards the Israelis or because he has psychological problems and the operation is a way for him to escape these problems. And we don't recruit people who don't know what they are doing," said Ayman.
And Ayman knows a thing or two about suicide bombings. At twenty-eight years old, Abu Ayman cut an impressive, muscular figure. He was about six feet with dark features and a military-style crew cut.
According to Israeli and Palestinian security officials and Islamic Jihad sources, Ayman was a central player in six suicide bombings carried out inside Israel since March 2005. Thirty-eight Israelis and two Americans were killed in the attacks. The terror leader had a more minor role in several of fourteen other suicide bombings perpetuated between December 2001 and 2005, killing ninety Israelis. Israeli officials say Ayman is one of the most important links between Islamic Jihad in the West Bank and the terror group's leadership in Syria. He was appointed overall commander of Islamic Jihad for the Jenin region in February 2007, after the former commander was arrested by Israel.
Ayman did not deny to me his involvement in planning the suicide bombings.
But he did lie when he claimed his terror group doesn't send Palestinians with psychological problems. Islamic Jihad has the past few years sent bombers with disabilities. Israel says it twice caught mentally retarded Palestinian teenagers attempting to infiltrate with suicide bomb belts.
But Ayman claimed these kinds of candidates "are never sent to the operation. Only those whom we feel are one hundred percent convicted and one hundred percent understand what it means to be a martyr and want to do so for religious motives, only those are sent to the operation."
Ahmed added, "The goal of becoming a shahid is that it is the way to reach Allah. The goal is satisfying Allah and his instructions. No money interests, nothing. No brainwash, no pressure." Strangely Ahmed claimed his goal is not even the killing of Jews.
"Did I hear you say your goal is not to kill Jews? Isn't that exactly what you will do as a suicide bomber?" I asked Ahmed.
"Maybe the fact that I was born in Palestine has sharpened my religious conscience, but I believe that even if I was in Chechnya, in Iraq, Afghanistan, or anywhere else I would want to be a martyr.
"It is Allah's satisfaction that is important to me no matter where I live. But as we live in this part of the world the way to reach Allah for me is through fighting the Zionist enemy. It is the jihad, the sacrificing that is important."
Now that we were on the subject of killing Jews, I became a bit nervous.
Okay, I was downright frightened. Here I was, an out and proud few in the middle of suicide bomb city talking with a potential bomber and a senior leader of a terror group sworn to the Jewish state's destruction.
I knew exactly what I was doing before I requested the interview, but there are always those moments when things suddenly become so much more real and you ask yourself, what did I get myself into and how I going to get out alive? But I tried my best to conceal my discomfort.
"These cliches about suicide bombings not being about killing Jews are impressive but I know you are aware that you are speaking to a Jew. Perhaps you are telling me what I want to hear. Tell me the truth. You want to kill Jews, don't you?" I asked. My heart started racing.
Ahmed replied, "We were never taught to hate Jews but to hate the occupation of the Zionists to our Islamic land that the Zionist entity with the conspiracy of the world has stolen and occupied. Jews can have their state but not on our lands and until this goal is achieved every Muslim must fight this entity.
"The Jews stole this holy Islamic land and we must fight them, but I am looking to receive what waits for me in the next world."
Of course, Ahmed was lying to me. He was absolutely taught to hate Jews. The Palestinian news media daily spew the most vicious, anti-Semitic propaganda imaginable. The official Palestinian school system teaches students Jews are descended from pigs and monkeys; that we are subhuman devils who drink the blood of Muslims and Christians and must be killed wherever we are found. But let's put that aside for now. It was time for the golden question.
"You talk about fighting them, the Jews. I'm an American Jew. Do you want to kill me?" I asked, biting back my words the moment I mustered them.
Ahmed started laughing. "You are here and nobody hurts you and nobody thinks to do so. But if, unfortunately for you, if you will be in a place where my [suicide] operation will take place, I will not feel sorrow," he said.
Then Ahmed turned serious. "You American Jews are fully partners with the Zionists and even more dangerous than the Israelis because of the international support you give to the Israelis in their massacres against our people and the maintenance of the occupation."
At this point I started nervously browsing the room to ensure Ayman wasn't reaching for a suicide belt to strap on to Ahmed to blow me up.
"So if after today's meeting you saw me in a cafe in Jerusalem that you were sent to attack, you'd still try to blow it up?" I asked.
"At the moment there will not be a place for feelings and hesitations. If I go in an operation it means that I decided to leave behind my loved ones-my mother, my father, brothers and sisters, all my family and my friends. And if I am capable of this I would not give you a break just because we met for one time. I will not hesitate to blow you up," said Ahmed
"Meanwhile and before I drive you to hell in an operation, enjoy your tea and our hospitality," he said.
It was then that it dawned on me that I was probably the first Jew that Ahmed had ever met. After the upbringing he had, I was surprised he didn't inquire as to what happened to my horns, or whether I had the features of a pig under my clothes.
The Quran actually states several times Allah turned Jews into pigs and monkeys.
Among several examples:
So when they [the Jews] exceeded the limits of what they were prohibited, We said
to them: 'Be you monkeys, despised and rejected.' (Sura 7:166)
Those [Jews] who incurred the Curse of Allah and his Wrath, and those of whom he transformed into monkeys and swines. (Sura 5:60)
I asked Ahmed whether he believes Jews are descended from pigs and monkeys.
He replied, "I know where this question comes from. You think that we all are naive or bad from birth or that we were ex posed to brainwashing. We just follow what we are demanded in the Quran to do because if we do not do so we will be attacked, occupied, controlled, and killed by these enemies of Islam."
"You didn't answer my question," I persisted. "Do you believe I come from pigs and monkeys?"
"The Quran tells us that Allah was upset with the Jews because of their negative behavior towards Moses and Allah's commandments and Allah shouted to the Jews, 'Be pigs and monkeys.' I don't know if physically Allah turned them to pigs and monkeys, or it was a way to tell them that they are as terrible as pigs and monkeys. The most important thing is that this is what Allah, may he be blessed, thinks that the Jews deserve to be."
Ahmed called Jews the nation "known for killing Allah's prophets and the nation that in our days wants to control the world or at least this part of the world, from the Nile to the Euphrates.
"Meanwhile they [Jews] are controlling the U.S., its media, its financial system, and its administration," he said.
"Did We Find the Seventy-two Virgins Yet?"
One of my great fascinations with suicide bombers is their fervent belief that when they explode themselves they are greeted in heaven by seventy-two dark-eyed virgins. The concept of the virgins as reward is driven home regularly by Palestinian imams, the news media, and the school system. Even Palestinian pop culture: a music video airing in September 2006 on official PA television, for example, encourages viewers to "martyr" themselves in exchange for eternal paradise and seventy-two beautiful "maidens." The video depicts a man who dies in jihad and is immediately escorted to "heaven" where he is greeted with several white-robed women with flowing hair.
In a November 10, 2006, Palestinian television broadcast, Sheik Imad Homato, a prominent West Bank religious cleric, instructs Palestinians to strive for a violent death in which the martyred corpse has "no head, no legs, his body completely burned... intestines outside, fingers ... gone."
Homato explains to his viewers that Allah blesses the "first blood" of the suicide bomber, who "sees his place in paradise, is shielded from the great shock, and marries seventy-two darkeyed maidens."
I only wish I could be there to greet every Palestinian suicide bomber in the afterlife so I could see the look on his face when the little suicide bombing pawn first realizes he's been lied to; when he suddenly understands he will spend the rest of eternity in a fiery furnace watching endless Golden Girls reruns with the sound of a Mariah Carey CD buzzing in the background.
One of the greatest differences between Judaism and Islam is in the religions' priorities. Jews are taught to serve the Creator in this world to achieve heaven in the next, but also that all Jews merit a place in heaven. The main emphasis in Judaism is life, not death. Ninety-nine percent of the Torah deals with life and how to live it. The Torah only vaguely refers to heaven, with little description of what it is. All Jewish sages agree heaven is for the soul and encompasses spiritual, not physical bliss.
Islam focuses on the "world to come," and how to achieve paradise. The emphasis is on the afterlife. Paradise is mostly described as a physical world replete with the most baseline physical pleasures, including free sex and wine.
It's interesting because the Quran doesn't specifically state that good Muslims get seventy-two dark-eyed virgins each. The only reference to the seventy-two maidens are in a Quranic verse quoting Muhammad as being overheard saying, "The smallest reward for the people of paradise is an abode where there are eighty-thousand servants and seventy-two wives. Verily, for the muttaqun [righteous], there will be a [paradise]; gardens and grapeyards; and young full-breasted [mature] maidens of equal age; and a full cup [of wine]."
So Muhammad describes the whole of heaven for regular Muslims as consisting of seventy-two wives (not to mention alcohol, which is forbidden to Muslims in this world) but doesn't specify whether each individual Muslim gets his own abode or if there is just one abode with seventy-two wives. Nothing in the Quran specifically states that the faithful are allotted seventy-two virgins apiece.
And the only reference to maidens in the Quran, when referring to the righteous, doesn't state anything about seventy-two. Just simply that paradise for the righteous has "gardens and grapeyards; and young full-breasted [mature] maidens of equal age; and a full cup [of wine]."
I always have fun with this when meeting my terror "friends." I ask them to show me where in the Quran it specifically states suicide bombers get seventy-two virgins. They usually struggle with the challenge for a few minutes and then change the subject.
Once, when interviewing the senior gun-toting leadership of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terror organization in the northern West Bank city of Nablus, the biblical Shechem, some pretty scary terrorists got a little testy over the subject.
Rusty Humphries, who is a nationally syndicated radio host with a nightly audience of millions of listeners, came along with me to Nablus and conducted much of the interview. Nablus is known as the stronghold of the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and is entirely controlled by Brigades-affiliated militias.
The Brigades, together with Islamic Jihad, took credit for all suicide bombings in Israel from 2005 to 2007 and regularly carries out shootings and rocket attacks against Jews population centers.
Humphries, recording the interview for his show, pressed Ala Senakreh, the West Bank chief of the Brigades, on the issue of the seventy-two virgins. Senakreh, by the way, was wielding a massive machine gun he claimed to have used less than twentyfour hours earlier to shoot at Israeli soldiers. Senakreh is well known for his regular appearances on Palestinian television where he spews deadly threats against Israel.
Another important detail here is that in the room with us were nine other well-armed terrorists who basically comprise the top of Israel's most wanted list of Fatah terror leaders.
Humphries had several of the terrorists, including a man called Nasser Abu Aziz, flip through the Quran for about five minutes looking for the seventy-two virgins. Abu Aziz, the Bri gades' deputy commander in the West Bank, had his hand in at least five suicide bombings in Israel and personally shot dozens of times at Jews living in the West Bank. At over six feet tall, wearing military boots, camouflage pants, and a thick black vest, and wielding a nice-sized pistol, Abu Aziz is by far the scariest looking terrorist I ever laid eyes on.
"Look up the seventy-two virgins in the Quran for me, because the Muslims in America say it is not true," prodded Humphries during the interview.
"Of course it is true! It is mentioned in the Quran. In your religion you have the book," retorted Ala Senakreh, the Martyrs' chieftain.
"I just want you to tell me chapter and verse where it is. And also many moderate Muslims, they call them moderate in America, believe that Islam is a religion of peace and that there should be no violence," said Humphries.
"There is not violence. This is jihad for God," Senakreh stated.
"Let's find the seventy-two virgins," Humphries persisted.
Senakreh and several others were flipping through the Quran but were not coming up with much. We engaged in general banter about Islam and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, but Humphries kept insisting the terrorists find the Quranic verse promising seventy-two virgins to suicide bombers.
The frustrated Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorists tried in vain to change the subject several times but Humphries kept at it.
"Hey! Has anybody found the chapter and verse of the seventy-two virgins yet?" asked Humphries. The terrorists were becoming visibly agitated.
I tried to signal to Humphries to stop asking about the virgins. I shook my head at him and tried to steer the convers
ation in other directions. I generally don't think it's a good idea to piss off a bunch of terrorist killers while you are on their territory and they have enough ammunition to blow us all to Allah's Paradise. But clearly Humphries thought otherwise.
"Do we have the virgins?" Humphries asked.
There was Arabic mumbling amongst the terrorists, but still no answer. Nasser Abu Aziz shot angry glances at me.
I truly believed we weren't going to survive the interview. I pictured Humphries and me making Arab propaganda pronouncements on an al-Qaida-style video before our heads were chopped off by masked Ala Senakreh and Abu Aziz.
I actually started making deals with G-d about the improvements I'd make in my life if only He got us out of Nablus alive.
And Humphries asked again.
"You guys find the virgins?"
Finally, Abu Aziz stated, "The Quran says, 'Fight those who fight against you, and never be the one who aggresses."'
"What verse is that?" asked Humphries.
"Verse 1-8-9," replied a proud Abu Aziz.
But Humphries blew the whistle.
"Okay, but still no virgins. Still looking for the seventy-two virgin thing, huh?" Humphries said.
After about five minutes of agitated conversation, Abu Aziz announced he found the Quranic verse promising seventy-two virgins.
"OK, we have seventy-two virgins in the Quran, let's pull it out. OK, we found the seventy-two virgins thing," said Humphries.
"This is Al Amran verse 1-6-8, which says that those who get killed in favor of God are not considered dead people [but are] alive people between God's hands."
"Where are the seventy-two virgins?" Humphries asked as my face turned white and my stomach nearly jumped out of my throat.
Disappointed, Ala Senakreh conceded to us, "The virgins are mentioned in the Quran but the experts [who] interpret it considered seventy-two virgins. Virgins are mentioned in the Quran but not the number of seventy-two."
