Author: J. Grant Swank, Jr.
Publication: MichNews.com
Date: August 28, 2003
URL: http://bigjweb.com/artman/publish/article_850.shtml
Her father stabbed her a dozen times
in the chest. Father waited to make sure daughter was soundly dead, then
he called police. Father was charged with misdemeanor. No prison time.
Judges clapped their hands for father because he upheld the honor of his
home.
Autopsy performed on murdered young
woman. Why? To check to see if she were virgin. If not, the Christian man
with whom she spoke must be murdered as well.
Where does this fiendish act take
place?
Jordan.
The land next to Israel. The country
whose deceased head of government years ago married an American woman.
This happened, not in the African bush country, but in modernized Jordan.
HONOR LOST is the real-life book
by Norma Kouri. The woman killed by her parent? Dahlia. Dahlia had the
misfortune of being reared in a Muslim home. Though she was smart, vibrant
and concerned about others, her father was of the killing faith. Others
of her gender are killed daily for the same "reason."
It is figured that 5,000 women are
slaughtered in so-called "honor killings" every year in the Middle East.
What have they done to deserve this? They have been raped. Or they have
been accused of adultery, though that is trumped up. Or they have talked
to a strange man, suspicioned to be Christian.
If father or brother or husband
gives testimony in court of any of these situations, that's enough. Off
with her head or knife blades in her torso.
In 2000, the United Nations had
before it a draft resolution condemning "honor killings." Muslim Jordan
and 19 other countries abstained from voting. Go figure.
And this is the segment of the world
where sane diplomats are dialoguing concerning humanitarian treatment guaranteed
other mortals. This is where a fresh democracy is trying to plant itself.
This is where the United States President George W. Bush seeks to establish
a roadmap of peace between Jews and Arabs.
Give me a break in all this high
ground venture.
Surely those living in a democracy
have become so enamored with the their freedoms that they envision the
entire planet enjoying same. But write it down in bold print that there
is a vast killing machine out there that works on self-absorption rather
than caring for human beings.
That is why every day in every way
the American liberty-blessed citizenry must stand alongside every effort
to overcome the killing machine - whether it is that macabre murder plot
of a father to knife his daughter or the militant alley thugs who seek
to snuff out every Jew and eventually topple North American democracies.
(email comments to josephswank@yahoo.com)