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Kidnapping of aid worker stirs debate
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-10-25 20:20 The kidnapping of British aid worker Margaret Hassan has generated a
debate on Islamist Web sites, with many contributors urging the kidnappers to
spare her life.
Hassan, 59, the director of CARE international's
operations in Iraq who has lived there for 30 years, was seized Tuesday in
western Baghdad. On a videotape aired Friday by Al-Jazeera television, the
terrified Hassan made a tearful plea for her life, calling on British Prime
Minister Tony Blair to withdraw troops from Iraq.
Hassan, who is married to an Iraqi and also holds Irish and Iraqi
citizenship, is the highest profile figure to fall victim to the wave of
kidnappings sweeping Iraq. As a woman who has spent nearly half her life helping
Iraqis, her abduction has stirred passions even among people who have little
sympathy for other kidnap victims.
"Spare this hostage. She is a woman who dedicated her life to supporting Iraq
and its people. Is it religious that she is rewarded with murder?" said one Web
site contributor, writing under the pseudonym "Hadeeth al-Zaman."
"Say the British government did this and that," he added. "Is it right that
we take our revenge on an innocent person who is not involved with what her
government does?"
Another contributor, writing under the name Nour Mohammed, said she "pitied
the poor woman when I saw her face (on television). I hope they release her in
respect for the poor woman's weakness."
Kidnapping and killing civilians have traditionally been considered against
the teachings of Islam. The Prophet Muhammad enjoined his followers to treat
captives with respect.
However, Islamic militants have argued that civilians who are working for the
U.S. military do not qualify as noncombatants since they are profiting from the
U.S. war effort.
However, Hassan, who spoke out against U.N. sanctions imposed on Iraq after
Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait in 1990, is a much more sympathetic figure to many
Muslims.
"It is very hard to justify her killing using any Islamic argument unless
they come up with something like 'she is a spy or an agent for occupation,'"
said Mohammed Salah, a Cairo-based expert on Islamic militancy.
On Sunday, the hardline clerics who run the Sunni insurgent bastion Fallujah
called on Hassan's kidnappers to release her unless they can prove she was
collaborating with the occupation.
Abu Saad, a member of the clerical Shura Council, said it was "illegitimate"
to kidnap her "because she has been dealing with the Iraqis for several years,
because she has been serving this country and because her husband is Iraqi."
Militants have kidnapped at least seven other foreign women over the past six
months, and all were released. By contrast, at least 33 foreign male hostages
have been killed, including three Americans beheaded by their captors.
Some participants on the Islamic online forums, however, have questioned
Hassan's work in Iraq and the intentions of CARE International, which has been
working in Iraq since 1991.
One contributor who wrote under the name "Yanaam" condemned Hassan's
supporters and claimed that CARE was interested in converting Muslims to
Christianity, a charge which CARE denies.
"Are you crying for one who is after making Muslims convert to Christianity?"
he asked. "Do you think they were doing this out of love for the Muslims?"
Despite such comments, Salah, the Islamic militancy expert, said the online
debate is "definitely in her interest."
"These people (militants) follow the media closely, and especially the
Internet, and they care a lot about what is said about them by Arab youth whose
sympathy they are after."
However, another terrorism expert, Magnus Ranstorp, said the debate gives the
militants "greater leverage" because it intensifies the pressure on the British
and American governments.
Ranstorp, director of the Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political
Violence at St. Andrews University in Scotland, said he does not believe the
kidnappers care much about the debate. However, he acknowledged that it could
reduce the chances of her death.
"Yes they want to have sympathizers," he said. However, he added that the
kidnapping presents even greater problems for the British government, which will
be blamed in some quarters in case she dies.
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