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Aasiya Hassan, Another American ‘Honor Killing’ Victim
By Ali Elizabeth | February 18, 2009
This is the second time in 5 years that I have had to sort through the horror of the beheading of a lovely woman whose last name was Hassan. The first time was when I was in Iraq and Margaret Hassan, the Baghdad director of CARE, (as in relief organization) was abducted by the muj, paraded on Al-Jazeera, shot, and then later a beheaded, disemboweled female body was found in Baghdad that was commonly assumed to be hers. For obvious reasons no CSI team could identify her, and to my knowledge a positive ID of any sort has never been made on those remains. Her death angered Iraqis, Muslim and “infidel” alike. I discuss her death at length in the chapter of my book, A Ballad for Baghdad:An Ex Hippie Chick Viet Nam War Protester’s Three Years in Iraq. Margaret’s chapter is called “A Tale of Two Hostages.”
This week another woman named Hassan has met a violent end with a “sword,” but it happened on American soil. This time her first name was Aasiya, and she was stunningly beautiful. She was in her mid ’30s, from Pakistan, and married to a monster named Muzzammil. The Hassans are originally from Pakistan, and Muzzammil is a television executive in New York State. Aasiya had filed for divorce on 06 Feb 08, and had also filed a restraining order after several documented instances of battering at the hands of the maniacal Mr. M. Thankfully he is behind bars.
The thing that is particularly bizarre about this situation is that Muzzammil was the founder of Bridges TV, a media outlet whose sole purpose was to break the stereotypes that Americans have of Muslims, casting them in a more culture-friendly and amiable light. Me thinks, however, that this is not what Dale Carnegie had in mind when he wrote “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” and I am curious as to how Bridges will do damage control now that their founder has behaved in a most stereotypical fashion.
By all accounts this looks like an honor killing, and they are on the rise in the good ol’ U S of A. The Said sisters, two teenagers who were killed by their father on New Year’s Day of ‘08 shocked us. Their father remains at large. Sandala Kanwal of Jonesboro, GA was killed last summer by her father, Chaudry Rashid, when she announced that she wanted out of her arranged marriage. He truly believes that he has done nothing wrong. There are others–a doctor in Michigan who first beheaded his wife and then chopped her up in little pieces. As far back as 1989, in St Louis, there was a particularly gruesome situation where Palestina Isa was killed by her father Zein who used a knife with a nine inch blade, and her mother held her down so he could do the deed. Her offense was to go to a dance and get a job at Wendy’s. To add to the horror of the Said and Isa murders, the girls’ 911 call was recorded, and the FBI had bugged Zein’s house, investigating possible links to terrorists. Palestina’s death is captured on FBI tape, and I can’t imagine what it must have been like to have been on the other end of the line.
Per usual there was the hand-wringing meshed with spineless “tolerance.” I have come to expect this. But there is a strange silence from a group that is world famous for being shrill when it comes to women’s rights, and that’s the odd creature known as the American feminist. I used to be one of said creatures, and God knows I was shrill. Some might even still think of me as odd, nonetheless I want to know some things. Why aren’t the members of the Boston Women’s Collective taking to the streets with a new updated version of their banner crying out to “Keep Your Laws Off of My Body?” Why isn’t Code Pink, that fearless group of feministas in Bezerkley that has their own parking spot in front of the Marine Recruiting station (so they can harrass the recruiters) up in arms over this? Why are the feminists looking the other way?
I would think that a movement whose leaders admit that it has lost traction, impact, credibility and focus might seize upon these killings to be the means to reinvent themselves and regain compromised cultural clout. Where is the outrage? Where is the outcry? And for those of us who aren’t female or feminista, what has happened to us that we think we have to somehow be sensitive to the decrees of clerics that violate our Constitution in no uncertain terms?
I have a friend in Iraq who is an interpreter, and she is secretly a Christian. She has not told her family yet. She has a brother who claims to believe that “everyone should choose their own way,” and a father who died before she told him of her new found faith. I have never asked her if she fears honor killing, and now I wonder if she ever comes to the States, (which is her dream,) that she’ll be assured that she can practice her faith without fear from American Muslims who would brand her as the worst possible type of infidel. There is one thing that comforts me, though. If any of the guys who kept us safe in Iraq get wind that she’s here, they’ll give their lives for her in a heartbeat, in uniform or out, because that is just who they are. They would be the Enforcers when it comes to “Keep Your Laws Off Her Body,” and they would no doubt insert some salty adjectives with respect to those so-called “Laws.”They, like no other group of human beings I have ever known, understand the meaning of the word “Honor,” and they would indeed allow themselves to be killed to keep her and me safe. That’s the only type of “honor killing” that Americans should ever defend.
Topics: Ballad for Baghdad, the Book | No Comments »