Earlier today I posted a Time magazine article about suicide bomber (and murderer of 132 people) Raid Al-Banna that had his parents lamenting his deed and wondering what went wrong. But this MEMRI piece, “Iraqi-Jordanian Tension Over the Most Lethal Suicide Bombing in Iraq” (thanks to Waterdragon52), gives a very different picture of his family’s reaction. Also, it tells us that the bomber was Hassan Al-Banna’s grandson, which makes him the cousin of the famed Muslim “moderate” Tariq Ramadan.
This horrific act would have been simply charted in Iraqi terrorist statistics as another act of terrorism were it not for “a social event” that shed light on the perpetrator himself and on his family. On March 11, 2005, newspapers reported that the terrorist was Raid Mansour al-Banna from the City of al-Salt in Jordan. According to his father, Raid had studied and worked a number of years in the United States, “in one of the Californian airports, to be exact.” [2] He was 32 when he blew himself up.
What riled the Iraqis the most was that al-Banna’s family honored his act by holding a festive ceremony known as “the wedding of the martyr” [ ‘irs al-shahid ] to symbolize his wedding in paradise with 72 virgins. At these events, the bereaved family receives guests who offer it condolences and congratulations for their son’s martyrdom. A truck was seen on television bringing food to a special tent erected to receive the guests. [3] In justifying the celebration, the family argued that the victims were Americans. In fact, there was no American casualty in this operation.
After the furor in Iraq regarding the “wedding of the martyr,” his father began to deny the event. He said that four Islamists visited him and asked permission to hang a poster of “congratulation for the martyrdom.” When he inquired about the meaning of the martyrdom in the case of his son, he was told by the Islamists that “whoever dies drowning or in foreign land is a martyr.” Hence, he said, “I agreed to the hanging of the poster.” Further, he told the press that his son was killed in Mosul [in the north] and that his body was buried according to Muslim ritual. The father stressed that if his son was involved in a suicide bombing in Hilla there would have been no body to bury in Mosul. [4]
A Letter from the Brother
Not satisfied with the festivities his family organized in honor of his terrorist brother, Naseer al-Banna published a letter on the internet praising Raid and wished him pleasant days in heaven alongside his grandfather Hassan al-Banna. He was puzzled as to why the Iraqis were calling his brother a terrorist.
In his letter, Naseer labeled the Shi’a as “American and Jewish agents.” He claimed that the Shi’a religion was created by Jews and the Shi’a killed Prophet Mohammad’s grandson, al-Imam Hussein whom the Shi’a consider the greatest martyr in Islamic history.
The brother concluded his letter by stating his intention to join the Jihad against the Americans, the Jews, and the Shi’a. [5]