The Qur’an forbids a Muslim man to have sexual relations with a woman who is married to someone else, except for “those (captives) whom your right hands possess” (4:3). This is the Qur’anic term for a woman captured in warfare and kept as a slave. Thus there is nothing preventing a pious Muslim male from having, as the Indo-Asian News Service rather luridly terms it, a “sex slave.” So while it is likely that some will, or will try, to take the fact that Osama had a sex slave as evidence that he is not a fervent Muslim, in fact it establishes nothing of the sort.
Others, of course, will say: You can’t say Osama is a pious and fervent Muslim. Why, that would be undercutting all the moderates. They would enlist us in their giant, global game of pretend, as if we are all five years old again and all we have to do is close our eyes and wish the dragon away.
Well, I myself think it is preferable to stick to reality, and to try to frame a course of action that is based on that reality, rather than on wishes, however politically correct and comforting.
“Osama’s former sex slave writes for TV” from IANS, with thanks to all who sent this in:
NEW YORK: Kola Boof, the former sex slave of Al Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden, is writing for the NBC soap opera Days of Our Lives.
The TV network is already trying to distance itself from the new hire, according to reports by pagesix.com. The show’s executive producer Stephen Wyman says: “Yes, Kola Boof has had writing assignments from Days of Our Lives since May. However, she does not hold a staff position with our writing team.”
In 2003, Boof had to pull her son out of school after rumours were spreading that bin Laden was his father. Boof claims that she was held prisoner and was forced to have sex with bin Laden in 1996 when she was pursuing an acting career in North Africa. She adds that he raped her and forced her to live with him for four months at a hotel in Morocco.
She escaped to Spain and in 1998 bin Laden threatened to kill her after reading her book of poetry, which was critical of Islam. She has also been marked for death by the Sudanese-based National Islamic Front in response to her writings condemning slavery in Sudan and the ill-treatment of African women.