Israel Matzav

Mama's boy

The family of 23-year old Fasial al-Saqsaq is proud of what he did this morning in Eilat. According to the Jerusalem Post,

The mother of Muhammed Faisal Saksak, the 21-year-old suicide bomber who carried out Monday's attack in Eilat, said she was aware of her son's plan to blow himself up and that she had wished him "good luck."

Dozens of Palestinians, chanting slogans against Israel and the US, converged on the family's home to "congratulate" them on the success of the attack.

...

Ruwaidah, 43, said she last saw her son on Friday morning, when he walked out of his home in the Slateen neighborhood near Bet Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip.

"As he walked out of the house, he asked me to wish him good luck," she said. "I wished him good luck and I knew of his decision to become a martyr. Although I was aware of his intention, I did not know exactly when he was planning to carry out a martyrdom attack."

According to the mother, another one of her sons, Naim, phoned Muhammed on his cellular phone over the weekend to inquire about his whereabouts. "When Muhammed answered, he told Naim: 'Pray for me all of you and don't try to call me again. I'm now in Jabalya refugee camp.' After that we tried to call him many times, but his phone was out of service."

The mother of nine said she was proud of her son for carrying out the suicide attack. "I pray to Allah that Muhammed will be accepted as a shaheed [martyr]," she said shortly after hearing about the Eilat bombing. "I hope that his martyrdom will deliver a message to the Fatah and Hamas fighters to stop the fighting and direct their weapons against the one and only enemy - Israel."

Ruwaidah said she was prepared to "sacrifice" all her sons "for the sake of the Aqsa Mosque and Palestine." She added: "I hope that our politicians will stop fighting so that the blood of the martyrs will not be shed in vain."

The suicide bomber's older brother, Naim, 26, said he too was proud of his brother, whom he described as a member of Islamic Jihad's armed wing, the Al-Quds Brigades. "I knew that he was going out to launch a martyrdom attack and I wished for him to become a martyr," he said. "The family is very proud of what Muhammed did. He always wanted to be a martyr and was among those who went out to fight against the Israeli soldiers each time they invaded the Gaza Strip."

Muhammed's wife, Nadia, said she shared the family's sense of "pride" for what her husband did. "When I heard that he was martyred, I felt very proud of him," she said. "Why shouldn't I feel so when I know that he died for the sake of Palestine and Al-Aqsa? It's much better than dying in the internal fighting between Fatah and Hamas."

Meanwhile, al-AP tries to humanize the terrorist scum:

The Palestinian who blew himself up in the Israeli resort of Eilat on Monday was unemployed, despondent over the death of his baby daughter and driven to avenge his best friend's killing by Israeli troops, relatives said.

Dozens of neighbors celebrated outside 20-year-old Mohammed Siksik's house after the fiery attack that killed him and three other people, waving his photo and praising him as a martyr. Inside, his mother greeted mourners with a smile.

''He told me: 'Meeting God is better for me than this whole world,''' said Rowayda Siksik, wearing a white veil.

She said her son told her only that he was going to carry out an operation inside Israel. ''He said, 'Goodbye, I am going, mother. Forgive me.' I told him, 'God be with you.'''

Siksik never found steady work, getting by with occasional jobs with his father, installing tiles. ''You can't find work in this place,'' his mother said. Her son lost his 7-month-old daughter to a nerve disease, she said.

Sitting on the floor of her bare house, the mother said her son's best friend, Nader Amrein, was killed six months ago in an Israeli military operation in northern Gaza. Amrein was a member of Fatah, the movement of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

As the brother of a top Islamic Jihad official, Siksik made an easy target for recruitment for the suicide attack.

Originally sympathetic to the more secular Fatah, Siksik's life changed after the death of his friend. ''He became religious about six months ago,'' his mother said. ''He joined Islamic Jihad.''

Outside the house, Islamic Jihad and Fatah members argued heatedly over who would sponsor Siksik's funeral. The two groups claimed to have jointly planned the attack.

'Moderate' 'Palestinian President' Mahmoud Abbas Abu Mazen is the leader of Fatah. Yet the United States, Israel and the European Union continue to pretend that Abu Mazen is a 'man of peace' and a 'moderate' who is somehow 'better' than Ismail Haniyeh and Hamas. Once again, I have to ask why?

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 12:33 AM