As has been posited in these pages for over a year, the threat of female suicide bombers originating from Europe seems to be taking a hold. The Spiegel Online article announced Germany’s first documented case of a woman, in this case, three women, wanting to travel to Iraq in recent weeks to martyr themselves. This particular case was thwarted by German intelligence authorities but only after one of the women announced her intentions?to martyr herself and her child?on the Internet. While authorities would not identify the women by name, they are known to identify with the “Islamic scene in Germany,” likely a reference to Ansar al Islam , and at least one is known to be a convert, harkening to Myriam/Muriel Degauaque’s successful November 9, 2005 suicide bombing in Iraq .
Authorities across Europe have long feared radical Islam taking hold and providing a sizable recruitment pool, comprised of non-traditional followers. This concern, coupled with the very real emerging trend of radicalization of Islam, is long overdue in that addressing socio-economic disparities between ethnicities should have taken place as far back as the 1980s in the height of immigration to avoid the simmering tensions and eruptions now seen throughout Europe. A European convert population would not only be more difficult for security officials to follow, but would also allow radicals to move unrequited through the European Union with their passport and onward to the US with no visa prerequisites. This would be a startling trend that the Western security apparatus may not be prepared to counter, especially should it involve female convert recruits, as this analyst has long warned.
Authorities located the web site, the name or URL of which was not released publicly, and tracked down the three women. Two of whom allegedly had children, and one of whom was placed in a psychiatric clinic. The battle to win hearts and minds will never be won with the mindset that the opposition is insane; putting a woman in a mental facility does little to help quash either the rising tide of radical Islam in Europe or the fury of maltreatment of Muslims, especially women. And, work should start immediately to reeducate the children of these women, lest Germany fail to learn lessons of child terrorists targeting Israel from the Palestinian Territories, which hosts TV programming to glorify martyrdom.
It remains unknown how intent the women might have been to launch suicide attacks, where precisely they intended to detonate themselves, how much planning had been done, or where they may have studied methods. Nothing?including nationality?has been released publicly about their husbands or families. Ansar al Islam, likely to have had a helping hand in the planning, is known to be linked to the al-Qaeda network and is known to transit humans to Iraq for Jihad and is known widely to raise money, collect equipment, and coordinate logistics for anti-US action in Iraq. In January 2006, a German judge sentenced Amin Lokman Mohamed, an Iraqi who sought asylum in Germany, to seven years in prison for membership to the group and for his involvement in trafficking eight people from Europe to Iraq before December 2003 (source). The group’s founder, Mullah Krekar remains free in Norway .
The possibility of Germany supplying suicide bombers, male or female, to Iraq is further disconcerting in the lead-up to Germany’s center stage spotlight: the World Cup soccer tournament, which begins on June 9 . Police are preparing security measures to counter suicide bombers , although much of the open viewing areas will be difficult, by definition, to secure . This development should have little impact on the World Cup matches, but security must remain high for the duration and be heightened further during particularly contentions match-ups (to include any ally country’s games) . Hooliganism?both inebriation and racially-motivated?can be anticipated to be far more likely and problematic for the month-long games .