Muriel Degauque?who Arabized her name to Myriam?was actually the third women to martyr herself for al-Qaeda in Iraq . She was a 38-year old working-class Belgian woman who in 2000, after a series of failed relationships, fell under the spell of a Moroccan Belgian who was a Salafist, believed to be Hissam Goris. She moved with him to Morocco for three years. Upon her return to Belgium, she was fully veiled and wore a chador, alienated from her family and friends, subservient to her husband, and a staunch Salafist herself. It is suspected that she snuck into Iraq via Syria . Not unlike various Palestinian female suicide bombers, Myriam had also been pronounced sterile. The series of events that lead her to kill herself and others on November 9?the same day a woman in Jordan failed to detonate herself in a Western hotel and targeting Jordanians ?remains unclear. Her attack killed five police and injured five other individuals; her death was allegedly quite slow and painful. However, her life runs parallel to many women who have been recruited as suicide bombers elsewhere in the world:

? Like Dhanu of the LTTE , Myriam was a departure from what security forces had been looking for in the traditional terrorist profile;