“When I Heard My Son Died I Was Happy, Proud”

There is a new, shocking and unprecedented phenomenon among the families of the Palestinian shahids.

Um-Nidal, the mother of Mohammed Farahat, 17, who perpetrated the suicide attack in Atzmona in which five yeshiva students were murdered, encouraged her son to perpetrate the terror attacks, was party to planning the attack and had her picture taken with her son as a memento before she said goodbye to him one last time.

“I’m proud of my four sons who were all raised to carry out terror attacks against the Israelis,” said Um-Nidal, a resident of Gaza, who is named for her eldest son Nidal, 31, who is on Israel’s wanted list. Her second son, Ahmed, also went to perpetrate a terror attack, but was caught, tried and sentenced to 11 years in an Israeli prison. Her third son, Muamin, is seen regularly with the leader of the Hamas movement, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin.

The Saudi daily, A-Shark al-Awsat, which yesterday published the chilling testimony of the Palestinian mother who encouraged her son to perpetrate a suicide attack, stressed that this is the first time in the history of terror attacks in the Arab world that the parents of a suicide bomber are involved in planning that terror attack in all its details, and are photographed together with the shahid as a memento, before his death.

The mother recounted, “My young son Mohammed joined Izzadin Kassam, the Hamas movement’s military branch, when he was seven. He was very close to the organization’s leader, Imad Akel, who lived in our home, and was assassinated by the Israelis seven years ago. From a young age Mohammed was a party to planning the terror attacks, and I encouraged him to commit suicide.”

When Mohammed left to perpetrate that terror attack in Atzmona, his mother took a video camera and a regular camera, and had her picture taken with him as a memento. “It was clear to me that these pictures would be a memento, and I was proud of him and his bravery. I knew the timetable of the planned terror attack, and as the time drew near, I sat at the entrance to the house and waited for the news of his death. When I heard the number of casualties the Israelis suffered I knew I should be proud. His friends reported his death to me and I was very happy.”