I received the following letter from a mother of a VICTIM of an Al-Qaeda, OR Al-Qaeda inspired bombing.  No one that I know ever wants to forget any of the victims.  I know that I am forever haunted to by the young children on the plane.  One sweet child from a poor family had received a prize of a trip to a special event.  He was frightened before the flight as he had never been on a plane.  His mother convinced him to go.  That terrified baby was on one of the planes that hit the first tower.  I heard from another young man who was blinded in the attacks.

This mother’s letter is heartfelt.  I asked permission to print her letter, and she kindly agreed, although due to concern about her son’s safety (who survived the attack), she later edited a few of the remarks that she fears might have led further danger to her beloved son’s door.

While I know that Omar and his mother and others in the Bin Laden family have never committed a bad act against anyone, and they have the right to speak out about their lives, I believe that the victim’s families should always be heard, and always listened to.  Without further comment, here is a mother’s letter.

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Dear Jean,

I have read many of your books and love your writing.

One book I don’t wish to read is “Growing up bin Laden”

I am the mother of a son, who survived an Al Queda bomb attack, about which Osama bin Laden crowed much. 

24 other mothers weren’t as lucky as me.  Their family members were blown into bloody spattered body parts, some of which adorned my son in the process.  Osama was delighted with the result.  I was not.  There were two reasons I was able to deal with it in a way many others were not.  First, my personal relationship with Jesus, and belief that whatever the result, God in the end, is in control.  Also, the minute I heard that the bomb went off, I knew deep in my heart, and in my mind, that my son was alive.  And so it was.

But after the bomb, my son listened with disgust, to the delight in the voices, and the clapping of many of (that country’s) ordinary people, who support Osama’s attacks on westerners wherever Osama next orders someone to pull the pin.  

My son lived, dreamed, and felt the bomb in his waking days, and dreams for a very long time. He says it’s also a smell you never forget.   Every time he sees an Al Queda bomb on TV, he tightens up.  

He was personally relieved at the method of despatch of Osama, but felt that it was far more civilised than his family or Osama deserved.

Your blog said you watched the wedding of William and Kate, but my son could not, because he was petrified that some other middle eastern-henchman-thug would find a way to barbarically ruin the day, and then-  again, publicly delight in the results.  

I thought he was over-reacting, but he said to me, “You don’t know these thugs like I do.  They have no soul, no conscience, no feelings, and don’t give a damn about anything except jihad.”

So, how would I feel were the boot on the other foot, and I had a son, father or relative, whose organisation took responsibility for the deaths of 30,000 Pakistanis, let alone all the non-Pakistanis in an even bigger total? 

What would I feel were my rights, or my due, if my criminal son had been disposed of, supposedly….  without a “fair” trial?

I would have been glad it was over, and quick… , but then, I can see more than one side here.

I know what that feels like to have to deal with a child who survived an Al Queda bomb.  I have all the photos that were provided to me.

Do you know how that feels?  Does Omar’s family know what that feels like? 

There are mothers out there who have children who have never recovered full physical or emotional health, and who live a living grief, watching their maimed children grow, with no hope of a job, every day of their future lives. 

I don’t have to do that, but I know how I’d feel, if I did have to do that.

What would such a trial do for mothers of dead children?  What do you think a long, protracted internationally televised trial would do to mothers who had to put the pieces of their shattered children back together?

It would be agony, Jean – hearing Osama’s rants, his rhetoric, His “righteousness” and watching newsreel after newsreel of Osama-followers revelling in every word he said at that trial just like they danced in the streets after 9/11… so rubbing salt in by the ton full.  Everywhere you would turn – every magazine, every paper, the latest jihadist propaganda would be the headline.  Everywhere, all we’d see was the face of my son’s assassin rubbing it in, day after day. Every day, there would be more Osama-followers delighting in his latest words.

Why should thousands of families worldwide, have endured that – to satisfy the selfishness of his family? 

And why should Omar or Osama’s other family expect his body, or even his family back, in order to become “a family” again?  Did they have that right?

The others in the compound are NOT innocent bystanders, Jean. 

The very fact that they chose to stay with him, means they are willing accomplices to murder and atrocities, no matter if they did not pull the trigger.

If I had a son like Osama, I wouldn’t want my son to be allowed to cause more verbal havoc, arguing minutae, fanaticism and jihadism in the Western court of media, TV, newsprint and public opinion.  It would be unfair on the whole world frankly, and deeply embarrassing to me as “family”.

And I find it deeply offensive that that is what his family wanted, and that bin Ladin’s family invoke Western standards of justice, when they live in and support barbaric standards of “justice” which is all any westerner is entitled to, should they be stupid enough to live in such a society, and about which you know, intimately.

It doesn’t matter to me, that they have turned their back on his life. If they really disagreed with what Osama had done, then wouldn’t they understand how thousands of families would have great difficulty enduring such a trial?

If they really disagreed with what Osama had done, then wouldn’t they have known how their questions impact his victims?

If they really disagreed with what Osama had done, they would not have asked them at all, but would have put out a simple statement denouncing his atrocities and sending condolences to all who had suffered at the hands of their father.  That’s all they would have said. 

The remaining Osama family, might also consider the fact that because they are bin Ladins – they did, and will continue to receive 100%  guaranteed privileged protection from the sorts of actions worn by those who suffered at the hand of Osama’s fanaticism, and-  those yet to come, now that the Islamic world has demanded more dead lives in widespread retribution for the “sin” of killing Osama bin Laden.

And if Omar and the others had some consideration for past and potential future victims, and respect for human life, all the remaining Bin Ladins, Omar and the others, would “walk their talk”, hunt down Osama’s son who disappeared from the compound, and who is tipped to become worse than bin Ladin himself,— and they will surely know if that is true… and if it is… —- they would put a bullet through his head as well, – as quickly as possible, so as not to further dishonour their family name.  But they will not.

And on second thoughts, why didn’t they “deal” with their father themselves?

Your books graphically detail fathers who drown daughters for “family honour”, but it seems that no-one would drown or kill Osama, because… well… I guess they considered him “greatly honourable” and not a disgrace to the family “honour”. And yet they ask for honour, esteem from the West?

From where I sit, right now, those questions from Omar just sounds like point scoring from people who don’t understand. 

Sincerely….. A Mother