A woman suspected of recruiting dozens of female suicide bombers in Iraq has told how she arranged the rape of victims and then convinced them martyrdom was the only way to escape the shame.
The Iraqi military announced the arrest of the woman yesterday, and played reporters video footage of her confessing to her role as a recruiter.
She explains in the footage how she recruited women, took them to an orchard for training, and finally picked them up and led them to their targets.
Later, during an interview from jail, conducted with interrogators standing nearby, the woman told how she helped plan the rapes of young women. She said she would then step in to persuade the victims to become suicide bombers as their only escape from the shame.
The woman has been identified as Samira Ahmed Jassim, who is nicknamed ''Umm al-Mumineen'', which means the mother of believers. In her video confession, the woman says she was acting on behalf of insurgents based in the volatile Diyala province, north of Baghdad.
This is a story being reported by numerous media outlets. I know that war brings out the worst in everyone and all sides have acts and incidents to be ashamed of (e.g. Abu Ghraib). Atrocities abound and I admittedly get inured to them.....but this just seems to be a new low. I just can't get over the fact that this lady arranges the rape of these young women and then swoops in after the to convince them they can cleanse themselves through Martyrdom resulting in the killing of nundreds or thousands of other innocents. They claim proof that she arranged at least 28 of these and perhpas as many as 80.
