The making of a Muslim rebel

• Published in: The Irish times
• Main Author: Mok, Judith
• Format: Newspaper Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dublin The Irish Times DAC 24.02.2007
• Subjects: Ali, Hirsi

In Nairobi, where she comes in contact with Christian children at school, her guilt has already been developed by solid Muslim indoctrination. Her mother, abandoned by their father for a third wife back in Somalia, treats her abominably but she continues to love and obey her like a slave. A non-Muslim boyfriend is sent away and Ayaan adopts the hijab and the faith, even going so far as to support the Muslim Brotherhood. During long religious discussions the first seeds of doubt are sewn when she learns about the true position of women in Islam; one of utter inequality. On arriving in Holland she discovers there is a whole culture of the self, a people who seek their own pleasure just because they feel like it, and Ayaan starts developing atheist beliefs. Working as an interpreter for her fellow asylum-seekers, while simultaneously studying political science, increases her experience and knowledge of what Muslim women have to go through, in Holland as much as in Somalia. The ritual beatings, approved by the prophet Muhammad in the Koran, the rapes, the honour killings - everything encourages her to fight for her own and other women's rights. Her sister, who does not seem to have any of Ayaan's strength and is a kind of mirror image of what might have become of her, gets pregnant, has a couple of abortions, joins Ayaan in Holland and finally loses her mind as a result of the unbearable suffering she has gone through. She returns to her mother and dies.