Bquba, July 12: A snippet of news from a shadowy corner of Iraq: al-Qaida in Mesopotamia recently issued a fatwa telling its fighters to marry the widows of those who have fallen.
This may seem odd but it is one of the rare grains of news to emerge publicly about the inner workings of the Iraqi offshoot of al-Qaida.
In Diyala province east of Baghdad, the fatwa has produced about 70 marriages in three weeks, say members of al-Qaida in Mesopotamia, and their relatives and associates. While Diyala is one of the group’s last remaining strongholds, the mere fact that so many people would rush headlong into marriages to strangers seemed to reflect how far the American military and the Iraqi government remain from their goal of eliminating the organization.
Some members say they are taking third or fourth wives, but many new husbands are from among the group’s most dedicated fighters bachelors previously wedded only to the work of killing invaders and their Iraqi allies. “I had been single and had given myself to an honorable cause,” said Ebe Hafsah al-Obeidi who married one widow.
-Agencies