Through the lives of two women and one religion, author Deborah Scroggins takes a novel look at the war on terror.
Scroggins, a former foreign correspondent for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, relocated her family to Amsterdam for four years, as she traveled to Pakistan, the U.S. and Kenya, researching the lives of Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Aafia Siddiqui for the recently released "Wanted Women" (Harper, $26).
Ali is well-known in the U.S. as a Somali-born author who opposes the subjugation of Islamic women. Lesser known in America is Siddiqui, a Pakistani scientist with alleged links to al-Qaida. Together they represent polar opposites in the war on terror, but as Scroggins would find, nothing is as black and white as it seemed.
"I thought it was extraordinary that these two women of the same age had taken such completely different paths," Scroggins said. "I thought it would be interesting to find out more about them and follow them and see what was going to happen to them."
In 2003, after Siddiqui, a divorcee, had married an important member of al-Qaida, she disappeared. Her connection to the Islamist terrorist organization landed her on the FBI's most wanted list, and she was captured in 2008. After standing trial in New York, Siddiqui was sentenced to 86 years in prison for assault and attempted murder of U.S. officers and employees and carrying and using a firearm. She is currently being held in the Federal Medical Center, Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas.
Ali, on the other hand, is an outspoken opponent of Islam despite her Muslim upbringing. She sought political asylum in the Netherlands and later became a member of the Dutch Parliament. When she authored a screenplay that resulted in the murder of director Theo van Gogh, Ali, too, was forced into hiding. She resigned from Parliament when her citizenship was questioned and months later released her best-selling autobiography, "Infidel." Ali currently serves as a visiting fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank in the nation's capital.
The two women were just gaining fame when Scroggins set off to uncover their true stories. They were very different, but Scroggins quickly observed their similarities.
"They were both strongly informed by Islamism. When I say Islamism, I say the political ideology that calls for a state based on Islamic law. Aafia embraced it and wanted to support jihad and bring it about, and Ayaan rejected it and feared it," Scroggins said. Both women also were informed by feminism, but had the opposite reaction to it. Either woman, Scroggins said, could have walked in the other's path.
As their public profiles grew, so did the myths surrounding each woman. Their respective supporters would use their stories as a rallying cry in the war on terror, and not always with the depth that their experiences demanded.
"There has been this superficial use of women’s rights as weapons in the war on terror," Scroggins said. "You see Aafia’s case used by Pakistani politicians who hold her up as an example of a victim of American aggression. It was depressing to see the way women's rights were used rather than anyone seriously thinking about how to improve them."
Researching and writing about the two women helped Scroggins see how extremists can feed off each other and become mirror images of each other. And though she had no idea how the women's stories would unfold over the years, there was at least one constant -- she never had access to either of her subjects.
In retrospect, Scroggins views it as a blessing.
"They are both extremely partisan people," she said. "To gain access to them ... I felt I might have had to give up some objectivity."
Event preview
"Wanted Women: Faith, Lies & the War on Terror: The Lives of Ayaan Hirsi Ali & Aafia Siddiqui" by Deborah Scroggins (Harper, $26)
7:15 p.m. Tuesday. Free. Georgia Center for the Book at DeKalb County Public Library, 215 Sycamore St., Decatur. 404-370-8450, Ext. 2225, www.georgiacenterforthebook.org.
About the Author
