There Is Only One Regret: That He Did Not Kill His Daughter At Birth
The teenager’s best friend had tried to hide the presents she was given by the soldier but a friend told her father after he saw the pair together
Two weeks ago, The Observer revealed how 17-year-old student Rand Abdel-Qader was beaten to death by her father after becoming infatuated with a British soldier in Basra. In this remarkable interview, Abdel-Qader Ali explains why he is unrepentant - and how police backed his actions.
Her uncles spat on her body at her funeral.
Observer:
For Abdel-Qader Ali there is only one regret: that he did not kill his daughter at birth. ‘If I had realised then what she would become, I would have killed her the instant her mother delivered her,’ he said with no trace of remorse.
Two weeks after The Observer revealed the shocking story of Rand Abdel-Qader, 17, murdered because of her infatuation with a British solider in Basra, southern Iraq, her father is defiant. Sitting in the front garden of his well-kept home in the city’s Al-Fursi district, he remains a free man, despite having stamped on, suffocated and then stabbed his student daughter to death.
Abdel-Qader, 46, a government employee, was initially arrested but released after two hours. Astonishingly, he said, police congratulated him on what he had done. ‘They are men and know what honour is,’ he said.
Her funeral was done without any of the traditional mourning because she was deemed ‘impure’. Her uncles spat on her body
Rand, who was studying English at Basra University, was deemed to have brought shame on her family after becoming infatuated with a British soldier, 22, known only as Paul.
She died a virgin, according to her closest friend Zeinab. Indeed, her ‘relationship’ with Paul, which began when she worked as a volunteer helping displaced families and he was distributing water, appears to have consisted of snatched conversations over less than four months. But the young, impressionable Rand fell in love with him, confiding her feelings and daydreams to Zeinab, 19.
Rand Abdel-Qader, 17
It was her first youthful infatuation and it would be her last. She died on 16 March after her father discovered she had been seen in public talking to Paul, considered to be the enemy, the invader and a Christian. Though her horrified mother, Leila Hussein, called Rand’s two brothers, Hassan, 23, and Haydar, 21, to restrain Abdel-Qader as he choked her with his foot on her throat, they joined in. Her shrouded corpse was then tossed into a makeshift grave without ceremony as her uncles spat on it in disgust.
‘Death was the least she deserved,’ said Abdel-Qader. ‘I don’t regret it. I had the support of all my friends who are fathers, like me, and know what she did was unacceptable to any Muslim that honours his religion,’ he said.
Sitting on a chair by his front door and surrounded by the gerberas and white daisies he had planted in the family garden, Abel-Qader attempted to justify his actions.
‘I don’t have a daughter now, and I prefer to say that I never had one. That girl humiliated me in front of my family and friends. Speaking with a foreign solider, she lost what is the most precious thing for any woman. ‘People from western countries might be shocked, but our girls are not like their daughters that can sleep with any man they want and sometimes even get pregnant without marrying. Our girls should respect their religion, their family and their bodies.
‘I have only two boys from now on. That girl was a mistake in my life. I know God is blessing me for what I did,’ he said, his voice swelling with pride. ‘My sons are by my side, and they were men enough to help me finish the life of someone who just brought shame to ours.’
Abdel-Qader, a Shia, says he was released from the police station ‘because everyone knows that honour killings sometimes are impossible not to commit’. Chillingly, he said: ‘The officers were by my side during all the time I was there, congratulating me on what I had done.’ It’s a statement that, if true, provides an insight into how vast the gulf remains between cultures in Iraq and between the Basra police the British army that trains them.
Sources have indicated that Abdel-Qader, who works in the health department, has been asked to leave because of the bad publicity, yet he will continue to draw a salary.
And it has been alleged by one senior unnamed official in the Basra governorate that he has received financial support by a local politician to enable him to ‘disappear’ to Jordan for a few weeks, ‘until the story has been forgotten’ - the usual practice in the 30-plus cases of ‘honour’ killings that have been registered since January alone.
Such treatment seems common in Basra, where militias have partial control, especially in the districts on the outskirts where Abdel-Qader lives.
While government security forces and British troops have control over the centre, around the fringes militants can still be seen everywhere on the streets or at the checkpoints they have erected. And they have imposed strict laws of behaviour for all the local people, including what clothing should be worn and what religious practices should be observed. There are reports of men having their hands cut off for looting and women being killed for prostitution.
Homosexuality is punishable by death, a sentence Abdel-Qader approves of with a passion. ‘I have alerted my two sons. They will have the same end [as Rand] if they become contaminated with any gay relationship. These crimes deserve death - death in the name of God,’ he said.
He said his daughter’s ‘bad genes were passed on from her mother’. Rand’s mother, 41, remains in hiding after divorcing her husband in the immediate aftermath of the killing, living in fear of retribution from his family. She also still bears the scars of the severe beating he inflicted on her, breaking her arm in the process, when she told him she was going. ‘They cannot accept me leaving him. When I first left I went to a cousin’s home, but every day they were delivering notes to my door saying I was a prostitute and deserved the same death as Rand,’ she said.
‘She was killed by animals. Every night when go to bed I remember the face of Rand calling for help while her father and brothers ended her life,’ she said, tears streaming down her face.
She was nervous, clearly terrified of being found, and her eyes constantly turned towards the window as she spoke. ‘Rand told me about the soldier, but she swore it was just a friendship.
‘She said she spoke with him because she was the only English speaker. I raised her in a religious manner and she never went out alone until she joined the university and then later when she was doing aid work.
‘Even now, I cannot believe my ex-husband was able to kill our daughter. He wasn’t a bad person. During our 24 years of marriage, he was never aggressive. But on that day, he was a different person.’
The mother is now trying to raise enough money to escape abroad. ‘I miss my two boys,’ she said. ‘But they have sent a message saying that I am wrong for defending Rand and that I should go back home and live like a blessed Muslim woman,’ said Leila, who is now volunteering with a local organisation campaigning for better protection for women in Basra.
One of those running the organisation, who did not want to be identified, said that Rand’s case was similar to so many reported in Basra, with the only difference being she was in love with a foreigner, rather than an Iraqi.
‘There isn’t too much to say. Rand is dead. It is a tragedy and will be a tragedy for many other families in Iraq in the days to come.
‘According to information we have been given, some from Rand’s colleague, we have doubts that her love was reciprocated. We have the impression that Rand was in love, but the English soldier wasn’t. But, for a girl to be paid nice compliments about her beauty and her intelligence, it was enough for her to think she was in love.
‘She isn’t here any more for her mother to ask any of the questions she would like to. Rand’s case had repercussions because she fell in love with a foreigner. But what about the other girls murdered through “honour” killings because they fell in love with some of a different sect, or lost their virginity, or were forced to become prostitutes?’
Rand’s mother used to call her ‘Rose’. ‘That was my nickname for her because when she was born she was so beautiful,’ she said.
‘Now, my lovely Rose is in her grave. But, God will make her father pay, either in this world … or in the world after.’
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I say, Arm the women of Iraq! It may be the only way to fix this fucked up society.
May 10th, 2008 at 6:38 pmStupid, imbecillic, moronic, retarded, perverted, dumbassholiness fucking PIGS! Jeez, somebody pass me the Tylenol - I don’t think we’ll ever be able to send enough of these toads to hell
May 10th, 2008 at 6:42 pmIf you can not love your own child and would willing murder them for some supposed dishonor ( the horror of being human and caring for another :roll:) of what value are you? I hope “Paul” finds this bastard and puts a 50cal round through him.
May 10th, 2008 at 6:49 pmThe religion of “peace” strikes again.
May 10th, 2008 at 6:55 pmMurder in the name of allah is still murder. The muslims are our enemies. They want to force this king of religious law on
America, Europe, and all of the world.THis man and the two brothers who participated should be tried, found guilty and put into prison for the remainder of there life.
Obama wants to coddle people just like these. Pretty fucked
May 10th, 2008 at 7:00 pmif you ask me. What a waste. The Muslims are our enemy…Wake up America!
And can you imagine what this soldier is now thinking and feeling?
What a clash of the Western and primitive worlds.
May 10th, 2008 at 7:03 pmNow, now, ya’ll. You’re such racist, judgmental, hate mongers. It’s their people’s culture to do this and who are we to judge them? We’re no better because of Bush sending in our troops to rape their woman and kill their children for oil and, um, Haliburton, uh, Bush lied….
You know, never mind. I honestly don’t know how the libs can say that kind of shit without puking. I need to shower…
On a more serious note, this is the kind of battle we’re not equipped to fight, thanks to the left. Our soldiers are the best in the world, as we all know. However, what kind of campaign are we waging against the idealogy behind our enemy? Zilch.
Unless things change we will never export our own ideology, or any ideology for that matter, to combat theirs. We can’t or the libs will stereotype us as racist, intolerant right wingers among the majority of Americans who don’t pay attention to this stuff. *SIGH*
I wonder what’s it going to take to wake America up? More blood of innocent civilians, I’d wager.
May 10th, 2008 at 7:07 pmSo thankful that my God, The Creator, is not this Muslim god. Her father and brothers were obviously possessed by one of Satan’s demons on that day. Pray for them to have a change of heart.
May 10th, 2008 at 7:14 pmAnother reason why we need to to get the hell out of this place and let the real Dawn Of The Dead go at it. These fuckin people are just wound all wrong.Did this idiot ever respect his daughter.
May 10th, 2008 at 7:23 pmNow, now, ya’ll. You’re such racist, judgmental, hate mongers. It’s their people’s culture to do this and who are we to judge them? We’re no better because of Bush sending in our troops to rape their woman and kill their children for oil and, um, Haliburton, uh, Bush lied….
You know, never mind. I honestly don’t know how the libs can say that kind of shit without puking. I need to shower…
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Yep … gotta just love all those women’s rights and human rights groups that jumped all over this …
May 10th, 2008 at 7:23 pmI’m not usually one for tossing nukes at entire countries indiscriminately but after reading this…
May 10th, 2008 at 7:40 pmIt will happen here, visit the west end of Atlanta, you’ll see the American muslims at their best. Wonder what happens when these fucks need to be killed here?????????
May 10th, 2008 at 7:40 pmI wonder what old Sir Harry Paget Flashman would have to say about these apes?
May 10th, 2008 at 8:02 pmIn Islam women are considered to be a field that a man can pick. They are useful for bearing children and nothing more. They are subject to a man’s authority and can do nothing without it. They have no freedom.
Arming them is a good solution.Crushing the jihadis is a better one.
Theirs is no “religion”. Islam has the rubric of religion, but nothing more. Its only the beard that they hide behind.
Allah is not great. He’s Baal. He’s Dagon. But he ain’t the one true God. He’s a fake and a liar; much like his child-molesting prophet (burning sulphur be upon him).
This dude is one sick f*ck. Killing him would be the real honor in this story.
May 10th, 2008 at 8:09 pmSomebody needs to track this fuck down…disembowel him, behead him, stick his balls in his mouth and plant the head on a post on his gate for the world to see. Fucking animal…
May 10th, 2008 at 8:55 pmThe young lady had her very first encounter with a real man. The so-called father found out, had a revelation that he could never be a real man, became jealous, & murdered her.
Like I said before with a similar story, she is with the real Father now. No more savages. No more islam.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:07 pmPoor girl sounds like she was starved for attention. I think her father expected there to be something in the koran to help him raise a daughther, instead he resorts to blaming his wifes genes- the loser. It doesn’t help that a lot of the information he gets about the West comes by way of Hollywood and other liberal media outlets-the lefts overlooked reason why the imams hate us. I hope the wife can successfuly escape that entire clan. Maybe a few years from now, she’ll hear that the boys killed the father one day cause he winked at one of their uncles.
May 10th, 2008 at 10:31 pmjerbil, you can stick your moral equivelancy crap right back up where you pulled it out from. Who are we to judge, we are civilized human beings passing judgment on those that have islamorabies, there is no cure for rabies. And as for you, you’re a miserable piece of shit faggot. If you’d stop sucking on islamofacist cock long enough you might have your mouth closed long enough where you ears will open. Be amazed at what you’ll learn. Fucking drive by bitch.
May 10th, 2008 at 11:04 pmjerbb, the problem with a computer is that you can’t reel it back in after you hit send. I didn’t read all you wrote and flew off after just the first paragraph. I passed judgment on something I hadn’t completely read. I’m very sorry and very embarrassed.
May 10th, 2008 at 11:12 pmomg that’s so tragic.
May 10th, 2008 at 11:33 pmIt’s all about humiliation, the dumb fuck father and all the other idiot honor killers in Muslumland are more concerned with their personal image amongst each other than the young lives of their children. It’s a brutal existance because if he does not kill her he and his entire extended family will lose everything to all the other murderers; they can’t leave to another town or city because before you can pick up a phone the entire country knows.
So he kills his daughter with his sons and he wins a free two week holiday to Jordan with full pay from his “health-care” job; after he gives an interview with a reporter in his rose garden joyfully sipping tea.
Primative survival learned in a brutal society.
May 10th, 2008 at 11:42 pmshe had been seen in public talking to Paul, considered to be the enemy, the invader and a Christian
this reminds me our WWII occupation, this was considerated as “collaborationing with the “occupant” ; some girls found also a death penalty by the resistance (not by their family though), much more had their hair removed
May 11th, 2008 at 1:43 am
Dammit what is wrong with people??? Is a society that breeds people like him worth saving?
May 11th, 2008 at 2:27 amOh Allah, oh Mohamed, what barbaric religion have you brought upon this world! People who kill their own children are less then pigs and dogs. Kemal Ataturk was right when he said that islam is a dead corps poisoning this world.
May 11th, 2008 at 4:41 amBosey
Having an armed and fully authorized female police contingent is not the worst idea in the world, but the notion that “arming the women” of Iraq is laughable.
Their husbands, brothers, fathers, and sons will simply take away their guns or kill them in their sleep.
No gun in the world is going to save any woman from an entire society that regards them as meat. Get serious.
May 11th, 2008 at 5:15 amThis might sound racist and if it does I apologize for it but why do most Arab men hate there women soooo much? They make the women wear clothing top to bottom to supposing to control the lust of Arab men! In most countries the Arab women are treated worst then the camel. If Arab women step out of line the Arab men are allowed to beat or kill there women because of HONOR!!! In most cases can’t drive a car, go to school or travel freely without an escort from a Arab male relative!!! I am not making these things up for I have seen this happen 20 odd year ago when I was on a Peace Keeping mission in Sinai, Egypt! And the Arabs wonder why we American are very very suspicious about them!!!
May 11th, 2008 at 6:01 amHow many people with these same beliefs are now living in the United States?
They are just waiting to have more of a majority.
May 11th, 2008 at 6:17 amWelcome to the hypocrisy and intloernace of islam, the religion of peace,haha. Well stop having war with the muslims when they start loving there children more than they hate us.
May 11th, 2008 at 7:39 am“jasjfarrell
How many people with these same beliefs are now living in the United States?
They are just waiting to have more of a majority.”
On a local talk radio show (KSFO), a mideast expert was discussing how yet another well intentioned (politically correct) program in the State dept. has resulted in Lebanese christians being denied visas to the U.S., as the bulk go to muslims. As he described it, post 9-11, Bush, under pressure from the Saudi’s, implented a policy that intended to show that we only viewed Islamofacists as the enemy and not muslims. Perhaps, a subconcious reference to the Japanese internment camps during WWII. Whatever the intentions, apparently many oversea State dept. employees are muslims, hence, they now are running the ticket-counters to Disneyland, and essentially front load the Trojan horse and ship it stateside.
You only have to watch what’s going on in Europe to see what we’re headed for here. Non-assimilation, a polar-opposite culture, kaboom. The U.S. welcomes all races, creeds, religion etc., but one that teaches, and justifies the murder of ones own daughter? Unless she’s Lizzie Borden, and has the drop on you, that unjustifiable act buys you a walk down the “Green Mile”.
So where’s the outrage from the MSM? Code Pink? Nat. Org. of Womyn? C’mon girls, take a break from your Obama swoon, and burn a few bra’s in outrage…
May 11th, 2008 at 7:55 amCrazy perverted values. Islam needs a reformation.
May 11th, 2008 at 8:00 amBut….but…Reid, Pelosi and other derangemocrats say global warming is the biggest threat facing the world.
Talk to the Rand…
May 11th, 2008 at 9:09 amThese Muslims are primitive and unclean in their thoughts and actions.
May 11th, 2008 at 10:09 amIt is always amazing that men always claim that their version of our Creator is “happy”.
I also find it interesting how easily people kill and justify their violence and hatred of another in the name of their version of our Creator.
That truly is man’s arrogance.
Our Creator gives life and free will as a gift but man in his selfish want of power over another on any level that he can achieve soon seems as history proves causes harm destruction and death.
Quite a legacy have we.
It’s the famous and fictitious SEPARATION of CHURCH and STATE
May 11th, 2008 at 10:23 amideologue that prevents the prerequisite foundation for a truly free Iraq to be formed. unless the ethics of Christianity are the basis for the law and constitution all the treasure spent in Iraq will be for naught. A second wave of Christian decency behind the efforts of our troops is the salvation that will free the women of that country and the men as well.
People just don’t understand that if you’ve seen one Muslim, you’ve seen them all. They are a hive mind. Their tactics are Fight, Surrender, Infiltrate, and Consume. You would not show a field of locusts any mercy, it should be the same with these cursed peoples. Yet our leadership grasps these serpents to their bosoms, as they spread like a metastasizing cancer through our cities, driving our citizens, handling our food in various ways, and loading our airplanes.
And history has shown that they will rise up as one when they hear the call, and swarm.
Time to call the exterminator, I think…
May 11th, 2008 at 11:30 amyou know what really sick is that the police told him that he did the right thing like wtf
Nukem All
May 11th, 2008 at 12:27 pmI’ve never heard this threat against civilization expressed more eloquently. You should have been a goddamn poet!
May 11th, 2008 at 2:26 pmMaybe she wasn’t fit for “any” Muslim. Maybe she wanted out, marry a decent Christian man who wouldn’t treat her like a piece of furniture. I hope someone shoots that sad excuse of a man.
May 11th, 2008 at 2:40 pmIslam is a major problem to the civilized world.
May 11th, 2008 at 5:20 pmlets give a big huraah for the coaliton trained Iraqi police force!
May 12th, 2008 at 1:01 amand we are letting the public school system get away with promoting islam. Very scary! Sick!!!
May 12th, 2008 at 4:36 amC’mon, did anyone really think that thousands of years of culture can be turned over in five years?
May 12th, 2008 at 4:44 amits cases like this that make me understand more what is really going on in iraq and afghanistan or any where else we are helping muslims. they tolerate us, they pretend to like us in order to get what they want, but associating with us in any other way brings out true islam. we are unclean to them. there is no love in islam only fear and “honor” Islam only places humans side by side with other animals. It appeals to our baser instincts and deprives man of reason. Whenever I encounter islam I will repudiate it and only it, because it is pure evil, the only way we will ever have success in iraq is when we eradicate islam.
May 12th, 2008 at 5:35 amThe “Rose” is in my prayers
islam and all who claim to be islamic, fucken die with a pigs dick in your mouth 
your shit ass god is the anti-christ! fuck you and the camel you rode in on 
May 12th, 2008 at 9:09 am