Er, the Toronto Star Does Know What 'Jihad' Means, Doesn't It?

I had to ask, because after reading this, it isn't at all clear to me that it does:

TRIPOLI—They prepared sharba — a soup of meat, tomato, oil and water.

Collected clothes and money from trusted friends.

Called anyone of influence outside the country to tell their side’s story, disposing of the SIM card after each call.

And prayed.

Seated in a row, six women, most of them engineering students, say they did their part to help the men take Tripoli from Gadhafi in their jihad, or struggle, against the regime.

“Jihad was made for men and women. There is no difference. But we are not warriors,” says Randa Al Alam, 26.

Auhood Elkhabule, 25, adds: “Most of the women went out and tried to help the men. But many of them say, ‘We are men, we do it ourselves.’ I couldn’t just sit and say let them do it. Many of my friends have been killed.”...

“I was in a group trying to gather money, food, trying to get them to the revolutionaries,” said Sanaa Eljerbi, 25. “We are already under the eyes of the regime, and it was hard to do. We used simple codes, without telling (anyone who might overhear) why we need it.”...

Could they have done more? Handle a gun if asked?

Narjes Elshaksto, 28: “I had jihad in a different way: praying for them.

Farah Al Mohalhel, 25: “Some women wanted to handle guns.”

Auhood Elkhabule starts shifting on the couch, eager to get a word in.

“Many girls, they can’t kill an insect, even a simple fly. For what Gadhafi did, I want to choke him, burn him alive.”

That, or: “Put him in a cage and put him in a zoo.”

“I am a rebel.”

More than a week since the fight for Tripoli began, the women are asked how it feels to sit and talk freely with a foreign reporter.

“I am speechless,” Auhood says, then laughs when she realizes she is, in fact, not.

Her sister Khulood, 29, says: “This is a proper jihad. You don’t choose what you want from the Qur’ran. It’s fixed, it’s right.”

You said it, sister. Too bad clueless "progressive" types—like the Star scribbler—have no idea what you're talking about. For the truth about these "rebels" and their "proper jihad," one must turn to a non-clueless, non-prog—like, say, Diana West.