Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Omar Khadr: From Jihadi to...Edney?

The Toronto Star recounts the going travails of Omar Khadr, former "boy soldier". (The Star report includes the by-now familiar photo of young Omar, the one that's proven so useful to him and his champions over the years by eliciting maximum sympathy for the hardened jihadi.) There seems to be a happy ending on the horizon, however, as Omar has been embraced by a new, non-jihadi mishpacha:
The Toronto-born 28-year-old is the only captive the Pentagon has tried and convicted for “murder in violation of the laws of war,” despite the death of thousands of U.S. service members in Iraq and Afghanistan.  
His bail application has received overwhelming support from his lawyer’s family, religious and community leaders and a Christian university that has offered to admit him should he be granted bail.  
Khadr’s longtime Canadian lawyer Dennis Edney, and his wife Patricia, have agreed to pay for Khadr’s university tuition at Edmonton’s King’s University and offered to have him live with their family.  
Patricia Edney, who works as a manager for the addiction and mental health program of Alberta Health Services, said Khadr has been a large part of their lives since her husband began fighting for him nearly 12 years ago and during his years of travelling back and forth on his own expense to Guantanamo. 
“When we look back at our life’s work . . . it’s not about the house, it’s not about the car, it’s about the lives that we’ve touched, and I believe Dennis has touched Omar’s life in such a tremendous way,” she said in a past interview from her Edmonton home.  
In her affidavit to the court supporting the bail application she wrote: “We are a family that makes a point of being together, for example, evening meals and weekends at the lake, and would welcome Omar into our family ways.”
Yes, but the real question here is would Omar welcome your family ways, being that you're a family of infidels and all?

No comments: