Also freed in the exchange was her relative Nizar Tamimi. He was proud of her for her major role in the Sbarro Pizzeria bombing, and she proud of him, too, for though he had only one cold-blooded murder of Jews to his credit, what he lacked in quantity he made up for in gruesome quality. It was just the kind of murder that made the Tamimi clan swell with pride. That murder is described by Caroline Glick:
Six weeks after Israel signed the Oslo Accords with the PLO on the White House lawn on September 13, 1993, Chaim Mizrahi from Beit El went to buy eggs from a farmer in Ramallah, as he had every week for years.
Two of Ahed’s cousins, Said and Nizar Tamimi, were there. They stabbed Mizrahi, stuffed him in the trunk of his car and burned him alive.
In Jordan, Nizar and Ahlam Tamimi were married. Nariman and Ahed Tamimi can be seen on stage in a video of the wedding, with Ahed “gazing worshipfully” — in Caroline Glick’s phrase — at Ahlam Tamimi, so very proud of her aunt for all that she had accomplished.
The third active terrorist in the Tamimi family, Said, who helped Nizar stab and burn to death Chaim Mizrahi, was not freed in the original exchange of 1000 Arab prisoners for one Israeli in 2011, but he was freed two years later, in 2013, because the Obama administration pressured Israel to release him and several hundred other terrorists as a way of demonstrating that the Israelis were committed to peace. For Obama and his men, apparently, nothing says “We’re committed to peace” like having Israel free hundreds of Arab terrorists. So now all three murderers in the Tamimi clan are free.
In Jordan, Ahlam Tamimi gives talks, appears in the media, and even had her own television show on a Hamas station for five years. She felt safe, happy, proud of killing all those Jews. But recently she’s had to start worrying — just a bit. Because Americans were among the victims of the Sbarro Pizzeria bombing, the American government in 2017 asked the Jordanian government to extradite Ahlam. King Abdullah, who is often described, wrongly, as a close American ally, and who has allowed Ahlam Tamimi to be lionized in Jordan, refused the request. The Americans have yet to try — one hopes they will — to concentrate his mind a bit better, using the only weapon that might work: cutting aid to Jordan, by hundreds of millions of dollars.
No one illustrates the mindset of the Tamimi family, and of many “Palestinians,” better than Ahlam Tamimi. You can see her discussing the Sbarro attacks in appearances here and here. Ahlam Tamimi is also attractive and sweet-faced, just like her niece Ahed. Good looking girls, but the media should never forget that they are both moral monsters. Ahed is a praiser and promoter of terrorism, and Ahlam has been a direct, unrepentant, enthusiastic participant in one of the deadliest terrorist attacks in Israel.
Here’s some of what Ahlam Tamimi has had to say about her part in the Sbarro bombing:
On 9 August 2001, Tamimi escorted suicide bomber Izz al-Din Shuheil al-Masri (Arabic: عز الدين شهيل المصري) to the Sbarro restaurant. She used disguise techniques to deflect attention from herself and al-Masri, wearing a dress that made her appear more like a “Jewish tourist” than an Arab, and using language skills gained in her journalism studies. While al-Masri died in the attack as intended, Tamimi left the area before the bomb detonated.
She then had a second role reporting on the attack in the press, in her part-time journalism job.
In an interview which aired on Al-Aqsa TV on 12 July 2012 (as translated by MEMRI), Tamimi described the reaction of other Palestinians immediately after the bombing:
“Afterwards, when I took the bus, the Palestinians around Damascus Gate [in Jerusalem] were all smiling. You could sense that everybody was happy. When I got on the bus, nobody knew that it was me who had led [the suicide bomber to the target]… I was feeling quite strange, because I had left [the bomber] ‘Izz Al-Din behind, but inside the bus, they were all congratulating one another. They didn’t even know one another, yet they were exchanging greetings…While I was sitting on the bus, the driver turned on the radio. But first, let me tell you about the gradual rise in the number of casualties. While I was on the bus and everybody was congratulating one another…
After hearing an initial report that “three people were killed” in the bombing, Tamimi stated:
“I admit that I was a bit disappointed, because I had hoped for a larger toll. Yet when they said “three dead,” I said: ‘God be praised’…Two minutes later, they said on the radio that the number had increased to five. I wanted to hide my smile, but I just couldn’t. God be praised, it was great. As the number of dead kept increasing, the passengers were applauding.
Following her release from prison, the sweet-faced smiling Ahlam Tamimi gave an interview with the Jordanian Ammon News website, which was later posted on YouTube (as translated by MEMRI):
“I do not regret what happened. Absolutely not. This is the path. [fi sabil Allah] I dedicated myself to Jihad for the sake of God, and God granted me success. You know how many casualties there were [in the 2001 attack on the Sbarro pizzeria]. This was made possible by God. Do you want me to denounce what I did? That’s out of the question. I would do it again today, and in the same manner.
Had enough?
The world’s journalists have singularly failed in their coverage of the Ahed Tamimi story. They should make sure to have her statements — including her calls for acts of terrorism — translated from the Arabic into English and other major languages, and reported verbatim in the world’s press. For example, in December 2017, when she attacked Israeli soldiers, after they left her mother encouraged her to send a message to the world. Ahed did, and that message included this: “I wish that everybody all over the world would unite so we can liberate Palestine, because Trump must bear responsibility for the decision he took for any Palestinian reaction – be it stabbings, martyrdom-seeking operations [i.e. suicide bombings], throwing stones – everyone must do something.”
Most of all, the media should report not just on Ahed but also on her mother, who fills Facebook with paeans of praise for “Palestinian” terrorists, and on the mass-murdering aunt she worships, Ahlam Tamimi, and Ahlam’s husband Nizar.
The most useful thing the world’s media can now do, when it comes to covering the story of Ahed Tamimi, is to ask her just one question: “What do you think of your aunt Ahlam Tamimi and her husband Nizar?”