Well, this isn’t one I was expecting… Apparently there have been rumors for a while that there was sodomy going on in some of the Al Qaeda cells. Those rumors were confirmed when they did the autopsy on one of three suicide bombers from Tademaït – one of the three guys had been raped right before he was sent off on his suicide mission. It wasn’t a loving fuck – the guy had a “large tear in [his] anus”. They’re doing analysis on the semen to figure out who the top was. Of course semen in an ass means they were fucking raw. Actually, I’m not sure why anyone would bother with protection if they’re about to blow themselves up.

While it’s surprising in one way, it’s not in another. There’s a history of “acceptable” homosexual sex in Arab culture (this was the subject of my honors thesis in college). For starters Arab men are more comfortable with each other’s bodies than western men. They walk down the streets hand-in-hand with friends and think nothing of it. But in traditional Arab culture there are documented cases of “allowed” homosexuality (I’m talking their pre-colonial period – so roughly 100+ years ago).

First were what we’d now call fems or transgendered. Early westerners who visited Arabia saw men dressed in feminine colors (not women’s clothes but men’s clothes with a feminine twist). These men were allowed to spend time in private with women who were not close relatives (which is otherwise not allowed). They weren’t having sex changes or anything, but there was the recognition that femmy guys weren’t a threat to the women and could have sex with the men without disrupting the balance of things, so to speak.

There was also occasional sex between apprentices and their “masters”. When young boys would train in a craft they would apprentice with a master craftsman. The process would take a few years and the boys (they were in their teens) were sometimes fucked by their masters. It was just part of the process – the boy was literally an indentured servant of the master and had to do whatever the master wanted – including sex. I’m not saying it was common, but it was frequent enough that historians made note of it. Of course, unlike the cross dressers, you were expected to stop it once you stopped working for the master. It really was sex based on power and control, though given how closely they worked together I’m sure there was sometimes an element of love in there too.

Getting back to Al Qaeda – apparently they’re using sexual violence as one of the tools to mentally train their suicide bomber recruits. I wonder exactly how that works. Maybe it’s about breaking them down and making them feel worthless. I just don’t know – it would be interesting to hear more. I’m also curious whether this will discredit Al Qaeda in the eyes of regular muslims…