SETTLERS USE PIGSKIN TO FOIL THE MARTYRS

By ALAN PHILPS,
London Daily Telegraph,
26 February 2002

Jewish settlers have apparently come up with a new way to deter Palestinian suicide bombers - wrapping their corpses in pigskin to deprive them of the fruits of paradise.

The settlers believe that contact with a pig, an unclean animal for Muslims and Jews, will rob the bomber of the reward of martyrdom, traditionally said to be 72 virgins. Settlers at Gush Katif, in the Gaza Strip, were the first to claim to have defiled the body of a dead Palestinian with "pigskin and lard."

Residents of Efrat, a Jewish settlement near Bethlehem, said they did the same to a Palestinian building worker who tried to blow up their supermarket on Friday, but was shot dead before all the explosives detonated.

Shlomo Riskin, chief rabbi of Efrat, defended the practice: "If burial in pigskin will deter suicide bombers, then it is incumbent on us to do this. We should do anything to save life."

No Evidence

There has been no photographic evidence of daubing with lard and no one has come forward as the supplier of the pork, leading some to suspect that the settlers are trying to scare off future suicide bombers.

Palestinian Muslims reacted with scorn to the idea, saying the soul went to paradise and was unaffected by any taint to the body.