Middle-east Arab News Opinion | Asharq Al-awsat

Mother of Missing Palestinian Still Adamant Son is Innocent in Hariri Murder | ASHARQ AL-AWSAT English Archive 2005 -2017
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Beirut, Asharq Al-Awsat- The mother of Ahmad Abu Adas, the Palestinian who claimed responsibility for the murder of former Lebanese prime minister Rafik Hariri in a videotaped message shown on al Jazeera in February last year, was surprised to discover her son’s name was mentioned in relation to a suspected terrorist cell. Members of the al Qaeda-linked group were arrested in Lebanon earlier this month and are currently being questioned for planning to carry out terrorist acts.

“I do not understand why some media organizations have claimed that Ahmad was brainwashed and recruited by Khaled Tah who is connected to the terrorist cell. Ahmad was not recruited by any group or political party. But it appears that some people are circulating totally fabricated news about him.” Said Nuhad Abu Adas

She cautioned that it was important to await the results of the investigation before making any accusations about Ahmad. “Khaled Tah stopped seeing Ahmad a year before he disappeared. They didn’t know each other very well. All I know about the matter I read in the report by the German UN investigator Detlev Mehlis. Tah is said to have entered Lebanon on 15 January 2005 and left the following day, the same day Ahmad disappeared. I am unable to determine the connection between what happened to my son and what the report includes. “

Nuhad indicated she had never met Tah and added that Ahmad spent his time with friends from school and the neighborhood. “Strangers or anyone else I could suspect of belonging to al Qaeda never came to the house. The only stranger was the unidentified young man that Ahmad met a few months before he disappeared. He called on Ahmad on 16 January under the pretext he wanted him to accompany him to a rented apartment in the area.”

Holding a picture of her son, taken a week before he disappeared, Nuhad said with bitterness, “The whole matter is made-up. We all know how Rafik Hariri was assassinated. I hope that Ahmad’s name is not mentioned in issues related to al Qaeda. It’s been a year [since he disappeared] and I do not know what happened to my son. I am desperate for information on his fate. If he has been killed, I want to retrieve his body in order to bury him and get accustomed to the idea of loosing him. After all this agony and the death of his father because of what we were subjected to after he appeared on TV, thin and almost ill, despite leaving us in good health, today there are attempts to connect his name to a terrorist cell. I do not even know if it’s related to al Qaeda.”

“The aim is to make Ahmad a suspect again. Perhaps he is no longer with us to defend himself. My son believed that a Muslim does not hurt another Muslim. He did not call for jihad but wished all Muslims would unite and that every Muslim could learn about his religion in a simple manner, especially the young,” she added.