Huma Abedin deserves widespread media support, not slander

Huma Abedin: Refusing to be humiliated

http://blogs.tribune.com.pk/story/6597/huma-abedin-refusing-to-be-humiliated/

Abedin and Weiner on their wedding day

Generally, the world loves to side with famous women whose celebrity husbands’ extramarital escapades are chronicled by scandalous headlines. Judging by the smorgasbord of sympathetic magazine covers, TV chatter and internet buzz that supported the marital tribulations of Maria Shriver-Kennedy-Schwarznegger (her‘Governorator’ husband’s affair with their housekeeper that resulted in a ten-year-old son), Elin Nordegren-Woods (whose golfer husband Tiger’d it out with countless prostitutes) and, of course, Jennifer Aniston-Pitt (who continues to get public sympathy six years after theBrangelina coupling), Huma Abedin-Weiner should be the public’s darling by now.

Instead, she seems to be bearing the brunt of the bigoted, self-righteous backlash to Weinergate while she remains maddeningly calm.

Until recently, Abedin, 35, had managed to maintain a reasonably low profile in a high profile career (she is Secretary Clinton’s Deputy Chief of Staff).  Congressman Anthony Weiner‘s, 46, (Dem/NY with 7 straight terms) sexting scandal not only ‘exposed’ his lascivious fascination for college students and porn stars but has also threatened his wife’s public image (the same Congressman Wiener who introduced a bill against internet predators five years ago).

Outspoken Right-Wingers have gone far beyond mainstream neo-Con ‘Weiner’s weiner’ jokes (as well Wiener’s own wiseguy-phallic humour), to attacking the heritage and upbringing of his wife (and, thereby, the Democrats) for alleged links to radical Islamists, all in the name of protecting American national interest. While Islamophobic ranting has led to fulsome conjecture and conspiracy theorieswhizzing across cyberspace, here in Pakistan, it seems absurdly unjust that Abedin’s Saudi upbringing is seen as suspicious; after all, Saudi Arabia is America’s leading ally in the Middle East, but then, so is Pakistan, though Abedin’s half-Pakistani ethnicity has also contributed to the backlash she’s experiencing.

At best, she’s been called “unflappable” by the Washington Post. The Washington Times briefly posted a racist blog (before removing it soon after) by Eliana Benador, former president of Benador Associates (who worked on spin doctoring Bush’s ‘War on Terror’ in the media) and US Representative of the Shomron Liaison Office (Israel-occupied West Bank).

According to Benador,

“Huma and the silent creeping Sharia(h)…” would “advance a socialist-Muslim agenda” in Congress and “bankrupt America, breaking its population and paving the way to surrender to wealthy Muslims” like the Saudi Royals.

Had her name been Jennifer (or Aniston), we could have expected headlines in the vein of “Huma’s Anguish” and more sympathetic covers than being called “Mrs. Crotch” by sex blogger, Shirley Coco.Either Abedin is an easy target or her calm, collected persona prevents her from instigating positive reactions in her favour. In any case, Abedin doesn’t try to appear like a victim and succeeds in coming across as elegantly in her marital crises as she does in her evening gowns. On Facebook, there are only a handful of people who have started fan pages and groups in her name.  As of June 24th, “Huma Abedin for Congress” had a paltry 83 members while “Support Huma Abedin—she should leave Anthony Weiner” had a dismal 20 members. Anthony Weiner’s official fan page, on the other hand, had 59,671 members.

Now, former Congressman Weiner is heavily into social networking (as his Twitter scandal illustrated), whereas Abedin has always maintained a low profile. She enjoys the rare privilege of being a Muslim woman who enjoys Hillary Clinton’s confidence, from the Office of the First Lady to the New York Senate and the State Department. The only other known South Asian-American Muslim woman in an influential position at the State Depertment is the Srinager-born Farah Pandith, who also reports directly to Secretary Clinton as the Special Representative for Muslim Communities.

Very impressive, ladies!

- Huma Mahmood Abedin was born in Kalamazoo, Michigan in 1976, raised in Saudi Arabia and speaks English, Arabic and Urdu.

- She studied at GWU (George Washington University in Washington, DC), and has worked for Hillary Clinton for a decade and a half.

- Her father, Syed Zainul Abedin (who died in 1993), was an Indian Saudi who founded an institute on interfaith dialogue, while her Pakistani mother, Prof. Saleha Mahmood Abedin, is a prominent educationist in Jeddah who pioneered a women’s college.

- She also has a sister, Heba, a fashion stylist in New York, and a brother, Dr. Hassan Abedin, who is a Fellow at Oxford University’s Centre for Islamic Studies.

The Nation newspaper in Pakistan called her “dignified” but that’s about all that’s been said about Abedin here in Pakistan, where male politicians’ adulterous behaviour has never lost them significant political standing, and where the wives of famous figures aren’t given much sympathetic editorial space to begin with. The US media circus and its fixation with the private lives of its elected representatives remains an enigma here. Washingtonian politics, far more conservative than Islamabad’s, have cost many American politicians their careers including several presidential hopefuls and even the impeachment of a former president, all for the sake of an illicit relationship.

The Huffington Post cited the Weiner-Abedin pairing as a living example of their theory that “attractive men don’t make the best husbands,” yet, continued the report, high powered women continue to look for physical attractiveness in their mates. Although Weiner could be perceived by some as attractive, it’s Abedin who’s described more frequently as “beautiful,” along with “well coiffed,” “elegant”and “smart” by political aides, journalists and colleagues. A slender 5’6,” she has distinctly Indo-Pak features with characteristically medium-long dark hair. She’s famously tightlipped about her personal life, which includes ex-boyfriends from Hollywood’s enviable A-list, George Clooney and John Cusack.

In 2010, Time magazine listed her among their complimentary “40 under-40s,” feature describing her as Hillary’s second “shadow.” She has also featured in a glamorous photo shoot for US Vogue in 2007, where Hillary is quoted as saying:

“Abedin has the energy of a woman in her 20s, the confidence of a woman in her 30s, the experience of a woman in her 40s, and the grace of a woman in her 50s. She is timeless, her combination of poise, kindness, and intelligence are matchless.”

However, even the closeness of Abedin with her boss has met with untoward suspicion—‘is she Hillary’s secret lover and does she live with the Clinton’s household,’ went the malicious Republican rumour mill. Even Huma’s elegant wardrobe, penchant for designer handbags and purchasing of an apartment in an upscale Washington DC neighbourhood has conspiracy theorists wondering where her money came from, suggesting that she is a “Saudi intelligence officer.” Yet, there are others in the American media who identify the backlash as a blatant “witch hunt against Huma Abedin” and Eliana Benador’s blog as “paranoid Islamophobia.”

Huma Abedin started her illustrious career as an intern at the Office of the First Lady and has remained by her side since. In 1996, while Monica Lewinsky infamously interned for President Bill Clinton, Huma earned Hillary’s trust during the ensuing scandal and has remained by her side since then; she was her right hand person during Hillary’s meteoric rise to New York Senator, during her presidential campaign, and continues to be her trusted confidante at the State Department. Hillary is always effusive in her praise of her, promoting her from Intern to Staff Assistant to the First Lady’s Chief of Staff, and then to aide and advisor to Traveling Chief of Staff before her current role as Deputy Chief of Staff to the Secretary of State.

Weiner courted Abedin during Hillary’s presidential campaign in 2008 and, according to a speech he made at their wedding, he pursued Huma relentlessly despite her initial rejection of him. She was aware of Weiner’s playboy past, though unlikely to have guessed that it would continue into their married life together. The besotted couple married in July 2010 with her family’s blessing (aka ‘rishta’), at the fairytale-like Oheka Castle in Long Island, New York, in a garden ceremony with a jazz band playing in the background and the glamorous guests dressed in tuxes and gowns. At a pre-wedding celebration earlier, Hillary had made a touching speech, saying:

“I have one daughter. But if I had a second daughter, it would [be] Huma,”

On the Abedin-Weiner wedding day, the bride wore her Pakistani grandmother’s heirloom necklace and a ravishing, custom designed east-west fusion gown using burnt gold embroidery by Oscar de la Renta. Designer De La Renta, a close friend of the Clintons’ and Abedin’s, spoke fondly of Huma saying that he made her a dress “that reflected her history.”

He added:

“It was like dressing Scheherazade, the beautiful queen from ‘One Thousand and One Nights.’”

The ceremony was officiated by former President Bill Clinton, who remarked ominously at the time that politicians did not make easy spouses because it is “easy to distrust them, whatever their religion.”

In wake of the sexting scandal and the revelation that she was pregnant with the couple’s first child, she continued her rigorous job and continued to travel with Clinton as she immersed herself into her work since Huma Abedin is not merely the wife of a Congressman but a powerful entity on her own. According to CNN’s Alan Duke:

“Her popularity among movers and shakers in the Democratic Party should have been an asset for Weiner’s future.”

Although Abedin seems to have received lukewarm sympathy in the media, there hasn’t been an strong outpouring of pubic support as one might have expected in such a case. However, an internet spoof report about Huma Abedin running for Congress caught on as a rumour with a generally positive response (which in itself is no small feat for a Muslim American woman in post-9/11 America). Cairo-born former Assistant Secretary of State Dina Habib Powell once said that Huma “certainly feels a deep responsibility to encourage more mutual understanding between her beliefs and culture and American culture.”

It seems that her husband’s scandal has created an even greater necessity for this.

…And, not that it’s anyone business, but Judaism is passed on from mothers to their children, not from fathers.  Baby Abedin-Weiner is likely to reflect his/her maternal grandparents legacy of interfaith dialogue and respect, as well his/her parents’ interfaith efforts within their own marriage: his/her mother Huma married a man with a secular Jewish background from Brooklyn; his/her father Anthony has fasted with his Muslim wife during Ramadan and given up alcohol. It may not be everything, but it’s more than many couples can claim to share even when they profess the same religion.

A recent photograph of Huma and Anthony showed the two smiling as they grocery shopped on their way to a weekend in the Hamptons. Anthony Weiner may have resigned in disgrace and ended a promising political career but, as her loyalty to Hillary Clinton has already proved, Huma Abedin is not likely to leave his side.

9/11...back when it happened

Written: 19th October, 2001

New York City

Everything always looks different from the outside.
It’s amusing, in a perverse kind of way, to see the horror that strikes people’s faces when they discover that I’m Pakistani and am planning to travel there soon. They implore me to reconsider with rejoinders like: “It’s incredibly dangerous! You can’t go there now!” In short, they think I’m insane to leave a dangerous city like New York for an even more dangerous city like Lahore.
Would you agree? Or would you say that it just looks worse on TV, that the thousands of Pakistani protestors we’ve been seeing on American TV are only in certain areas and that life is going on much the same way as usual for relatively sheltered people like you and I?
Such reactions are normal, though. One tends to thinks twice before visiting a headline-making place like Beirut or Kosovo, even though those are likely to be safer destinations than New York is right now. The media, with its harrowing kaleidoscope of imagery, mirrors a sick, cruel world that we are forced to confront in the midst of turmoil at the local and global levels. We are, however, seeing a more fair representation of the victims on various fronts than we did during the Gulf ‘War.’ We hear the agony of family members who have lost loved ones in the Twin Towers, weeping over why they’ve been punished in such a brutal manner. We see destitute, amputated children in the dusty plains of Afghanistan who are barely aware of what’s happening around them, so immune have they become. Judging from what one sees on TV, Musharraf reassuringly comes across as confident and rational. The entire Pakistani population, on the other hand, seems to consist of only angry mustached males in their 20s and 30s, clerics standing on podiums, and young boys in madrassas rocking back and forth as they spout Quranic verses. As for the rest of the population, we really don’t seem to exist.
Here in the US, one is bombarded with headlines in the print and broadcast media that include ‘America United,’ ‘America Under Attack,’ and ‘Why They Hate Us.’ For the most part, the populace has led a blissfully sheltered existence and has only now begun to weave their way into the complex mesh that is US Foreign Affairs. The American public can now easily locate Afghanistan on the map—the US is fast becoming a less isolationist nation. Public taste isn’t quite in harmony with action flicks at the moment, so not as many people are going to the movies, although Directors of films such as ‘The Siege’ and ‘Air Force One’ have been given new respect for their narrative foresight. Shopping malls are desolate and companies are rapidly closing down. Airlines—the ones that still exist—are trying to lure people into buying tickets by offering huge discounts. Americans, including those who are Muslim, are analyzing the underlying meanings of Islam for themselves to see if it can help them understand the complex layers of this catastrophic international battlefield, and to be equipped to answer their children’s questions. Debates continue on television, at the workplace, and bars, and urban legends rule the Internet. The questions are mostly geared towards Islam’s stance on violence, the nature of Taliban rule, who and what extremists are. One certainly questions oneself. How many of us, for instance, really thought of the term Jihad as an inward spiritual struggle rather than what we’ve been brought up to believe?
The first days following September 11th stand out in my mind as being the only time when I witnessed the great NYC machine brought to a standstill. The air was cloudy with ash, smelling putrid of debris and corpses, enough to make you cringe and weep at the same time. Policemen could be (and continue to be) found on every block, outside every place of worship and every notable building. In a city known for its traffic jams, there was no need to wait for a ‘Walk’ sign as there were simply not enough cars on the street. In one fateful morning, the bustling metropolis had transformed into a surrealistic war zone: the Empire State Building, surrounded by bomb-sniffing dogs and special forces, and the site of the occasional U.S. Army Hummer on the street, were among the sights recorded in the Camcorders of the tourists stranded there. Bus shelters and telephone kiosks were covered with ‘Missing’ notices of the vast majority of people lost in the WTC whose bodies hadn’t been recovered in the hopes that they would miraculously turn up. Candlelight vigils had become part of daily routine. The American Red Cross actually received an excessive amount of blood from donors, so eager were people to have something to contribute towards. Union Square on 14th St. became a shrine of hope and memorabilia, a place that people could use as a forum for expression. There were messages of peace, strength and unity written by people from around the world including verses from Holy texts including the Quran. There were low platforms covered with flowers, lit candles and burning incense. Last but not least, there were the requisite camera-crews reporting live nearby with their satellite dishes perched atop their respective vans.
Ever since the first trucks, filled to the brim with the remains of that blighted neighborhood on Fulton St., were being carted away down FDR Drive, New Yorkers began socializing with gusto at events planned for relief funds. Not only was continuing with an active nightlife beneficial for raising funds for disaster victims, but it also served to preserve one’s sanity. We had all seen downtown Manhattan burning from our rooftops, smelt it through our gas masks, felt it in spirit as well as presence, and we needed to block it out for a few hours a week. Most people went back to work almost immediately, except for those who were left without their offices. Time is money in a place such as this, and the widespread prioritization of the philanthropic and spiritual above the material was immediately felt. However, so was the general desire for retribution.
Since the first week, things have gradually begun returning to a more normal level…but not quite. Despite getting back in the groove with one’s routine, one continues to harbor fear at what could happen next, fear that someone near us could be a terrorist, fear that someone around us could think of one of us as being a terrorist. There have been countless false alarms, bomb scares, frightening forwarded emails about the possibility of a future strike, and now there’s the threat of Anthrax. By the time this article is published, there might even be something new to be cautious about. In characteristic New York fashion, there is no general vibe of fear or hysteria despite what newspapers describe or what news anchor may warn about, which has a great deal to do with the tremendous strength displayed by Mayor Rudy ‘the Rock’ Giuiliani. During turbulent times, the need for strong leadership is crucial to keep the masses appeased. Even George W. Bush, previously the butt of every standup comedian’s jokes, has gained the respect of the staunchest of Democrats. American patriotism is at its peak. One can see this being capitalized in t-shirts being sold on the street—some state ‘We Shall Overcome,’ others bear Osama’s features and the caption, ‘Wanted: Dead or Alive.’ Stars & Stripes are on stickers, flags, shirts, houses, fashion runways, store displays, office windows and yes, even cabs. Nobody, particularly anyone ‘foreign’-looking, wants his or her patriotism to be questioned.
The evening of the WTC collapse, a woman making a very heated statement about Middle Eastern politics glared repeatedly at my friend and I who were sitting nearby. It was a numbing experience. Around the same time, an elderly woman offered me a throat lozenge while I was coughing, and a policeman bid us Good Evening and advised us to dress more warmly as it was getting chilly. Yet, somehow, that one negative event stood out in my mind more than the two positive ones. I told myself that it was natural for people to feel angry, but couldn’t help feeling fearful at the extent of this anger, which seemed to be coming from every direction.
One outburst came from quite a different direction. Selim, who is Turkish-American and works in the music industry, is adamant about getting his point across. “The clash against Middle Easterners is awful!"
Yes, many of my friends are quite vocal with their thoughts. Elise is Moroccan-American and Jewish, works in the textile industry, and has lived in Israel, which she regards as a second home. She remained reasonably calm when the WTC incident occurred—understandably so since this isn’t the first time she’s witnessed urban terror. What does unsettle her is when she hears derogatory statements or sees incidences of discrimination. Despite my protests, she insisted that she would threaten any person on the street she saw glaring at me. Luckily, no one did, although the other day, she sharply reprimanded a garbage collector whom she heard badmouthing Arabs.
Then there’s Sanam, from Islamabad, who has a very worthy job in the philanthropic field. Sanam works in Public Relations for Sakhi, a non-profit organization that represents and works for South Asian women who are victims of domestic violence. Like other Pakistanis working in New York, she feels the irony of the current situation: “Our parents encourage us to come to the US in pursuit of promising careers. When something like this happens in New York of all places, we lose all sense of security—even more so now that Pakistan is heavily involved. I think we’re realizing that that the concept of security is just one big illusion!” Sakhi for South Asian Women, along with various South Asian, Islamic, Arab-American, and Afghani groups such as The Arab-American Family Support Center, Inc, and Women for Afghan Women, has participated in vigils and peace rallies in the City. As the only young Muslim female in her organization, Sanam’s candid views are to appear in the Spanish edition of Marie Claire magazine, the Arab Press, and the Italy-based European Press. She has also had an in-house interview at MTV Studios on Broadway, which has been particularly good with trying to end discrimination and the cultivation of Muslim stereotypes. Their Anti-Discrimination campaign, previously aimed at promoting Gay Rights, aims towards educating American youth to prevent them from succumbing to Islamophobia. Recent topics of Oprah Winfrey shows include ‘Islam 101,’ a sensitive and informative study of the teachings of Islam which included interviews with Maleeha Lodhi and a previous Pakistani Ambassador the UK, as well as Queen Rania of Jordan. ‘Inside the Taliban,’ was the topic of a show that outlined Taliban rule including the plight of Afghan women, as well as briefly mentioning that the Taliban, successfully defeating the USSR after extensive warfare, owed “much of their success to billions of dollars in weapons supplied by the United States.” Efforts such as these directed towards increasing public awareness are incredibly heartening. There will certainly always be room for sympathy and compassion in a world where most else seems to be ruled by aggression.
Despite all the hoopla—‘Breaking News’ headlines accompanied by pulsating music—in the national media, and public paranoia about where and how ‘the Evil One’ (to put it in the words of Mr. Bush) could possibly strike next, life in NYC is, after all, going on much the same as usual. The streets of Broadway, if not the shows themselves, are as crowded as ever; the ‘6’ train, running up and down the east side, rapidly runs out of seating space for irate commuters; there’s still a line of hopefuls outside Lotus, a lounge in the meatpacking district; Junior Vasquez is spinning vinyl somewhere in the City; and everyone is on a treadmill at the New York Sports Club after a 10-hour workday. OK, so Rockefeller Center is partially closed off, there are 3-hour waiting lines at airports and sports stadiums due to increases in security measures, and there are souvenir shops selling $25 postcards of the old New York City skyline. And, of course, a lot of people now watch CNN more than NBC. But, really, things are on the path of getting back to normal. Only now, the definition of normal has changed.
New York was the city that never sleeps. It still is.

19th, October 2001
Also on: http://www.ae.metu.edu.tr/~evren/history/texts/newyork.htm