{"id":2159,"date":"2005-09-05T14:17:52","date_gmt":"2005-09-05T19:17:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com?p=2159"},"modified":"2005-09-05T12:20:45","modified_gmt":"2005-09-05T17:20:45","slug":"the_funeral_of_1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/2005\/09\/05\/the_funeral_of_1\/","title":{"rendered":"The funeral of Hatim Kathiria"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n\n

\"\"<\/a>Per his wishes, slain U.S. citizen<\/a> and Army soldier Hatim Kathiria<\/a> was laid to rest in his home town of Dahod in the state of Gujarat.  The BBC reports<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n

Thousands of mourners have attended the funeral in India’s Gujarat state of an Indian-born US soldier killed in Iraq.<\/p>\n

Hatim Kathiria, a 23-year-old Muslim, who died in a rocket attack in Baghdad on 22 August, was buried in his home town of Dahod.<\/blockquote>\n\n

I hate to sound cynical on such an occasion but this is the first time I’ve seen such a large public Muslim funeral reported in the media that was not for a “martyr” or an innocent victim of collateral damage.  I know this is because such “regular” stories are not as sensational and so the media is uninterested, but it’s good to see an actual soldier being honored for giving his life in battle. <\/p>\n\n

His mother, Shirin, said: “He was my only son. His ambitions took him to the US and then to Iraq. We lost him, but he died a martyr’s death<\/strong>.”<\/blockquote>\n\n

Damn, maybe I spoke too soon.  It sucks that the word martyr has been co-opted by terrorists to the point where it’s hard to distinguish a true martyr (and I’m not sure if I know what qualifies a true martyr).<\/p>\n\n

Of course there was also some drama that took place at the funeral<\/a>.  Kathiria’s parents apparently didn’t know he was married.  Probably because the girl wasn’t Indian:<\/p>\n\n

The crowd fell over each other to catch a glimpse of his Anglo Indian widow Lisse Jean Pierre<\/strong>, who reached Dahod along with the body. <\/p>\n

Amid rumours that Kathiria’s family was unaware about the marriage<\/strong>, which took place earlier this year, a jeans and T-shirt clad Ms Lisse – also a US army specialist – met her in-laws. However, sources said the women of the Bohra community were not allowed to talk to her<\/strong>. She was also kept away from the media, which was present in large number to cover the incident. \n

So tight was the security around the Hussaini Mosque, where the last rituals took place that not even his close relatives were allowed inside. “Normally, Bohra community is better known for its trading prowess but we are proud of Hatim as he joined the US Army and laid down his life for a cause,” Kathiria’s cousin Abuzar Mirchiwala said.<\/blockquote>\n\n

Sigh.  Some things never change.<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Per his wishes, slain U.S. citizen and Army soldier Hatim Kathiria was laid to rest in his home town of Dahod in the state of Gujarat.  The BBC reports: Thousands of mourners have attended the funeral in India’s Gujarat state … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[26,2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2159"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2159"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2159\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sepiamutiny.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}