Mariam Al Mansouri’s participation in F-16 bombing raids for the UAE was celebrated in the West, but an anonymous statement claiming to be from her family ‘disowned’ her for ‘taking part in the brutal international aggression’ against Syria.
It also expressed support for the Islamic State, saying ‘we are proud of the Sunni heroes in Iraq and the Levant’. The brutal terrorist group’s original name was the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or Isil. The statement also expressed support for the Syrian revolution, according to the Palestinian Wattan news agency.
Read the statement below
‘We the Mansouri family in the United Arab Emirates hereby publicly declare that we disown the so-called Mariam Al Mansouri as well as anyone taking part in the brutal international aggression against the brotherly Syrian people, starting with our ingrate daughter Mariam Al Mansouri.
‘We hereby remind the Muslim nation all over the world of its duty to defend the causes of the nation [meaning the Islamic nation], and we urge them to take up the jihad [holy war] for the sake of God to support the blessed Syrian revolution against the descendants of Ibn Al Alqami.’ [Sunni Islamist insurgents refer to the Shi’a as ‘alqami’ – a reference to Mu’ayyad al-Din Muhammad Ibn al-Alqami, a Shi’ite minister in the last Abbasid caliphate, who purportedly assisted the Mongols in conquering Baghdad in 1258.]
‘We call upon all factions and battalions operating on the Syrian battleground to unite and join efforts and forces towards the single objective of overthrowing the monstrous Assad regime perched on the pure and blessed Syrian land.
‘Al Mansouri family, in the UAE and abroad, takes this opportunity to declare its support for the blessed Syrian revolution and to all free men defending their rights everywhere in the world.
‘Our family is proud of all free men who defend their cause and of all those who take up arms to defend the honour of their nation [The Islamic Nation}. We are proud of the Sunni heroes in Iraq and the Levant and all those who take up the banner of righteousness wherever they may be. We may not know them, but God knows them and would champion them.
‘We ask our countrymen not to burden us with the consequences of the actions of the so-called Mariam Al Mansouri. All the honourable members of our family have agreed to this statement.
‘Al Mansouri family.’