Fort Worth Marathon for Aafia

By Nadrat Siddique

November 8, 2021
Fort Worth, TX

This weekend, I ran the 26.2 mile Fort Worth Marathon (race) to call attention to the glaring injustice of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui's imprisonment in that town. For the crime of being an unapologetic Muslimah, she's serving an 86-year term. That means--if the authorities have their way--she may still be in prison after most readers of this post are dead.

Before her imprisonment, she was super-conservative; very family-oriented; and well known and active in her community, local mosques, and student organizations. And she was very focused on intellectual pursuits, earning advanced degrees from MIT and Brandeis in a short time.

I'm not sure how Aafia would view the enormity of my traveling 1,400 miles from the Washington, DC area to Texas to run a marathon in her name, and that, too, in funky red tights.

Some photos of my Fort Worth Marathon for Dr. Aafia Siddiqui are here.

The marathon, interestingly, is run on a portion of the Trinity Trail. This is part of a  huge system of trails- over 100 miles in total- called the Trinity Trails System. It is so expansive that you can basically travel the entire city on foot, bike, or rollerblade, relying solely on the trail.

During the marathon, an approximately 6.5 mile segment of the trail is traversed 4 times. Much of the route is flat and follows the Trinity River. I saw egrets, herons, and other waterfowl as I ran, repeatedly murmuring "subhanAllah" to myself. Along the way, there were water and Gatorade stops--and Saleema Gul.

What Gul Did

Saleema Gul, a staunch supporter of Aafia, came out to assist me in my marathon effort. In October, she'd helped organize a protest for Aafia (one of a five-city mobilization) outside the Pakistan Consulate in Houston, despite the strong objections of consular officials, including the CG, Abrar Hashmi. Seemingly in an attempt to disavow responsibility for the Pakistan government's essential role in Aafia's abduction from Karachi, and then her transfer to U.S. authorities for torture, the Consulate insisted that the protest not occur near their premises. "Any location but the Consulate" was the message. The Aafia Foundation and its coalition partners went ahead with the Pakistan Consulate protest anyway.

This time around, Gul again showed that she had more guts than most men. Fort Worth is nearly four hours from Houston. The Houston-based Gul woke up around 1:00 AM, chugged down some coffee, then jumped in her car and headed to Fort Worth. She was at the race with her "Free Aafia" sign well before me--and I was staying in a hotel literally 15 minutes away!

While I was running (sporting my "Free Aafia Siddiqui tee, prepared for me by an all-women's collective in Indiana), Gul was busily explaining Aafia's case to numerous bystanders.

As I passed by her, I was a bit concerned that she, a petite Pakistani hijabi, was standing in the midst of a largely White, largely pro-Republican crowd rocking a "Free Aafia" sign. And- Texas has an open-carry law. In other words, guns can legally be carried in plain view, on one's person in public places. Pro-Trumpers and others were known to use the provision to their advantage. Gul did not seem to be the least bit concerned. Afterwards, she told me the reception she got was generally positive, and that people were polite--even friendly--in some cases.

Torture in the Shadow of the Trinity

In the DFW area, everything seems to be about Trinity. As mentioned, there's the Trinity Trail, which runs along the Trinity River. Then, there's Trinity Park, Trinity Springs, Trinity High School, and Trinity Valley Middle School. There are churches of all denominations bearing the name Trinity. Then, there's Trinity Spine and Orthopedics, Trinity Valley School of Ballet, and Trinity Self Storage.

There is even a portion of the Trinity Trail a stone's throw from FMC Carswell, the prison where Aafia is held.

Although my understanding of the Trinity (in Christian belief) is limited, I do know that Jesus (AS) is a crucial component of this. To Christians, he is the Son (ouzo-billah). To Muslims, he is the revered messenger of God, sent to the people of his time to bring them to God's Word.

In either case, Jesus, like Aafia, was tortured horribly by the authorities of the time. And, like Aafia, he did not give up his faith under torture. 

As I left Fort Worth, I wondered what Jesus would say if he knew of an innocent Pakistani Muslim woman's continued abuse in an ostensible prison hospital, in the area popularly known as the "Bible Belt." Would he sanction Aafia being forced by her jailors, to walk on her holy book, Al-Qur'an?

#FreeAafiaSiddiqui #FortWorthMarathon #RunningForJustice #IAmAafia #FreeAllPoliticalPrisoners 

© 2021 Nadrat Siddique

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Nadrat Siddique is a Pakistani Muslim woman marathoner who lives in the Washington, DC area. She has done 48 marathons, frequently combining her twin passions of advocating for political prisoners and distance running by doing marathons to draw attention to political prisoners' cases. Previously, she did two Boston marathons, two Chicago marathons, and a Washington, DC marathon to draw attention to Dr. Aafia Siddiqui's case.

Yazidi Woman Awarded Not-So-Nobel Prize

Nadia Murad, an Iraqi Yazidi woman was selected to receive the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this month. It is instructive that:

1) Iraq has a population of 37,000,000 (37 million) people, all of whom have lived under U.S. occupation and war/ proxy-war since 2003. Off those millions, the Nobel committee selected a clear Islam-hater;

2) Of that population (37 million), 90% are Muslim. (Yazidis, by comparison, form 2% of the population.) Vast segments of the Muslim population have fought back against the U.S. occupation and war, often times in ways which demonstrated extraordinary courage and heroism. (Despite the pervasive labels and propaganda against fighters who oppose U.S. power, fighting a superpower with vastly great force of arms can only be described as heroic, and in any other era--e.g. the Warsaw Ghetto, the Algerian Civil War, etc.--would be viewed as an act of courage.)

Comparable to the Palestinian children throwing rocks at Israeli tanks, Iraqis (in the early days of the war) armed with only IEDs would launch themselves upon U.S. APCs and tanks--but only after the U.S. dropped 50,000 bombs and missiles on Baghdad in just over a month's period. And yet not one Muslim fighting occupation and oppression was deemed worthy of the Nobel committee's consideration;

3) Iraqi Muslim women suffered perhaps the most as a result of the U.S. occupation and war; and many of them have fought back against the terror enacted upon them by a Superpower terror. Again, not one of them was deemed worthy of the Nobel award.

Only Nadia Murad was deemed worthy. After she visited Israel (in a trip to witness the enacting of legislation protecting Yazidis, an incredible irony in a state which practices apartheid against Palestinians), she returned to Germany where she currently resides. Shortly after that, she was notified by the Nobel Committee of her award. In response, she said, "I am incredibly honored and humbled by their support and I share this award with all Yazidis with all the Iraqis, Kurds and all the minorities and all survivors of sexual violence around the world." Oddly, she uttered not one word against those who had occupied and steadily destroyed and destabilized her country since 1991.

If it were up to me, Abeer an-Janabi, the 14-year old Iraqi girl raped and burned to death by U.S. troops in 2006 (all of her family were killed by U.S. troops in the same incidentj) would have received the Nobel. Posthumously, if there is such a thing as a posthumous Nobel. THAT would have restored the dignity of the Nobel.

© 2018 Nadrat Siddique