Shamima Begum, the erstwhile teenage ISIS bride, stuck in a semi-secure detention camp in northern Syria with her UK citizenship revoked is as divisive a figure as ever as her story airs on BBC. A victim or a threat? Even journalists who know the territory and have interviewed her seem unsure. It is now eight years to the day since she left her mum at a London bus stop on a well-planned exit without a hint of where she was going. She passed through a smuggling network run by a spy for Canada, and lived at the centre of the Islamic State caliphate. Her two best friends have been killed, and her three children have died, two likely of starvation and one of pneumonia.
Shortly after she arrived she was ‘matched’ with a husband, who demanded absolute obedience and she said it felt like ‘prostitution’. It was all the more savagely ironic since part of her reason in escaping the UK was to get away from her Bangladeshi immigrant mother who kept her tied down. She is evasive about how much she knew of ISIS savagery either before or during her time in the Middle East. Western countries are mixed about opening their doors to ISIS brides. Canada has recently chosen to repatriate; the USA has been asking nations to do so; Australia has now taken some back. At present she is a stateless person, having had her UK citizenship withdrawn and she has never been in Bangladesh which might be a possibility.
Born 25 August 1999 London, she is a confident Sun Virgo square Pluto – controlled and controlling – and trine an indulgent Jupiter in Taurus. Her Jupiter is tied into a plethora of Fixed planets square to Neptune with (Moon), Uranus in Aquarius opposition North Node in Leo, Mercury and Venus in Leo square Saturn in Taurus with Saturn opposition Mars in Scorpio. It is not an easy chart to warm to – can-be-vengeful, not overly sensitive, sharp-edged, very obstinate.
Tr Saturn moving into Pisces will damp down her Sun and Pluto this year; and Uranus has two years to go before it clears her Fixed planets in a jolting and jangling ride that start several years back. She’s an uncomfortable mix with the UK since her Mars in Scorpio and Saturn in Taurus never mind Uranus collide with the UK’s Fixed planets.
Even those who see her as culpable think she would be better in the UK facing British justice here.
I also feel very sorry for her. The trauma she has been through – the death of three children! World-wide vitriol and vilification in the press, terrible, bleak living conditions, exile in limbo etc etc… She has youth on her side now, but it will all catch up and take a great toll on her later. She has a hard, harsh chart – no nurturing there – Moon square Saturn, conjunct Uranus, sextile Pluto. Venus square Saturn.
I understand on some level, her motivation. I came from a somewhat similar background. That sort of upbringing can be suffocating for a girl. If you have a bolshy, disruptive independent spirit, if you have sexual urges (duh, teenage hormones!), plus the coldness engendered by a lack of being unconditionally loved, valued or ‘seen’, then a culturally strict muslim family can be the most hideously frustrating, tedious, enraging entrapment possible. I have my own runaway story, also ended badly. Though not as badly, thankfully!
Sajid Javid coming down hard on Shamima just spoke of his his own immigrant-in-a-white world-insecurities. I found it pathetic. I do not believe Shamima is a threat to national security. She acted like a pig-headed pillock, but then she was fifteen years old, looking for a utopia. Warrior hard men with guns. Yeah! The (Pakistani origin) comedian Shazia Mirzia at the time twigged what it was about, and her conclusion – it was all about bagging a s**g with some hairy honcho.
I’m so glad you looked at this Marjorie, I’ve often thought that Sajid Javid was making an affirmation about his own status because of his heritage, and would never have acted so harshly towards a young woman of Celtic or Anglo-Saxon background.
I do feel sorry for her, and completely agree with the comments made by SuHu. Unfortunately I think she will have to wait until there is a change of government before she is repatriated. Such a waste of a life, she had so much potential.
Shamima was barely more than a child, naive, unworldly, Yes. Watching an interview with her, asked how she felt seeing civilians being slaughtered, her reply, I felt nothing, seeing heads rolling in the street didn’t upset me. Her sensitivities must have shut down seeing these gut wrenching things happening and no way of escaping. How long will it take her to come to terms with that life. The traumatic events will never leave her. No judgement on her returning to the UK. If this happens hopefully she will be given the support she will need to adjust. The reactions to her return will be very mixed.
There was an especially notable eclipse from a mundane astrology perspective on August 11, 1999. She was born with her Mercury on the eclipse degree just a couple of weeks later. Also interesting to see her Venus square her Mars/Black Moon Lilith conjunction in Scorpio. Not surprising, considering the level of vitriol she has experienced.
I was surprised that anyone would head towards a war zone thinking there’s going to be a successful outcome. Where in the chart do we see that niavety? Are we failing to teach young people enough critical thinking?
If you remember the ISIS proganda films – very slickly produced, they didn’t present it that way. The war zone aspect was probably glamourised in the same way that is was then they conscripted young men in various wars of the last century. The methods were already well established by then, add in free access to unregulated media platforms and they we are.
I don’t think it’s worth looking for naivety in a child’s chart – they just need time to grow up. I agree about critical thinking in schools, I know that many do now. Although – one of the reasons I choose my daughter’s school was because it taught philosophy as a serious subject and not just the usual minimal “religious studies” in the British national curriculum. But it’s now been cut because the government won’t fund schools properly
Can’t say much but v do have an attraction ..a kind of pull towards banned or dark areas of life n universe
I m 22 aug born born on full solar eclipse n my Virgo is also square with Scorpio
Dunno much about astrology but Scorpio in 11h does make us have a pull towards darkness..an escape from mundane life or same repeated social boring framework
Awful I agree. She was a British child, groomed online in the UK. And now the case of Rhianan Rudd as well. It seems that young girls, children, are fair game for exploitation if they’ve been indoctrinated into a cult.
The precedent also makes those of us in Britain born with a second nationality a lower tier citizen – because our citizenship can be revoked, and who knows what will be a crime in the future? Is this going to create a “purer” class of Britishness? Absolutely disgusting and again numpty politicians not thinking through consequences – yet expecting it of children..
Mothers and daughters: always a battleground. I remember how bad it was between me and my daughter when she was 14-16. They so want to fly but understand little of the predatory nature of the world beyond the safety of home. For Shamina it was made worse by the culture clash between her family’s values and those of the society she had grown up in. And clearly in her home these issues were never really talked about. She thought she was gaining her freedom and self-determination by leaving but she fled in the wrong direction, into even greater incarceration in a society which places no value on women but their reproductive capacity.
I feel sorry for her, she has been scapegoated by the British government which has failed completely to address the routes by which people become ensared and ‘radicalised’. I fail to see how she can be a threat to national security, she learned no new skills there apart from how to survive in a war. She didn’t kill anyone, she didn’t run a drugs operation, she didn’t steal the crown jewels and yet she is villified simply for being stupid. Let her return I say, and maybe spend a few years in jail so that society can feel justified in victimizing the victims of self delusion. I am so glad my daughter actually listened to someone else’s mother who was kind enough to sit down with her and explain why I was so ‘strict’.
I don’t know a single soul who thinks she should be allowed back apart from the journalists
I am out all the time thanks and don’t know one person or have ever met anyone who wants her back. She’s exactly where she wanted to be bearing in mind it wasn’t easy to get where she wanted to be.
Love your line
@ suhu
very well said !!