Friday, December 15, 2006

From Head Scarf to Army Cap, Making a New Life - New York Times

From Head Scarf to Army Cap, Making a New Life - New York Times: "December 15, 2006
Faith and War
From Head Scarf to Army Cap, Making a New Life
By ANDREA ELLIOTT

LACKLAND AIR FORCE BASE, Tex. — Stomping her boots and swinging her bony arms, Fadwa Hamdan led a column of troops through this bleak Texas base.

Only six months earlier, she wore the head scarf of a pious Muslim woman and dropped her eyes in the presence of men. Now she was marching them to dinner.

“I’m gonna be a shooting man, a shooting man!” she cried, her Jordanian accent lost in the chanting voices. “The best I can for Uncle Sam, for Uncle Sam!”

The United States military has long prided itself on molding raw recruits into hardened soldiers. Perhaps none have undergone a transformation quite like that of Ms. Hamdan.

Forbidden by her husband to work, she "

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