The wife of an Egyptian man who gunned down two people at the Los Angeles airport said Monday that her husband is innocent and that he gave no hint of violence, during a telephone call, hours before the shooting.
"My husband didn't do such a thing. This is nonsense," Hala Mohammed Sadeq El-Awadly, 41, told The Associated Press on Monday in Cairo.
"Hesham called on July 4, it was his birthday. His voice was very beautiful," she said. "He asked about the boys, asked me to take them out a lot and to review their lessons with them in order to be ready for next year."
El-Awadly added she did not believe her husband was responsible for the July 4 shooting and was being blamed because he was Arab and Muslim. "He is a victim of injustice," she said three times. "In America, they hate Islam and Arabs after September 11."
El-Awadly said she could not wear black, mourn or cry because she had not yet told her sons – Omar, 12, and Adam, 7 - any of what had happened.
She said she was thankful that their Arabic was so poor they could not understand media reports or the conversations of the adults around them - though the older boy has been asking why his father's name keeps coming up.
His wife said he was not a violent man and had never expressed anger at Israel or at the recent Israeli-Palestinian violence that has sparked anti-Israeli protests throughout the Arab world.
"No, this wasn't an issue," El-Awadly said without elaborating.
"We became very cautious, and sometimes scared. Every Muslim became a suspect," El-Awadly said.
El-Awadly said she, Omar and Adam came to Cairo on June 15 to be near her mother, who was to have an open-heart operation. Her husband, who owned a limousine business, had not planned to join them because of his work.
El-Awadly and her sons have reservations to fly back to California on August 20 and an appointment later that month to be interviewed by immigration authorities considering their citizenship request.
"I don't know now whether I am going back or not. Our lives are upside down," El-Awadly said.
For days, she has spent hours being questioned by Egyptian government security agents and expected "more days of interrogation to come."
She said the agents told her not to talk to reporters. Looking pale and with her graying hair disheveled, she at first slammed the door of her parents' downtown Cairo apartment in the face of a reporter. Later, she spoke by phone from behind the door to the reporter standing in the stairwell and apologized for slamming the door.
"I'm in a state of shock, I feel I'm having a nervous break down," she said in a voice choked with tears. "Pray for us please." (Albawaba.com)
© 2002 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
