Shaima al Awadhi

A mother is dead at 38. She leaves five school aged children behind, orphans. Her teenage daughter found her beaten almost to death in her own home. The killer left behind a note: terrorist go home.
When she fled Saddam's Iraq 20 years ago she must have thought that she and her family would be safe in America. She surely never dreamed that the ghosts of Hitler and the KKK would be waiting to take her life.
She was murdered for the crime of being foreign, alien, darker skinned, worshipping Allah, wearing a head scarf.
When you listen to the news on the radio or cable this week you learn that we have yet to exhaust the subject of the Trayvon Martin case but you learn nothing about this entire family being destroyed in California. Why not? Where is the million hijab march? Where are the coast to coast rallies for justice? Whither the endless television coverage of every detail?
Maybe because there is no great controversy? No weird gun laws or police misconduct? Do we really need controversy and manufactured conflict in order to demand justice for a dead woman? Is that what passes for journalism now? That's the way it looks from here and it's a damned shame.
Rest in peace, Shaima.