War tests all faiths

By Michael Tsai
Advertiser Staff Writer

When Mona Darwich-Gatto attends a Memorial Day service today, she'll do so beneath the traditional head covering of her Muslim faith.

Mona Darwich-Gatto and her husband, Marine Sgt. Omar Gatto, are practicing Muslims. The couple, shown with their prayer mats in their Mililani home, today will reflect on the lives of service members and civilians lost in the Afghanistan and Iraq conflicts. Eugene Tanner • The Honolulu Advertiser

"I've been to memorials and looked around and asked myself, 'Where are the Muslims?' " said Darwich-Gatto, who was born in Brazil and spent her late teens in her parents' home country, Egypt. "I think we have a responsibility. As a minority here, we have the experience and the expertise to bridge the divide."

It is that divide, the perceived disconnect between Islam and the continuing U.S. military action on Muslim soil, that has prompted the 29-year-old Darwich-Gatto to closely examine her life, her allegiances, and her convictions, both internally and in an essay she is writing for the National Endowment of the Arts' "Operation Homecoming" project.

At a time when zealots, ideologues and opportunists on both sides of the conflict have tried to frame America's actions in Iraq and Afghanistan as a struggle between the democratic Christian West and the collective Muslim world, Darwich-Gatto said her experiences as an American military wife and a devout Muslim have led her to reflect on this holiday in the most basic, human terms.

"I think about all the soldiers who have lost their lives and also about the Muslims who have lost their lives," she said. "I think about their families, their loved ones, and it brings me to tears.

"This is an important holiday for me."

Friends lost

Omar Gatto doesn't plan on attending any of today's public observances, but in his own way, he'll remember the good friends and comrades who died in Afghanistan. Some of these men he knew from a previous stint patrolling the Turkish-northern Iraq border.

"The ironic thing was these were guys who were curious about Islam," Gatto said. "They asked me questions because they wanted to better understand what it was all about."

Gatto, 29, grew up in Pittsburgh. His mother was Protestant, but Gatto said he didn't consider himself a religious person until he found Islam in 1991.

"I was drawn to its simplicity," Gatto said. "The way it was presented to me was very simple: There is divinity and there is you. The fact that there were rules was very attractive to me too at the time."

Gatto, whose studies in Arabic and other Middle Eastern languages led to his present work as a linguist with the Joint Intelligence Center-Pacific, met his future wife through her brother, a neighbor who attended the same mosque.

Mona was living in Egypt at the time, and the two corresponded for a year before Gatto finally visited her. They were married in 1996.

There were murmurings and a few disapproving looks when the couple appeared in public, but nothing intimidating, no threat of real danger.

"I got married in my (military) uniform," Omar Gatto said. "We had this big wedding on the street. They just closed off a street and we had like a big block party."

But that was before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and before the worldwide war against terror.

"Nobody bothered us back then," Darwich-Gatto said. "I can't imagine what it would be like now. I know I would not go to the Middle East with my military ID."

No mixed feelings

The couple had just arrived in Hawai'i from California when the attacks in New York and the Washington area happened.

"I knew the terrorists were Muslim from the beginning," Gatto said. "I didn't have any mixed feelings. I was angry from the outset. How dare they do this?

"I saw Muslims (in America) go from being very insular, very inward to being very vocal and active in their communities and I was very enthusiastic about this," Gatto said. "So when 9/11 happened, it seemed to me like a calculated attempt to draw a wedge between us. I felt it was more an attack against Muslims than against America."

Gatto said he had no reservations about serving in Afghanistan because he didn't view it as an attack on Islam.

"I have enough faith in the Marine Corps that we weren't just going in there to kill people indiscriminately out of revenge," he said. "It was highly targeted to those who were responsible."

Gatto said he considers the U.S. invasion of Iraq to be "the right thing for the wrong reason," and he bemoans the politicizing of the conflict. Still, he said, he has never felt his Muslim beliefs were compromised by fighting a war in a Muslim country.

"Without getting into how the politicians act, on our level, it's easy to be a Muslim and be a Marine at the same time," Gatto said. "Our training and how we're expected to carry ourselves as Marines fits well. Integrity is absolutely essential in both, especially when people's lives are at stake.

"I've never been caught where I've had to do something against my faith or against my conscience," he said.

Another view

Chris Kendrick, 23, comes from a long and distinguished line of soldiers, including close relatives who have served in every major conflict since World War II.

But while Kendrick, a recent convert to Islam, prays for the safety of U.S. troops abroad, he said he can't in good conscience support their presence in Iraq.

"I don't see how any good can come from Muslims killing Muslims," he said. "The Muslim world knows that what the terrorists did was evil, but the (U.S.) response does not cure that evil. It just makes it worse."

Kendrick, a student at Kapi'olani Community College, plans on being at Punchbowl today to pay his respects to the fallen soldiers he calls "real heroes."

"I think the best thing we can do as Muslims is work in positive ways to bring an end to war," he said. "I think Muslims and people of other religions have to get over all of this fear and hatred before it destroys everything."

Fear factor

Gatto and Darwich-Gatto both see the national media as creating and perpetuating an atmosphere of fear and distrust.

"The reporting has been almost exclusively negative," Gatto said. "Network news, in particular, survives on fear, uncertainty and doubt. They make you think that you have to fear Islam and Muslims. The LCD (lowest common denominator) is always fear."

The situation in the Middle East isn't much better, Darwich-Gatto said.

"My family is still in Egypt and they reflect what they see there, especially on al-Jazeera," she said. "For them, (the war on terror) was a Jewish conspiracy."

Gatto has heard his share of outlandish comments from both sides of the divide, yet he's encouraged by the acceptance that he's experienced within the Marine Corps and that he and his wife have felt living in Hawai'i.

"I don't hear too much here," Gatto said. "Even after 9/11, people didn't look at us funny because (Mona) was wearing a scarf on her head. That was tremendous. I think it could have been a lot worse if we were in California."

Darwich-Gatto, who said she received more support from other military wives than from the local Muslim community during Omar's deployment, said she hopes other Muslims will step forward to support U.S. troops fighting a radical fringe that has compromised the integrity of Islam.

Today, she has one more message: "I just want to thank the troops for all that they've sacrificed."

Reach Michael Tsai at mtsai@honoluluadvertiser.com or 535-2461.