WOMEN risking their lives to fight terrorism

Marie Claire, Dec, 2001 by Athina Rapitou

Marie Claire talks to five women who are combating despicable acts of hate and violence around the world

HANI ABRAMOV, 19

On July 31 of this year, Hani Abramov was riding in a jeep with two male army colleagues patrolling "the green line," the volatile border that separates Israel from the Palestinian West Bank. It's a dangerous region even in the best of times. In the worst, it's deadly.

Because it was during a rare peaceful interlude, the group had left their helmets and Kevlar flak jackets behind. Then, suddenly, a car with three men inside sped up and overtook their jeep. "A bullet hit my right leg," Hani says. "I looked up and started to scream, 'They're shooting at us! They're shooting at us!' Then, a second bullet slammed into my face and knocked me out of the jeep. I don't remember anything after that."

Hani was rushed to the hospital. "Everything in my face was smashed: my nose, my jaw, my teeth. Even my lips and gums are damaged," she says, talking with great difficulty 47 days after the attack. She is now convalescing at her parents' home north of Tel Aviv. Doctors told her she was actually lucky: The bullet missed her brain by a centimeter.

"I spent 25 days in the hospital," she says. "At first, I couldn't eat anything but soup. But today, I had some pizza. That's progress.

Hani, like most Israeli teens, was drafted into the military just a few weeks after graduating from high school. She says she chose the border police "because I wanted to fight terrorism in my country. I wanted to be in a combat unit, not stuck doing clerical work somewhere in the Army, which is what often happens to girls."

In the 13 months of her service, Hani has witnessed "a lot of violence. But you expect that when you're involved in antiterrorism security. We had two border patrols killed last year." There have been times when she wanted to hide, she says, but her uniform gives her the strength she needs.

Once she's fully recovered, Hani plans to return to work with the border patrol. "I don't know why," she says thoughtfully, "but I am not afraid. I think this experience has hardened me." -Jan Goodwin

SHOKO EGAWA, 43

In March 1995, followers of the Japanese doomsday cult Aum Supreme Truth released poison gas into the Tokyo subway system, killing 12 and injuring 5500. The attackers used sarin, a deadly nerve agent invented by the Nazis. Colorless, odorless, and fatal within seconds, the gas seeped into train cars packed with commuters. Japan watched in disbelief as choking office workers staggered out into the streets of one of the world's safest, most orderly capitals.

But Japanese journalist Shoko Egawa was not surprised. "My first reaction was anger. I knew that the cult was armed with sarin gas, and I knew they would stop at nothing to achieve their destructive aims," says the tiny, bookish-looking writer. "But Japanese authorities ignored all the warning signs."

Shoko had been investigating the obscure religious sect for years. She'd discovered that Aum was led by a partially blind guru named Shoko Asahara who preached that his followers must wage a holy war. To distort his followers' minds, he reportedly made them drink potions made of his own blood and bath water, secretly laced with hallucinogenic drugs. Shoko Egawa began exposing the cult in newspaper articles-and soon became a target herself. In 1994, cult members tried to kill her by pumping poison gas into her home.

The attempt on her life helped prompt Japanese police to raid the 10,000-strong cult, and Shoko's crusade eventually resulted in many of the cult leaders being convicted.

Shoko has spent the years since doggedly reporting on the Aum trials (millionaire guru Asahara has yet to be convicted), trying to get justice and keep the cult from re-emerging. But, while the group's numbers dropped after the guru's arrest, they have steadily risen again. Under a new name, Aleph, the cult now has over 2000 members in Japan alone and has even held pop concerts to persuade the public it has "reformed."

Shoko is unconvinced. Fanatical religious devotion is easy to abuse, she says, because followers can easily be brainwashed into believing that the real world is evil and that violence will result in eternal happiness. "The danger," she says, "still remains." And she is keeping watch.--Abigail Haworth

JENNIFER AMOROSO, 30

Jennifer Amoroso's telephone has been ringing nonstop since September 11. As an expert in Middle East terrorism, she now finds herself squarely in the midst of America's public battle to wipe out terrorism here and abroad.

That mission is nothing new for the Spokane, WA, resident. As a counter-terrorism consultant, she works regularly with the government to anticipate and head off terrorist attacks. She certainly has the resume for the job: For three years, she served as the chief of intelligence operations for the U.S. Air Force Security Forces Headquarters, Force Protection Battlelab, tracking and analyzing terrorists' moves around the globe. Today, she delves into the minds of monsters such as those who hijacked the four U.S. commercial airplanes, creating strategies to catch them before they act.