Leila Ahmed And The Attack By Jaffari: An Analysis

it is an innate nature of humans to want to belong to a group or a community. As people grow older they develop their sense of identity and belonging based their interaction with their environment and the other people around. To many identity is belonging to something you identify with or as a part of. Moreover, a lot of people just adapt the identity and the culture they are raised on. Many parents will not discuss what is Identity or what does it mean to be a part of community with their children and they expect their children to grow up to be like them. Leila Ahmed and Amin Jaffari are two people who grew in colonized countries with two different realities the reality that colonizer created and the reality of the colonized. Leila Ahmed grew up in Egypt which was a the British colony at the time, she was from a rich family which enable her to live a comfortable life. Leila went to a an English school and her family was a traditional Egyptian family who had strong feeling of identity and love to their cultures. However, Amin was a Palestinian-Israeli successful doctor who lived in Israel. We read in “A Border Passage” and “the Attack” that both characters had …show more content…
When Leila moves to United Arab Emirates she finds herself facing whole new culture different than the Arabic culture she knew in Egypt, and a different Arabic language than her own. Leila’s identity issues now are even more complicated than ever. After Jaafari’s wife Siham commits a suicide booming, Jaffari faint sense of belonging fades and he is left with broken heart and feeling betrayed and alone. For Jaafari having a home and wife, home, and a successful career might have been the only sense of belonging he ever felt. Therefore, we see his despair and cynical view of the world after his wife’s betrayal shatters his