donderdag 22 oktober 2009

The Hunt for Malika Karoum | more Gossip but now in a book

malika boek2 The story of Malika Karoum is no doubt widespread by now: Spy, Mata Hari, Fraud, Money-laundering but all these stories seem to go back to gossip spread by her ex-husband and a fundamentalistic kid-hunter in  what is not more than an ugly custody battle.

Now there is a book (“Klopjacht op Malika” = “The Hunt for Malika”) about the story that in its announcements promised to finally reveal the truth. The fact that the book is written by Jan Libbenga, a reporter for Dutch Tabloid ‘Revu’, should cast some doubt about that statement. Libbenga after all,  ‘broke the story’ about Malika’s alleged Mata-Hari life.

Reading the book indeed confirms that suspicion. It is ‘more of the same’. There is ample space for kid-hunter Jacques Smit to repeat the unfounded gossip he has been spreading in the past, but now it is ‘substantiated’ by the stories of a certain ‘Rafiq’ who supposedly is the man who ‘supposedly’ contracted and trained Malika to work for ‘the intelligence service’.

Rafiq has no reliability. There is no proof for any of his stories and he could be anyTom, Dick or Harry, with a big fantasy, that was picked of the street.

One thing is clear: Rafiq is mentally instable. After Malika (alledgedly) informs him that she is quitting. He has an emotional meltdown that includes black-outs and a trance state in which he ended up in the Netherlands without remembering how. Typically the sort of guy that would get through the rigourous mental selection spies are said to go through.

It is all beautiful stories, but again, not a shread of convincing proof

It only proves that gossip can ruin a person's life.

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