The mother of a slain Muslim soldier in the Iraq war has hit back at Donald Trump’s criticism that she did not speak alongside her husband at the Democratic National Convention.
Ghazala Khan, whose son Humayun Khan was posthumously awarded a bronze star and the purple heart for heroism in Iraq, stood beside her husband at the DNC as he delivered a powerful address to the Republican nominee, urging him to not smear Muslims’ character.
Ms Khan was later criticised by Mr Trump for being silent, and he questioned whether she had been “allowed” to speak.
“Here is my answer to Donald Trump: Because without saying a thing, all the world, all America, felt my pain. I am a Gold Star mother. Whoever saw me felt me in their heart,” she wrote in an op-ed for the Washington Post.
Her son and middle child, who was an army captain, signed up to the Reserve Officers' Training Corps at the University of Virginia before the 9/11 attacks, and she and her husband, Khizr Khan, had worried for his safety when he went to Iraq.
She said she had begged him not to “run around trying to become a hero” but he had responded: “Mum, these are my soldiers, these are my people. I have to take care of them.”
She last spoke to him on Mother's Day in 2004. On 8 June he was later killed by car bomb at the gates of his military base.
She wrote that she still prayed and cried for her son every day, even though 12 years have passed, and she still cannot walk into a room with his pictures in it.
“Walking onto the convention stage, with a huge picture of my son behind me, I could hardly control myself. What mother could? Donald Trump has children whom he loves. Does he really need to wonder why I did not speak?”
Her husband had asked her if she wanted to speak, but she declined. She said that her religion teaches her that all human beings are equal in the eyes of God, and marriage is based on love and respect.
"When Donald Trump is talking about Islam, he is ignorant. If he studied the real Islam and Koran, all the ideas he gets from terrorists would change, because terrorism is a different religion," she said.
"Donald Trump said he has made a lot of sacrifices. He doesn’t know what the word sacrifice means."
Mr Khan said during an MSNBC interview: “I am much weaker than she is in such matters. Forty years of marriage [have] brought us in a position where we are a strength for one another, so her being there was the strength so that I could hold my composure.”
Mr Khan had indirectly asked Mr Trump at the DNC whether he had made any sacrifices for his country.
The Republican nominee told ABC news that he had made sacrifices: he had worked “very hard”, he had created jobs for thousands of people and raised millions of dollars for military veteran charities.
His answers were mocked and spurred a hashtag on twitter called “Trump Sacrifices”.
