'Beloved Terrorist': The Autobiography of a Terrorist's Dutiful Wife

Anna Sundberg, born in Halmstad, Sweden, once lived among militant Islamists for many years. She endured life in a poor Georgian village, while her husband fought Russia alongside Chechen rebels; she's also lived under house arrest in Damascus with her four children. Now she is sharing her experiences from those times in an aptly-titled book: "Beloved Terrorist."

The book, co-authored by writer Jesper Huor, features Sundberg's bittersweet memories of years as a student in the university town of Lund, where she ended up in endless philosophical discussions with a circle of "seekers" before finally converting to Islam — only to find herself living with a militant Islamist for the next 16 years.

In the book, which has already fetched flattering reviews in the popular media and is soon to hit the market, Anna Sundberg, now a teacher and a proud mother of four, recollects her circle's disillusionment with the mundanity of everyday life, and describes herself as having been "alone in a boat on a stormy sea." The dejection went on until she met Walid, a Muslim from Algeria whose good looks, she recalls, were matched by his spiritual eloquence. Two weeks later, they were happily married.

After converting to Islam and abandoning her former circle of friends and beliefs, she began the life of a zealous Muslim, wearing a niqab and looking after her children. However, she failed, she admits, to "notice the warning signs." Before she knew it, she was separated from her husband, only to be presented to Said Arif, a staunch supporter of the Salafist branch of orthodox Islam, soon to be wanted by the police.

​The not-so-happy couple had to move around the world, but ended up in a village in the Pankisi Gorge in Georgia, near the Chechen border.
Her husband was a radical Muslim Mujahedeen and participated in the terrorists' fight against Russian troops in Chechnya, while Anna mingled with neighboring women. The family lived in a cement house without electricity, surrounded by a meandering river and tall, green mountains.

"Yes, it was certainly poor and physically rough, but it was very cozy at the same time," Anna recollects.

In 2003, the family moved to Damascus in Syria, where her rough life came to a halt, as Said Arif was arrested by the Syrian security police. Anna was never told why, but she and her children had to live under house arrest in different apartments; she also experienced what a Syrian prison is like.

The same year, Anna managed, with the Swedish embassy's help, to finally return to Halmstad, where she received a warm welcome from her parents, who have supported her over the years. The monotony of life back in Sweden struck her as bland and domestic in comparison to the struggles in the East.

In 2010, Anna separated from her husband, who spent time in various jails all over Europe, and told her Muslim friends she had started to doubt the existence of God and decided to take off the niqab for good.

Almost a year ago, she learned that Said Arif, who had escaped from captivity in France, had been killed. There is, in any event, credible information that he died in a US airstrike in Syria, where he led an Islamist rebel group.

"Beloved Terrorist" is expected to cast a long-welcome light on how many view secular life as empty, compelling them to embrace extremism and sectarian violence.