Blasphemy Law: An Academic Investigation

Muslim Woman, Come and Exercise Your Rights in Three Islamic Countries! Burned, Mutilated and Stabbed, You Are Our Queens!

``Honour`` killings of women can be defined as acts of murder in which ``a woman is killed for her actual or perceived immoral behavior.`` (Yasmeen Hassan, ``The Fate of Pakistani Women,`` International Herald Tribune, May 25, 1999.) Such ``immoral behavior`` may take the form of marital infidelity, refusing to submit to an arranged marriage, demanding a divorce, flirting with or receiving phone calls from men, failing to serve a meal on time, or -- grotesquely -- ``allowing herself`` to be raped. In the Turkish province of Sanliurfa, one young woman`s ``throat was slit in the town square because a love ballad was dedicated to her over the radio.`` (Pelin Turgut, ```Honour` Killings Still Plague Turkish Province,`` The Toronto Star, May 14, 1998.)

Most ``honour`` killings of women occur in Muslim countries, the focus of this case study; but it is worth noting that no sanction for such murders is granted in Islamic religion or law. And the phenomenon is in any case a global one. According to Stephanie Nebehay, such killings ``have been reported in Bangladesh, Britain, Brazil, Ecuador, Egypt, India, Israel, Italy, Jordan, Pakistan, Morocco, Sweden, Turkey and Uganda.`` Afghanistan, where the practice is condoned under the rule of the fundamentalist Taliban movement, can be added to the list, along with Iraq and Iran. (Nebehay, ```Honor Killings` of Women Said on Rise Worldwide,`` Reuters dispatch, April 7, 2000.)

Focus (1): Pakistan

Pakistan, where ``honour`` killings are known as karo-kari, is probably the country where such atrocities are most pervasive. Estimating the scale of the phenomenon there, as elsewhere, is made more difficult not only by the problems of data collection in predominantly rural countries, but by the extent to which community members and political authorities collaborate in covering up the atrocities. According to Yasmeen Hassan, author of The Haven Becomes Hell: A Study of Domestic Violence in Pakistan, ``The concepts of women as property and honor are so deeply entrenched in the social, political and economic fabric of Pakistan that the government, for the most part, ignores the daily occurrences of women being killed and maimed by their families.`` (Hassan, ``The Fate of Pakistani Women.``) Frequently, women murdered in ``honour`` killings are recorded as having committed suicide or died in accidents.

One of the most notorious ``honour`` killings of recent years occurred in April 1999, when Samia Imran, a young married woman, ``was shot in the office of a lawyer helping her to seek a divorce which her family could never countenance.`` According to Suzanne Goldenberg,

Samia, 28, arrived at the Lahore law offices of Hina Jilani and Asma Jahangir, who are sisters, on April 6. She had engaged Jilani a few days earlier, because she wanted a divorce from her violent husband. Samia settled on a chair across the desk from the lawyer. Sultana, Samia`s mother, entered five minutes later with a male companion. Samia half-rose in greeting. The man, Habib-ur-Rhemna, grabbed Samia and put a pistol to her head. The first bullet entered near Samia`s eye and she fell. ``There was no scream. There was dead silence. I don`t even think she knew what was happening,`` Jilani said. The killer stood over Samia`s body, and fired again. Jilani reached for the alarm button as the gunman and Sultana left. ``She never even bothered to look whether the girl was dead.``

The aftermath of the murder was equally revealing: ``Members of Pakistan`s upper house demanded punishment for the two women [lawyers] and none of Pakistan`s political leaders condemned the attack. ... The clergy in Peshawar want the lawyers to be put to death`` for trying to help Imran. (Suzanne Goldenberg, ``A Question of Honor,`` The Guardian (UK), May 27, 1999.)

Hina Jilani, Pakistani

campaigner against

``honour`` killings.

According to Goldenberg, ``Those who kill for honour [in Pakistan] are almost never punished. In the rare instances [that] cases reach the courts, the killers are sentenced to just two or three years. Hana Jilani [the Jahore lawyer who witnessed Samia Imran`s murder] has collected 150 case studies and in only eight did the judges reject the argument that the women were killed for honour. All the other [perpetrators] were let off, or given reduced sentences.`` (Goldenberg, ``A Question of Honour.``)

A human-rights report published in March 1999 stated that ``honour`` killings took the lives of 888 women in the single province of Punjab in 1998 (Hassan, ``The Fate of Pakistani Women``). Similar figures were recorded for 1999. In Sindh province, some 300 women died in 1997, according to Pakistan`s independent Human Rights Commission. (Goldenberg, ``A Question of Honour.``) It is unknown how many women are maimed or disfigured for life in attacks that fall short of murder. Pamela Constable describes one such case:

Zahida Perveen`s head is shrouded in a white cotton veil, which she self-consciously tightens every few moments. But when she reaches down to her baby daughter, the veil falls away to reveal the face of one of Pakistan`s most horrific social ills, broadly known as ``honour`` crimes. Perveen`s eyes are empty sockets of unseeing flesh, her earlobes have been sliced off, and her nose is a gaping, reddened stump of bone. Sixteen months ago, her husband, in a fit of rage over her alleged affair with a brother-in-law, bound her hands and feet and slashed her with a razor and knife. She was three months pregnant at the time. ``He came home from the mosque and accused me of having a bad character,`` the tiny, 32-year-old woman murmured as she awaited a court hearing ... ``I told him it was not true, but he didn`t believe me. He caught me and tied me up, and then he started cutting my face. He never said a word except, ``This is your last night.`` (Constable, ``The Price of `Honour`,`` The Gazette (Montreal), May 22, 2000.)

Bangladeshi women scarred in acid attacks.

Perveen`s husband stated in court that ``What I did was wrong, but I am satisfied. I did it for my honour and prestige.`` Often burning or scarring with acid are the preferred weapons of the men committing such crimes. ``The Progressive Women`s Association, which assists attack victims, tracked 3,560 women who were hospitalized after being attacked at home with fire, gasoline or acid between 1994 and 1999,`` according to Constable. About half the victims died. Lawyer and women`s activist Nahida Mahbooba Elahi states that ``We deal with these cases every day, but I have seen very few convictions. The men say the wife didn`t obey their orders, or was having relations with someone else. The police often say it is a domestic matter and refuse to pursue the case. Some judges even justify it and do not consider it murder.`` (Constable, ``The Price of `Honour.```) Such crimes are also rife in Bangladesh, formerly East Pakistan, where some 2,200 women are disfigured every year in acid attacks by jealous or estranged men. (Ellen Goodman, ``How Long Before We Take the Honor out of Killing?,`` The Washington Post [in the Guardian Weekly, April 6-12, 2000.)

In August 1999, an international furore erupted when the Pakistani Senate rejected a resolution by former Prime Minister Benazhir Butto to condemn ``honour`` killings in the country. (See Zaffer Abbas, ``Pakistan Fails to Condemn `Honour` Killings``, BBC Online, August 3, 1999.) In April 2000, the head of the Pakistani military regime, General Pervez Musharraf, pledged that his government would take strong measures to curb ``honour`` killings. ``Such acts do not find a place in our religion or law,`` Musharraf stated. ``Killing in the name of honour is murder, and it will be treated as such.`` Most observers were skeptical, however, that Musharraf`s words would be followed up by committed actions. (See ``Honour Killings Now Seen As Murder``, The Sydney Morning Herald [from The Telegraph (UK)], April 24, 2000.)

While the victims of Pakistani ``honour`` killings are overwhelmingly female, tradition dictates that males involved in the ``crimes`` should face death as well. But the accused women are standardly killed first, giving men a chance to flee retribution. Moreover, targeted men can escape death by paying compensation to the family of the female victim, leading to an ```honour killing industry` involving tribespeople, police and tribal mediators,`` which ``provides many opportunities to make money, [or] obtain a woman in compensation,`` according to Amnesty International. The organization also states: ``Reports abound about men who have killed other men in murders not connected with honour issues who then kill a woman of their own family ... to camouflage the initial murder as an honour killing.`` (Amnesty International, ``Pakistan: Honour Killings of Girls and Women``, September 1999.)

[Note: For more information on ``honour`` killings in Pakistan, contact the International Network for the Rights of Female Victims in Pakistan, P.O. Box 17202, Louisville, KY 40217, USA; e-mail: inrfvvp@inrfvvp.org.]

A poster condemning ``honour`` killings, produced by

Kurdish Women Action Against Honour Killing.

Focus (2): Jordan

In Jordan, ``honour`` killings are sanctioned by law. According to Article 340 of the criminal code, ``A husband or a close blood relative who kills a woman caught in a situation highly suspicious of adultery will be totally exempt from sentence.`` Article 98, meanwhile, guarantees a lighter sentence for male killers of female relatives who have committed an ``act which is illicit in the eyes of the perpetrator.`` Julian Borger notes that ``in practice, once a murder has been judged an `honour killing,` the usual sentence is from three months to one year.`` (Julian Borger, ``In Cold Blood,`` Manchester Guardian Weekly, November 16, 1997. See also ``Four Men Sentenced to Year or Less for Brutal Jordan Honour Killings,`` Agence France-Presse dispatch, July 31, 1999; the perpetrators included a 19-year-old man, Hussein Suleiman, who ``was accused of driving three times over his six-month-pregnant unmarried sister in a pick-up truck, despite her denials of immoral behaviour and pleas for help.``) Ironically, as Borger notes, this legislation is ``the result of Western influence in the Middle East,`` having arisen ``out of a fusion between Egyptian tribal custom and the Napoleonic Code in 1810, after the French legions took Cairo.`` (Borger, ``In Cold Blood.``)

In a particularly tragic case in 1994, a handicapped 18-year-old girl, who had already served six months in jail (!) for becoming pregnant out of wedlock, was killed by her 17-year-old brother. A neighbour was quoted as saying the family ``seemed relaxed, happy and satisfied after announcing the news that she was killed ...`` (Rana Husseini, ``18-year-old killed for `family honor,``` The Jordan Times, September 19, 1994.) Manchester Guardian Weekly reporter Julian Borger described another typical case in 1997:

One morning this summer, Rania Arafat`s two aunts came to take her for a walk. They told their 21-year-old niece they had arranged a secret meeting with her boyfriend. She strolled with them through Gwiesmeh, a poor suburb where Amman`s concrete sprawl peters out into desert. When the three women reached a patch of open land, the aunts suddenly stepped aside, leaving Arafat standing alone. She was shot four times in the back of the head at close range and once in the forehead. The gunman was her 17-year-old brother, Rami. ... Arafat`s crime was to refuse an arranged marriage and elope with her Iraqi boyfriend. Rami is in jail, but is unlikely to be sentenced to more than a few months, especially as he is a minor, which is almost certainly why he was given the role of executioner. (Borger, ``In Cold Blood.``)

Rana Husseini, a journalist

with The Jordan Times, has exposed

``honour`` killings in her country.

The Jordan Times estimated in 1994 that between 28 and 60 Jordanian women -- the difference between official police figures and commonly-cited estimates of the actual number -- die in ``honour`` killings every year (Rana Husseini, ``Murder in the Name of Honour,`` October 6-7, 1994.) The death-toll may even run into the hundreds, with hundreds more women in perpetual hiding, fearful for their lives.

One positive sign is the staunch opposition to the practice displayed by the regime of King Abdullah II, who took power after the death of his father King Hussein in 1999. ``The king has backed legislation to put honor killings on a par with other murders and has encouraged public support to change the law. ... The fact that the royal palace has taken such a stance has translated into tougher sentencing and investigations of honor killings by the courts and police. The king`s support has also encouraged activist groups to speak out more strongly against honor killings.`` (Stephen Franklin, ``Jordan Begins to Punish Practice of `Honor Killings```, The Chicago Tribune, September 1, 2000.)

Such efforts continue to encounter staunch resistance from conservative elements, however. In early February 2000, the Jordanian parliament ``took only three minutes to reject a draft law calling for the cancellation of Article 340.`` The country`s leading political party, the Islamic Action Front (IAF), denounced the draft law as an effort to ``destroy our Islamic, social and family values, by stripping the man from his humanity, [and] not allowing him to get angry when he is surprised by [i.e., surprises] his wife committing adultery.`` Ten days later, in an unprecedented action, some 5,000 protesters flooded the streets of Amman demanding the repeal of the penal code provision allowing ``honour`` killings. The protesters included ``Prince Ali, who is King Abdullah`s brother and his personal guard, as well as Prince Gazi, the king`s advisor for tribal affairs.``

Focus (3): Palestine/Israel

``Honour`` killings are also regularly reported in the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. In the Canadian women`s magazine Chatelaine, Sally Armstrong described the fate of one victim:

Flirting was a costly mistake for Samera. She was only 15 years old when her neighbours in Salfeet, a small Palestinian town on the West Bank, saw her chatting with a young man without a male chaperone. Her family`s honour was at stake; a marriage was quickly arranged. By 16, she had a child. Five years later, when she could stand the bogus marriage no longer, she bolted. In a place where gossip is traded like hard currency, and a girl`s chastity is as public as her name, Samera`s actions were considered akin to making a date with the devil. According to the gossips, she went from man to man as she moved from place to place. Finally, last July [1999], her family caught up with her. A few days later she was found stuffed down a well. Her neck had been broken. Her father told the coroner she`d committed suicide. But everyone on the grapevine knew that Samera was a victim of honour killing, murdered by her own family because her actions brought dishonour to their name. ... Here in the West Bank, the Palestinian Authority law allows honour killing. Samera`s parents are walking the streets of their neighbourhood with their heads held high, relieved that the family honour has been restored. (Armstrong, ``Honour`s Victims``, Chatelaine, March 2000.)

Twenty-two other women died in the Palestinian territories in the same year as Samera. The killings often spill over into neighbouring Israel, as with the killing of ``40-year-old Ittihaj Hassoon`` near Haifa in 1995:

On Oct. 16, 1995, ... Hassoon got out of a car with her younger brother on a main street of Daliat al Carmel, a small Israeli Druze village ... Over 10 years before, Ittihaj had committed the unpardonable sin of marrying a non-Druze man. Now, after luring her back to her home village with promises that all was forgiven and her safety assured, her brother finally had the chance to publicly cleanse the blot on the family name with the spilling of her blood. In broad daylight in front of witnesses, he pulled out a knife and began to stab her. The witnesses quickly swelled to a crowd of more than 100 villagers who -- approving, urging him on -- chanted, ululated, danced in the street. Within minutes, Hassoon lay dead on the ground while the crowd cheered her killer, ``Hero, hero! You are a real man!`` (Suzanne Zima, ``When Brothers Kill Sisters,`` The Gazette [Montreal], April 17, 1999. See also Walter Rodgers, ``Honor Killings: A Brutal Tribal Custom``, CNN World News, December 7, 1995.)

According to Zima, ``Ibrahim had agonized over his decision: `She is my sister -- my flesh and blood -- I am a human being. I didn`t want to kill her. I didn`t want to be in this situation. They [community members] push[ed] me to make this decision. I know what they expect from me. If I do this, they look at me like a hero, a clean guy, a real man. If I don`t kill my sister, the people would look at me like I am a small person.```

Who is responsible?

``Honour`` killings of women (and occasionally their male ``partners in crime``) reflect longstanding patriarchal-tribal traditions. In a ``bizarre duality,`` women are viewed ``on the one hand as fragile creatures who need protection and on the other as evil Jezebels from whom society needs protection.`` Patriarchal tradition ``casts the male as the sole protector of the female so he must have total control of her. If his protection is violated, he loses honour because either he failed to protect her or he failed to bring her up correctly.`` (Armstrong, ``Honour`s Victims.``) Clearly, the vulnerability of women around the world to this type of violence will only be reduced when these patriarchal mindsets are challenged and effectively confronted.

As many of the examples cited in this case study indicate, state authorities frequently ignore their obligation to prosecute ``honour`` killings. They should be viewed as ``co-conspirators`` in such crimes, and held accountable by organizations such as the United Nations.

The typical ``honour`` killer is a man, usually the father, husband, or brother of the victim. Frequently teenage brothers are selected by their family or community to be the executioners, because their sentences will generally be lighter than those handed down to adults (as was the case with the killing of Rania Arafat in Jordan, cited above). ``Talking and writing about this atrocity is a good start,`` wrote Marina Sanchez-Rashid in a letter to The Jordan Times, ``but I believe that action to start treating and judging the men who commit these crimes as the first degree murderers that they are, as well as to protect the victims as they deserve to be protected, is needed as soon as possible.`` (Quoted in Patrick Goodenough, ``Middle East Women Campaign Against `Family Honor` Killings,`` Conservative News Service, March 8, 1999.)

As with witch-hunts, however, ``honour`` killings also need to be viewed from a broader societal perspective; they derive from expectations of female behaviour that are held and perpetuated by men and women alike. Women`s role has often been underappreciated. Occasionally, they participate directly in the killings. More frequently, they play a leading role in preparing the ground. In Palestine, for example, the anthropologist Ilsa Glaser has noted that ``women acted as instigators and collaborators in these murders, unleashing a torrent of gossip that spurred the accusations.`` (Quoted in The Calgary Herald, April 20, 2000.) Jordanian women running for parliament have also been ``reluctant to break the taboo`` on condemning and prosecuting ``honour`` killings; one told the Manchester Guardian Weekly that ``This is our tradition. We do not want to encourage women who break up the family.`` (Borger, ``In Cold Blood.``) In the Ramle district of Israel, police commander Yifrach Duchovey lamented his inability to secure the cooperation of community members in investigating ``honour`` killings: ``Even other women -- the mothers -- won`t cooperate with us. Sometimes the women co-operate with the men who commit the murders. ... A woman may think it is OK -- maybe she thinks the victim deserves it.`` (Quoted in Zima, ``When Brothers Kill Sisters.``)

(2)

``Atheist, mushriks, wannabe murtids & munafiques come sniffing towards muslims to wrestle their own demons.``

Or maybe some of them/us are merely telling you that you are fukking up the world, so get your act together!

Muslim Women: Come and Claim Your Rights!

Stoning Sentence for Nigerian Woman



(New York, August 20, 2002) The August 19 ruling by a Nigerian court of appeal to uphold the verdict of death by stoning of Amina Lawal for adultery is a cruel and inhuman application of Sharia (Islamic) law, Human Rights Watch said today.

Send Appeals Protesting the Sentencing



Related Material

Nigeria: Woman Sentenced to Death Under Sharia

HRW Press Release, October 23, 2001

Nigeria: Reverse Woman`s Sentence of Death by Stoning

Letter to President Obasanjo, October 23, 2001







``The legal system is being used to punish adult women for consensual sex.``

LaShawn R. Jefferson

Executive Director

Women`s Rights Division





``The legal system is being used to punish adult women for consensual sex,`` said LaShawn R. Jefferson, executive director of the Women`s Rights Division of Human Rights Watch. ``The death penalty is never an appropriate punishment for a crime, and, in this instance, the very nature of the crime is in doubt.``

In March 2002, a Sharia court in the state of Katsina in northern Nigeria had sentenced 30-year old Amina Lawal to death for having engaged in sex outside marriage. The government used her pregnancy as evidence of her having committed adultery. Ms. Lawal now has an eight-month old child.

Over the past year, some northern Nigerian states have increasingly applied Sharia law to criminal cases, among them theft and adultery. Consequently, Nigerian Sharia courts have ordered amputations as punishment for theft and death penalty by stoning for adultery cases. To date, no stoning sentence has been carried out.

Jefferson urged the Nigerian government to commute the death sentence of Amina Lawal and drop the criminal charges against her.

Human Rights Watch, which opposes capital punishment in all circumstances because of its inherent cruelty, also urged Nigeria to end the death penalty and the prosecution of consensual sex between adults.

Appeals protesting the sentencing should be sent to the following:

His Excellency Olusegun Obasanjo,

President of the Republic,

The Presidency,

Federal Secretariat,

Phase II, Shehu Shagari Way,Abuja;

Fax: 234 9 523 21 36 (press office)

Email: president.obasanjo@nigeriagov.org

His Excellency Kanu Godwin Agabi,

Minister of Justice, Ministry of Justice,

New Federal Secretariat complex Shehu Shagari Way,

Abuja, Federal Capital Territory,

Nigeria;

Fax: 234 9 523 52 08

Minister Alhaji Abdullahi Ibrahim

Minister of Justice and Attorney General

New Federal Secretariat Building

10th Floor, Federal Secretariat

Block 1, Wing 1-B

Shehu Shagari Way

Abuja, Federal Capital Territory, Nigeria

Fax: c/o Ministry of Foreign Affairs

234 9 523 0394/0210

re _digit #471

Glad you realize your complicity in the crime of your co0conspirators, for silence in such matters is nothing if not complicity.

786786:

Nice! So the sexism we are up in arms about is merely about recognizing the differnces between the sexes? Very nice attemp at obfuscation.

You on the same intellectual plane as DRUMZ? HAHAHAHAH! Well, maybe. What about the honesty-plane? You`re so caught up in your complexes you can`t make up your mind drom day to day who is friend and who foe.

Keep amusing us anyway. We need some comic relief here on this otherwise dour board.

Atheist, mushriks, wannabe murtids & munafiques come sniffing towards muslims to wrestle their own demons. If a robust Lahaul Villa Quvvat does not send them scurrying away back to their Sodoms & Gommorahs, then quoting Qurani SEXIST Surahs, and SEXIST Shariat Laws might work.

(DRUMZ: you are truly a genius! but it takes one to recognise one;)--I fully understood your post & you are damnwell right. This forum`s IQ is not at par with yours. Only among black hiphop/rasta crowd one encounters such raw in-your-face intelligence)

Here is one avowed SEXIST--and well damn proud of it. The delicate & dainty members of the delicious sex should get all the credit (there are/were many more than one.;)

`Vive La difference`.

I defer to this groovy difference. I am tethered and chained and enslaved to this difference. I would fight anyone anytime anywhere to maintain & uphold this difference. This difference is nourishing and nurturing Life itself.

This difference has made all the difference.

The ``in-betweens`` and ``out-of-bounds`` are hereby served notice NEVER ever to even dream of bridging this difference.

Charming, Feminine, delicate & delicious women of the world UNITE!----you have nothing to lose except your shame-less-ness.

_________________________________________________

Islam decreed a right of which woman was deprived both before Islam and after it (even as late as this century), the right of independent ownership. According to Islamic Law, woman`s right to her money, real estate, or other properties is fully acknowledged. This right undergoes no change whether she is single or married. She retains her full rights to buy, sell, mortgage or lease any or all her properties. It is nowhere suggested in the Law that a woman is a minor simply because she is a female. It is also noteworthy that such right applies to her properties before marriage as well as to whatever she acquires thereafter.

With regard to the woman`s right to seek employment it should be stated first that Islam regards her role in society as a mother and a wife as the most sacred and essential one. Neither maids nor baby-sitters can possibly take the mother`s place as the educator of an upright, complex free, and carefully-reared children. Such a noble and vital role, which largely shapes the future of nations, cannot be regarded as ``idleness``.

However, there is no decree in Islam which forbids woman from seeking employment whenever there is a necessity for it, especially in positions which fit her nature and in which society needs her most. Examples of these professions are nursing, teaching (especially for children), and medicine. Moreover, there is no restriction on benefiting from woman`s exceptional talent in any field. Even for the position of a judge, where there may be a tendency to doubt the woman`s fitness for the post due to her more emotional nature, we find early Muslim scholars such as Abu-Hanifa and Al-Tabary holding there is nothing wrong with it. In addition, Islam restored to woman the right of inheritance, after she herself was an object of inheritance in some cultures. Her share is completely hers and no one can make any claim on it, including her father and her husband.

``Unto men (of the family) belongs a share of that which Parents and near kindred leave, and unto women a share of that which parents and near kindred leave, whether it be a little or much - a determinate share.`` ((Qur`an 4:7).

Her share in most cases is one-half the man`s share, with no implication that she is worth half a man! It would seem grossly inconsistent after the overwhelming evidence of woman`s equitable treatment in Islam, which was discussed in the preceding pages, to make such an inference. This variation in inheritance rights is only consistent with the variations in financial responsibilities of man and woman according to the Islamic Law. Man in Islam is fully responsible for the maintenance of his wife, his children, and in some cases of his needy relatives, especially the females. This responsibility is neither waived nor reduced because of his wife`s wealth or because of her access to any personal income gained from work, rent, profit, or any other legal means.

Woman, on the other hand, is far more secure financially and is far less burdened with any claims on her possessions. Her possessions before marriage do not transfer to her husband and she even keeps her maiden name. She has no obligation to spend on her family out of such properties or out of her income after marriage. She is entitled to the ``Mahr`` which she takes from her husband at the time of marriage. If she is divorced, she may get an alimony from her ex-husband.

An examination of the inheritance law within the overall framework of the Islamic Law reveals not only justice but also an abundance of compassion for woman.

Any fair investigation of the teachings of Islam o

DRUMZ #474

I think this post of yours is directly opposite to post before, where you told me to ask you questions.

Looks like there is lot of bad blood (sorry Shahjehani blood).

People are not as forgetful, as you think in your mind.

In response to Umer, who wrote in #457

``With all this sexism and whatnot happening, let me give you children something profound to munch upon...Anyone who places testicles between legs could never hate women``

Wonderful!! Am forwarding forthright to the Mastoi`s defence bench.

Three cheers for our glorious Interpretative Traditions. Who says Islamic jurisprudence is not the most advanced in the world? Look how far we have come in just 1400 years!

Note the use of precedence (in caps) in reaching this `landmark` decision. Maybe in another 1400 years we will be ready for actual use of reasoning faculties!



http://www.dawn.com/2002/08/20/top9.htm

Rape Victim Won`t face Punsihment, rules Shariat Court

A Three-judge bench in its landmark judgment on the appeal of Zafran Bibi, a woman from Kohat who had been awarded punishment of stoning to death by a Sessions Court of Kohat, has laid down the rule that no woman could be punished mere for the fact that she was part of the act, though forcibly.

The FSC, which had ordered the release of Zafran Bibi through a short order on June 6, 2002, released the detailed judgment on Monday.

``The sentence of Hadd is highly severe and deterrent. Therefore, every pre-caution is ordained to be adopted so that no innocent person gets punished,`` the FSC ruled.

THE COURT POINTED OUT THAT A NUMBER OF INCIDENTS HAD BEEN REPORTED DURING THE PERIOD OF HOLY PROPHET (PEACE BE UPON HIM) AND IN THE PERIOD OF CALIPHS THAT THE WOMEN WHO WERE COERCED INTO COMMITTING ZINA, WERE ACQUITTED BUT THE CO-ACCUSED WERE CONVICTED AND SENTENCED.

The court also ruled that in case of pregnancy of a woman, either unmarried or in case of being married, having no access to her husband, conceived but pleads that it was the result of commission of rape on her, she could not be awarded punishment of Hadd.



This is indeed a crushing defeat for all who claim that Islam engenders mistreatment of women.

Krashid: ``Who is interested in getting answers from you.``

I am perplexed. Why did u ask me so many questions then?

786789 ``What a great show. Bring it to a boil---but on slow heat. The wailing, flailing, and ululating is almost audible across cyber-space.``

If anyone was wondering what a Muslim orgasm feels like...

Hobbes:

Questions, questions, taking us inexorably in circles. Ahh waht the heck, I`ll play, but jsut for a while longer...

Q1. ``Does misogyny mean woman hating?``

Yes. Or disregard for women.

Q2. ``Can God be woman hating and still be God?``

Apparently, yes. Refer to your #whatever where you say that the quran is the eternal, literal word of God AND that 4:34 is misogynistic (``in our understanding``, which, of course is a needless qualification!)

``Can the word of God be woman hating, and still be the word of God?``

Yes, following from #2.

``Obviously God cannot be woman hating and be God, nor can His word be His word and be woman hating?``

Not obvious at all. Unless your again confusing some totally abstract conceptualization of God, which we may as well call The Embodiment of all that is Good``-- but this is really not what you`re talking about at all. You`re referring to the God as known through the Bible, torah, quran etc. I repeat, if the former abstraction is the God you want to discuss, why bring in scripture at all, given that those are mere human understandings of OGd. No, but wait.. you said they, or at least the Qu`ran was God`s literal word, and incontrovertible. Can`t have it both ways, Mr. Hobbes. Sorry. No, can`t do!

``The entire notion of ``misogyny`` is a refelection of a interpretation of history, isn`t that so?``

Only inasmuch as the entire notion of ANYTHING is such a reflection. Which, my friend, is saying nothing! See the absurdity in your line of argument now? We are not concerned with the question of whether or not misgyny was an issue in the 7th or the 17th century -- that is wholly academic (and granted long ago in this debtae anyway-- or don`t you read outr posts??) We are concerned with the REALITY that a misgogynistic culture continues to engender, espcially when backed up by the fiat of eternity! Get it?

``Is it not a fact that the notion of misogyny is a part of ``femin-ist`` interpretation of history?``

that`s laughable? Pray tell, at what precise point in history did this supposed feminist movement begin? Were the prophets wives not being `feminist when asserting their conjugal rights in the face of competition from Mariah? Was the Holy Prophet not being `feminist` when he or Allah decreed that women should have some part of their father`s inheritance?

``Did ``femin-ism`` always exist?``

Yes. It`s modes and methods may have changed, but you can besure that everytime a woman put a little extra salt in the curry to show her disapproval of her mistreatment, feminism was in play.

``Is ``feminism`` a ``eternal``? If it is not ``eternal, if it did not always exist, than isn`t it time bound?``

Actually, I was going to answer `Yes` to the first of those questions, but you`ve gone and assumed we`d all agree with you! Well, the best i can do is ask you to please define what you understand by `feminism`.

Thank you!

``Your interpretation, my interpretation, X`s and Y`s - the point is to be conscious of the number of interpretations and of a number of interpretations of history.``

And you would assume we are not because...?

``Feminism and Marxism are but examples of that multiplicity.``

See, bhai, you haven`t credibly established that misogyny is but a function of feminism, which you NOW describe as a the THEORY of political equality of the sexes (as opposed to activity). But be careful, for you are suggesting that their was no international injustice before the Geneva Accord was signed.

``Your insistence that there can be no other way except the one that you propose is puzzling - how is it different from those who insist ``my way or hiway``.

Here`s how it is different -- and I am shocked that you should draw a sort of moral eqivalence between my insistance on formulating ideas based on the the principle equality of all humans, and those that would deny such a proposition, merely on the grounds that we both may be instransigent on our positions. Don`t kid yourself, professor. Get as relativistic and accomodative as you wish, but sometimes you will still encounter conflict of fundamental values. Only the wishy washy will fail to assert their `way` when threatened. Or would you rather the Allies tried more `reasoning` with Hitler? Consider taht a question I would like answered. and if you are not going to answer my simple query posted earlier, and insist, instead, on posing increasingly non-sequitor and leading ones as in your last post, please consider that I have more important ways to spend my time.

``A particular set of verses trouble you. You judge them. This is your own business, but for the purpose of our discussion - would it be possible for you to present the verses you find troubling to all.``

Already done that. Perhaps you have not heard of 4:34, or of the one in which Allah asserts that you may go unto your wife and use as your field (talk about objectivifcation!!), or that Allah looks not kindly upon the woman who would deny her husband his conjugal rights, but keeps silent on the woman`s rights.

Oh yes... Allah didn`t MEAN for women to HAVE these rights-- not until the suffragettes came out with this silly conceptualization of their interpreted historical votever, right? taht seems to be precisely waht you content with your contention of quran being literal truth and eternal.

Simple question professor: Is 4:34 demeaning in anyway to women (a case for misogyny)?

I trust you understand the meaning of the word `IS`.

Thank you.

``You do not do, you do not do

any more, black shoe

Daddy, I have had to kill you...``

Watch out Farangi Kush, theres a big black boot with your name on the heel and its coming to kick you in the

From cooking to controversy, Arab women can tune in

A new Arab TV station – the first to target a female audience – hopes to reach women in remote villages as well as cities.

By Catherine Taylor | Special to The Christian Science Monitor

BEIRUT, LEBANON – From his no-frills offices, Nicolas Abou-Samah is preparing for a revolution. His weapon is satellite television. His mission: empowering women of the Middle East.

After two years of planning, Heya TV (Arabic for ``she``) will begin broadcasts this summer. Like the Qatar-based Al Jazeera network – which gained international recognition for its coverage of US operations in Afghanistan – Heya TV will boast celebrity anchors and be based in a Middle East state with relatively little censorship.



Reporters on

the Job:

Catherine Taylor gives you the story behind the story.

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Weigh in on the fervent debate in our Middle East discussions.



But it also will be first station in the region to target a female audience and will air ``anything and everything to do with women,`` Mr. Abou-Samah says.

The station will initially broadcoast on a digital satellite network that currently reaches 6 million viewers. Within the next three years, however, Abou-Samah hopes it will expand to count 10 million women among its viewers – from sophisticated residents of big cities like Beirut or Cairo, to illiterate villagers in remote parts of Iraq, Syria, and Egypt.

Along with typical programming for women – shows about makeup, fashion, modeling, and cooking – Heya TV will screen two shows designed as forums for debating restrictions placed on women by traditional culture and Islamic law.

``We want to be controversial,`` says Abou-Samah. ``We will discuss the difficult issues that face many women in the Middle East, as well as Muslim countries like Pakistan and Malaysia.``

The new station`s signature program, ``Too Daring,`` will run every day at 8 p.m. Each episode will feature a woman who has challenged the region`s code of female conduct and a panel of guests who both oppose and support her decision.

Leila Bazzi-Jarrouje, who will direct the show, has herself defied stereotypes: She is a Shiite Muslim married to a Christian Maronite. Ms. Bazzi-Jarrouje is also the executive producer of Lebanon`s National Broadcasting Network.

``We will broach sensitive subjects,`` she says. ``It`s like putting a finger on a wound. But there is a feeling in the region now that things are evolving, and women`s role is shifting. We may not be able to change the mind-set of older generations, but younger viewers can be enlightened about how to open up.``

The first program will feature a Lebanese woman named Renee who created a scandal when she posed nude for artists in the 1960s. Renee says she had ``lost her relationship`` because of her career and now lives alone with her cats.

In most Western countries, such prejudice would be unthinkable. But a woman`s virtue is highly prized in the Middle East and, to many, the decision to take off her clothes for money was akin to prostitution. The episode will discuss the line between freedom and cultural insensitivity.

``Too Daring`` doesn`t seek to reach a verdict on these questions, but to push boundaries and focus on women`s changing role. ``We don`t aim to take a moral standpoint,`` says Bazzi-Jarrouje. ``The goal is simply to present these issues as facts, put them out there for debate.``

And the debate is not just about loosening limitations on women.

In its second episode, the show will discuss a 23-year-old Egyptian movie star`s decision to swap Western-style dress for hejab, the scarf and long coat associated with Islam – defying a trend in her country. Her family and friends were appalled by what they saw as a backward step for women.

Heya TV will also produce the ``Morning Show,`` broadcast from 7 a.m. until noon each day. An Arabic version of ``The Oprah Show,`` it will address serious subjects such as HIV/AIDS, domestic violence, divorce, prostitution, and honor crimes – in which male members of a family kill sisters, wives, or daughters who are deemed to have shamed the family, often by having sex outside wedlock.

``Even within the Middle East, women have a difficult time understanding each other,`` says Bazzi-Jarrouje. ``Each country has its own atmosphere. It may surprise some women from Lebanon, which considers itself one of the region`s more progressive countries, to learn that divorce laws in Egypt offer women greater equality.``

But unlike Oprah – where women willingly come before the camera – the ``Morning Show`` will ask viewers to drive the debate by phoning in personal testimonies and opinions, a format designed to overcome particular challenges of the Middle East.

At the very least, many women are uncomfortable discussing such difficult and intimate subjects in public. Some may also fear reprisals if they are discovered promoting controversial change.

Although similar themes are now addressed in women`s magazines, television has a special role to play, says Abou-Samah. Illiteracy or lack of access to newspapers and journals locks many isolated villagers out of the print-media discourse.

``Even though many families in the region are poor, television is the easiest and cheapest form of entertainment,`` says Abou-Samah. ``Many families see a television and satellite subscription as a priority.``

Censorship shouldn`t be a problem as long as the station steers clear of directly criticizing particular leaders or regimes, adds Abou-Samah, whose television production house, Filmali, is known for its innovative programming. And while losses are expected for the first two years, he says, Heya TV ultimately promises good financial returns.

Arabic speaking countries are home to about 100 million female teenagers and women, and Abou-Samah`s research shows women make up between 65 and 70 percent of regular TV viewers in the region. ``This is a positive start,`` he says. ``We approached advertisers who felt they had a gap in the market for selling high-end products like perfume and jewelry. Most of these advertisements were being sold to magazines, not television, and that was another advantage for us.``

The station, broadcast on the digital Nile Sat satellite TV, will run on a tight budget of $3 million to $4 million a year – raised through coproductions with regional television companies. It will have a staff of 50, with studios in Beirut and Dubai as well as correspondents in Syria, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinian Territories, Jordan, and North Africa.

``I`m excited,`` says Bazzi-Jarrouje. ``We are going to push buttons.``

``And of course we must deal with them as the danger they are?? Have you lost your mind, what difference between the intolerant and you?``

I`m intolerant only of the intolerant. That, my friend has already proven to be a valid position within the propostion of tolerance. Like I said, would you have had Churchill tolerate Hitler`s plans? The analogy is fully valid if you consider it a human responsibility to prevent injustice against any single human being-- male feamle or in-between. DO you or don`t you?

Should I tolerate Mullah Omar who would have acid thrown on my daughter`s face because he conisders her dressing a threat to sensibilities-- or call for my death becasue I, as a non-Muslim, proclaim openly that Prophet Muhammed was not a Prophet of God?

Tolerate?!??! Get real!!

Your attempt to draw equivalence between all moral positions is, well, plainly ridiculous. You forget that differences are amenable to resolution through reason only when there is agreement on basic principles -- or haven`t you read your Hobbes properly?

The eternal validity of 4:34 is, I`m afraid, not something I subscribe to, though I`m there are many out there willing to use it to justify their misogyny. Try REASONING with them! Good luck!

Prem 463

Prem - as a matter of fact - I propose we go further, beyond Ijethad - I actually posted to Tahmed a piece called ``Beyond Ijtehad; Revival and the Reconciliation of the Eternal and the Temporal`` - Tahmed never bothered to respond to it in any way - and I never finished the piece. This is not an original work at all, but a recapitulation of Sorosuh`s ``Islam Revival and Reform: Theological Approaches`` - If you ever get a chance, do not miss reading this.

The work is a vessel for the introduction and exploration of The Theory of Hermenutical Contraction and Expansion of Shariah.

If I could only get you to read these works and the works of thescholars upon whose works this builds you, I assure you, you will experience a joy.

PM has mentioned method and I hope (IF HE EVER FINISHES HIS READING)and if you should also become familiar with works - we can have ``liberating`` discussions - I will even promise not to show you your posts - all this possible if you will read the works.

Hobbes,

Why would you think that subscription to certain absolute values comes without the ability to temper our views of opposing values with and number of lense, yet still say there is right and wrong, and be willing to die, or kill, for that.

Scary? Well, like I said, I`d sooner have all those calling for the retention of the blasphemy law in it`s current state lined up and shot (or perhaps, if I`m in a good mood, put them on a boat and send them over the Niagara Falls) than see even ONE other innocent victim of the `blasphemy culture` lose his life WHILE YOU AND URSTRULY DEABTE THE REASONABLE GROUNDS (or if there exist any such thing) on which to defeat those regressives.

Too harsh? Hey, haven`t you heard, one (innocent) life is worth all of humanity!

But this may be all too pragmatic an outcome of this discussion for your liking, sitting where you are in the safe confines of farangiland. Go ahead, you have the luxury to discuss how you can or cannot reason with those whose central article of faith is a rejection of reason.

By the way, nice of you to ridicule my invocation of Hitler without the admission of exaggeration that immedaitely followed. :) Keep up the selective reading!

Hobbes,

Not homogeneity but unity in diversity.