Islam goes digital: Africa: News: News24

Posted on May 8th, 2007 by .
Categories: Misc. News.

Islam goes digital: Africa: News: News24

Cairo – Egyptian residents, already summoned to prayers five times a day by a chorus of scratchy loudspeakers, are now clamouring for a new line of portable electronic devices to show their devotion to Islam. (more…)

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BBC NEWS | Americas | Arrests over US army base 'plot'

Posted on May 8th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: International Terrorism.

BBC NEWS | Americas | Arrests over US army base ‘plot’
Arrests over US army base ‘plot’
Map showing New Jersey
Six men have been arrested on charges of plotting to attack Fort Dix army base in the US state of New Jersey.

The men allegedly planned to use automatic weapons to enter the base and kill soldiers there, according to officials quoted by US media.

The six were due to appear in court in Camden, New Jersey, on Tuesday.

Local media reports suggested the six were nationals of the former Yugoslavia who had been living in the US for some time.

Fort Dix is used for military training, particularly for reservist soldiers.

The six men will face charges of conspiracy to kill US servicemen, a spokesman for the US Attorney’s Office in Newark, New Jersey, said.

Five of the suspects were arrested in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, on Monday, about 20 miles (32 km) south-west of Fort Dix.

According to local media reports, the men had allegedly trained in weapons use over recent months in the Pocono Mountains area of north-eastern Pennsylvania.

A spokeswoman for the FBI said a news conference was planned for later on Tuesday to discuss the arrests.

According to CNN:‘Islamic radicals’ arrested in plot to kill Fort Dix soldiers

(more…)

0 comments.

BBC NEWS | Americas | Arrests over US army base ‘plot’

Posted on May 8th, 2007 by .
Categories: International Terrorism.

BBC NEWS | Americas | Arrests over US army base ‘plot’
Arrests over US army base ‘plot’
Map showing New Jersey
Six men have been arrested on charges of plotting to attack Fort Dix army base in the US state of New Jersey.

The men allegedly planned to use automatic weapons to enter the base and kill soldiers there, according to officials quoted by US media.

The six were due to appear in court in Camden, New Jersey, on Tuesday.

Local media reports suggested the six were nationals of the former Yugoslavia who had been living in the US for some time.

Fort Dix is used for military training, particularly for reservist soldiers.

The six men will face charges of conspiracy to kill US servicemen, a spokesman for the US Attorney’s Office in Newark, New Jersey, said.

Five of the suspects were arrested in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, on Monday, about 20 miles (32 km) south-west of Fort Dix.

According to local media reports, the men had allegedly trained in weapons use over recent months in the Pocono Mountains area of north-eastern Pennsylvania.

A spokeswoman for the FBI said a news conference was planned for later on Tuesday to discuss the arrests.

According to CNN:‘Islamic radicals’ arrested in plot to kill Fort Dix soldiers

(more…)

0 comments.

Uitgeverij Bulaaq: Philip Hermans – De Wereld van de Djinn

Posted on May 8th, 2007 by .
Categories: Important Publications.

Uitgeverij Bulaaq

djinnvoorrgbfac647.jpg

Als psycholoog werd Philip Hermans geconfronteerd met psychische stoornissen van Marokkaanse migranten waarop men geen antwoord had. Ziekten werden door migranten vaak heel anders beleefd. Bij traditionele genezers voelden zij zich beter begrepen. Op zijn speurtocht naar achtergronden zocht de auteur eerst contact met genezers in België en Nederland. Later bezocht hij als antropoloog talloze centra in Marokko en sprak hij met genezers en hun patiënten. Uiteindelijk koos hij het heiligdom Ben Yeffu, aan de westkust, als centrum voor verder onderzoek.

(more…)

1 comment.

CBS – Toename jongeren met startkwalificatie in stedelijke gebieden – Webmagazine

Posted on May 7th, 2007 by .
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

De toename van het aandeel jongeren met een startkwalificatie in de meest stedelijke gebieden komt vooral door de allochtone jongeren zo blijkt uit een onderzoek van het CBS: Toename jongeren met startkwalificatie in stedelijke gebieden – Webmagazine. Van de niet-westers allochtone jongeren had 43 procent in de periode 2004–2006 een startkwalificatie. In de periode 2001–2003 was dat nog 34 procent. Het aandeel autochtone jongeren dat het onderwijs met een startkwalificatie heeft verlaten, is licht toegenomen van 62 procent naar 63 procent.

2185g3.gif

(more…)

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The Globe – Yazidi leaders voice concern over repercussions of Dua's death

Posted on May 6th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Misc. News.

Yazidi leaders voice concern over repercussions of Dua’s death
The Globe – By Khidhr Domle

Reprisal attacks by Muslims on Yazidi workers in Erbil and elsewhere ratchet up the consequences of the stoning death of a young Yazidi girl.

A Yazidi girl’s death by stoning because of her love for a Muslim boy has resulted in mounting tensions in the Yazidi areas of Bashiqa town and Bhazani village northeast of Mosul. Yazidi religious authorities have formally and publicly condemned the killing.

Du’a, the victim, was a 17-year-old Yazidi girl from Bahzani village. Dozens of members of her community stoned her to death in late April after her relationship with a Muslim boy was discovered.

Yazidis are Kurds who live mainly in Duhok and Mosul provinces and have adopted the religion of Yazidism, which combines Islamic teachings with Zoroastrianism.

(more…)

0 comments.

The Globe – Yazidi leaders voice concern over repercussions of Dua’s death

Posted on May 6th, 2007 by .
Categories: Misc. News.

Yazidi leaders voice concern over repercussions of Dua’s death
The Globe – By Khidhr Domle

Reprisal attacks by Muslims on Yazidi workers in Erbil and elsewhere ratchet up the consequences of the stoning death of a young Yazidi girl.

A Yazidi girl’s death by stoning because of her love for a Muslim boy has resulted in mounting tensions in the Yazidi areas of Bashiqa town and Bhazani village northeast of Mosul. Yazidi religious authorities have formally and publicly condemned the killing.

Du’a, the victim, was a 17-year-old Yazidi girl from Bahzani village. Dozens of members of her community stoned her to death in late April after her relationship with a Muslim boy was discovered.

Yazidis are Kurds who live mainly in Duhok and Mosul provinces and have adopted the religion of Yazidism, which combines Islamic teachings with Zoroastrianism.

(more…)

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Real Bad Hollywood: How Western film demonizes Arabs and Muslims | Art Threat | Political Art Magazine

Posted on May 5th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Arts & culture.

Real Bad Hollywood: How Western film demonizes Arabs and Muslims | Art Threat | Political Art Magazine
Real Bad Hollywood: How Western film demonizes Arabs and Muslims
Reel Bad Arabs: Aladdin gets Racist

Aladdin. Back to the Future. True Lies. It isn’t everyday that you hear these three movies mentioned in the same breath, but for Dr. Jack Shaheen the link is clear. For thirty years, Shaheen, professor emeritus of mass communication at Southern Illinois University, has been studying the misrepresentation of Arabs and Muslims in film, particularly movies coming out of Hollywood. His conclusion: that Arabs and Muslims are the single most maligned and attacked group in the history of film. “If the case went before a jury, they’ll be out for 30 seconds and they will agree,” he says over the phone from his home in Illinois. Over the next few months, viewers can be will be the jury themselves as Shaheen tours North America with Reel Bad Arabs, the 2006 documentary based on his 2001 book of the same name.

(more…)

1 comment.

Real Bad Hollywood: How Western film demonizes Arabs and Muslims | Art Threat | Political Art Magazine

Posted on May 5th, 2007 by .
Categories: Arts & culture.

Real Bad Hollywood: How Western film demonizes Arabs and Muslims | Art Threat | Political Art Magazine
Real Bad Hollywood: How Western film demonizes Arabs and Muslims
Reel Bad Arabs: Aladdin gets Racist

Aladdin. Back to the Future. True Lies. It isn’t everyday that you hear these three movies mentioned in the same breath, but for Dr. Jack Shaheen the link is clear. For thirty years, Shaheen, professor emeritus of mass communication at Southern Illinois University, has been studying the misrepresentation of Arabs and Muslims in film, particularly movies coming out of Hollywood. His conclusion: that Arabs and Muslims are the single most maligned and attacked group in the history of film. “If the case went before a jury, they’ll be out for 30 seconds and they will agree,” he says over the phone from his home in Illinois. Over the next few months, viewers can be will be the jury themselves as Shaheen tours North America with Reel Bad Arabs, the 2006 documentary based on his 2001 book of the same name.

(more…)

1 comment.

Cracks in the Iraqi Al Qaeda Front

Posted on May 5th, 2007 by .
Categories: International Terrorism.

 logo.jpgAl Qaeda has been trying to form a unified front against the US in Iraq. For a while this seemed quite successful but now the front seems to fall apart. There was already a public dispute between the Sunni Islamic Army of Iraq (IAI) and Al-Qaida’s “Islamic State”. Recently the IAI together with other Sunni militant groups (the Mujahideen Army and the Ansar Al-Sunnah Army) have joined forces in a new coalition seperate from that of Al Qaeda: The Reformation and Jihad Front (RJF).

(more…)

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ISIM Review – Connections

Posted on May 3rd, 2007 by .
Categories: Misc. News.

ISIM Review 19 is out now with, of course, several very interesting articles. I will name a few (and link directly to the corresponding pdf-files):

“Burka” in Parliament and on the Catwalk / Annelies Moors While the veil in public debates is often seen as the symbol representing the ultimate Other: the muslim (woman), in fashion industries boundaries are much more blurred and repertoires are much more mixed.

Brazilian TV and Muslimness in Kyrgystan / Julie McBrien A really fascinating article about a Brazilian soap opera with a kind of stereotypical image of Muslims. These Brazilian telenovela’s are very popular outside Brazil too, for example in Kyrgystan where the negative stereotypical image ‘suddenly’ is transformed into something positive.

Meeting, Mating, and Cheating Online in Iran / Pardis Mahdavi Iranian youth uses websites and blogs for constructing new sexual and social discourses. Indigenous discourses are mixed with other discours. Practices are not ‘just’ practices but social and political messages.

Hymen Repair on the Arabic Internet / Björn Bentlage & Thomas Eich

There are many discussions on the Arabic Internet about whether or not hymen repair is allowed in Islam. The authors of this article analyzed several of these discussions and show that, although internet is a decentralized medium that may spur pluralism, it functions as a filter in which only a few voices are heard and often repeated. A development which, according to me, is also taking place on the Dutch ‘islamic’ internet.

Hidden Features of the Face Veil Controversy / Emma Tarlo The author shows how discussions about veiling is not a debate of Muslims against others but a debate on competing definitions of British citizenship that are also apparent among British Muslims.

Ham, Mozart, and Limits to Freedom of Expression / Alexandre Caeiro & Frank Peter

Connecting the German Idomeneo affair and the French Redeker affair in an interesting article about how those two controversies show that the existing definition of what Europe is (or ought to be) is excluding Muslims.

Danish Muslims: Catalysts of National Identity? / Tina Gudrun Jensen Denmark like several other countries has recently seen a polarization in the islam debate. This makes the position of Danish converts to Islam very interesting.

Religious Symbols Made in Italy / Maurizio Albahari How media produce and reproduce the us vs. them dichotomy by using religious symbols.

Being a Pious French Muslim Woman / Jeanette S. Jouili By showing how pious Muslim women negotiate their religiosity in the context of French secularism, the author shows how the construction of identities depends on a particular context which creates a certain type of Muslim subjectivity.

But of course you should read the whole magazine.

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CV Koers – God in Nederland: afscheid of terugkeer?

Posted on May 3rd, 2007 by .
Categories: Islam in the Netherlands, Religion Other.

In CV Koers het artikel  God in Nederland: afscheid of terugkeer? geschreven door Marten van der Meulen en Johan Roeland.

Terwijl de WRR stelde dat religie terug is, wordt in God in Nederland gesteld dat juist de secularisering zich voortzet. Marten en Johan laten hun licht schijnen op deze paradox. Zij pleiten voor nieuwe onderzoeksmethoden. In God in Nederland wordt de geinstitutionaliseerde religie min of meer gezien als de standaard waartegen andere vormen van geloof worden afgezet. Een teruggang van de geinstitutionaliseerde religie is een teruggang van geloof wat eigenlijk (in mijn opinie) betekent dat de geinstitutionaliseerde religie gezien wordt als het echte geloof. Dat mag je vinden, maar niet als wetenschapper. Hoe religie wordt opgevat en hoe bepaalde tendensen beoordeelt moeten worden (met name als het gaat om de rol van de media) zijn belangrijke aspecten. Zeker in het geval van de islam is er een strijd aan de gang tussen moslimgroepen met als vraag wie vertegenwoordigt wie? Deze strijd vindt deels plaats in de media (televisie en internet met name). De media is daardoor niet alleen een doorgeefluik van de werkelijkheid, maar ook een product ervan en reproduceert deze ook nog eens. De Cartoon Affaire laat daarbij ook zien dat media ook een arena zijn waarin de strijd over representatie van de islam en het gebruik van symbolen daarbij wordt uitgevochten. Niet alleen door moslims onderling, maar ook door niet-moslims.

Voor wat betreft islam in de publieke ruimte en secularisering is er ook nog wel wat op te merken. We kunnen secularisering ook zien, zoals antropoloog Talal Asad doet, als de uitoefening van macht door de staat erop gericht om sociale cohesie van de natie-staat te behouden door religieuze verschillen te beheersen. Eén van de manieren om deze te beheersen is religie zodanig te hervormen dat het in overeenstemming is met een liberale seculiere staat. Dit zien we terug in het stimuleren van centra als Marhaba die een ‘liberale islam’ moet promoten en in de aandacht van de AIVD voor de zogenaamde radicale moslims (salafisten). Hiermee begeeft de overheid zich in de strijd over de representatie van islam onder moslims. Dit wordt nog eens versterkt doordat er in de publieke ruimte allerlei politici en opinieleiders zijn die zich opwerpen als hoeder van de seculiere staat en in feite secularisering van de islam (in de zin van hervorming of het opgeven van het geloof) als enige oplossing zien. Het gevolg hiervan is dat islam per definitie een publieke aangelegenheid is. De strijd om de islam vindt namelijk grotendeels plaats in de publieke ruimte: bouw van moskeeen, hoofddoek, discussieprogramma’s op tv en columns in kranten, internet enzovoorts. Moslim-zijn is daarmee dus ook per definitie een publieke aangelegenheid.

Wil je het stuk van Johan en Marten lezen, klik dan op bovenstaande link van CV Koers of ga naar Johan’s weblog en reageer daar.

0 comments.

'Moslimschilderij'?

Posted on May 3rd, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Arts & culture.

AD.nl – Gedoe rond moslimschilderij beu

Nee, de politie heeft haar niet gevraagd om het schilderij uit de etalage te halen, maar wel is Zola Khadija (52) verzocht ’discretie te betrachten’ met het doek. Voor haar eigen veiligheid, benadrukten agenten die langskwamen in haar galerie. Noord is nou eenmaal een buurt waar de islam gevoelig ligt.

Bloed spat van het gewraakte stuk canvas. Het toont gesluierde moslima’s die er potten vol van vasthouden. Daarboven is de tekst ’with our blood we pay the price for peace’ geschreven.Khadija’s boodschap: moslims overal ter wereld, wordt wakker. ,,Dit is wat we iedere dag op televisie voorbij zien trekken. Iedere dag sterven onschuldige moslims in Palestina, Irak, in Afghanistan. Dat heb ik de agenten ook uitgelegd die langskwamen.’’

Van geen enkele passant van de Zaagmolendrift heeft Khadija naar eigen zeggen negatieve reacties op het werk gehad. Wel zag ze vorig weekend iets opmerkelijks: ,,De hele straat stond ’s avonds vol moslims. Ze stonden allemaal te bidden voor mijn galerie. Ik had ook een koran in de etalage liggen.’’

Ze begrijpt dan ook niet zo goed waar de politie zich zorgen om maakt. ,,Moslims begrijpen dit.’’

Geen idee of het nou een islam-kritisch schilderij is of juist niet, maar ehhh waar zijn die boze moslims nou? En wat is eigenlijk nu precies een moslimschilderij?

0 comments.

‘Moslimschilderij’?

Posted on May 3rd, 2007 by .
Categories: Arts & culture.

AD.nl – Gedoe rond moslimschilderij beu

Nee, de politie heeft haar niet gevraagd om het schilderij uit de etalage te halen, maar wel is Zola Khadija (52) verzocht ’discretie te betrachten’ met het doek. Voor haar eigen veiligheid, benadrukten agenten die langskwamen in haar galerie. Noord is nou eenmaal een buurt waar de islam gevoelig ligt.

Bloed spat van het gewraakte stuk canvas. Het toont gesluierde moslima’s die er potten vol van vasthouden. Daarboven is de tekst ’with our blood we pay the price for peace’ geschreven.Khadija’s boodschap: moslims overal ter wereld, wordt wakker. ,,Dit is wat we iedere dag op televisie voorbij zien trekken. Iedere dag sterven onschuldige moslims in Palestina, Irak, in Afghanistan. Dat heb ik de agenten ook uitgelegd die langskwamen.’’

Van geen enkele passant van de Zaagmolendrift heeft Khadija naar eigen zeggen negatieve reacties op het werk gehad. Wel zag ze vorig weekend iets opmerkelijks: ,,De hele straat stond ’s avonds vol moslims. Ze stonden allemaal te bidden voor mijn galerie. Ik had ook een koran in de etalage liggen.’’

Ze begrijpt dan ook niet zo goed waar de politie zich zorgen om maakt. ,,Moslims begrijpen dit.’’

Geen idee of het nou een islam-kritisch schilderij is of juist niet, maar ehhh waar zijn die boze moslims nou? En wat is eigenlijk nu precies een moslimschilderij?

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Protected: Centraal Comité voor Ex-Moslims opgericht

Posted on May 2nd, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Misc. News.

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AD.nl – Indonesisch bezoek Alouan Gouda

Posted on May 2nd, 2007 by .
Categories: Gouda Issues.

AD.nl -  Indonesisch bezoek Alouan
Indonesisch bezoek Alouan
Door NADIA AYRIR

GOUDA – De allochtone jongerenorganisatie Alouan heeft dinsdag een groep Indonesische docenten ontvangen.
Het gezelschap is in Nederland om te leren hoe Nederland omgaat met religieuze conflicten.

De docenten waren vooral benieuwd hoe gebeurtenissen als 11 september en de moord op Theo van Gogh spelen onder jongeren. Ook vragen over emancipatie en moslimextremisme kwamen aan bod. Voor het debat werd de stad Gouda gekozen vanwege de ruime hoeveelheid islamitische inwoners. ,,Wij wilden geen beeld geven van een prachtig Nederland ergens in een grote zaal, maar juist klein in Gouda. Bovendien wonen hier ook veel Marokkaanse moslims,’’ zegt Bart Klem, coördinator van het bezoek aan Gouda.

Het bezoek aan Nederland van juist deze docenten was geen toeval. Sinds 2004 is er samenwerking tussen de Universiteit van Wageningen en de Walisongo Islamic University in de Indonesische stad Semarang. De directeur van de Indonesische universiteit, Dr. Achmad Guraryo, kijkt tevreden terug op de dag. ,,Het was leuk om met de jongeren te praten. Ze waren erg open en daardoor hebben wij een goede impressie gekregen.’’

0 comments.

SaudiDebate.com & Mona Eltahawy

Posted on May 1st, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Internal Debates.

A very interesting website I’ve come across is SaudiDebate.com. Interesting in particular are the articles of award-winning journalist, commentator and lecturer Mona Eltahawy. You may or may not agree with her, but she certainly provides out with some food for thought in a very well written and accessible style. Read for example the following two articles:

SaudiDebate.com – Qaradawi damages Palestine’s cause by turning global issue into Islamist weapon

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not a Muslim issue. It is a dispute over land, it is about an occupation that must end and it is about a people who deserve a state. But it is not a religious dispute. Clerics, rabbis, priests and any one else who claims religious authority for his opinion should stay out of it. As a Muslim, I’m particularly eager to keep our clerics away from Palestine.

For too long the easiest Friday sermon to give began and ended by cursing the “Zionists”, often interchanging Zionist with Jew, stopping along the way to enflame the worshippers with news of the latest humiliations or atrocities committed by the Israelis against the Palestinians.

The conflict has been one of the most jumped upon bandwagons in both the Arab and the Muslim world – but framing it in religious terms serves no one’s interest, least of all the Palestinians. With the Islamist Hamas at the helm of the Palestinian government the temptation is great to lose ourselves in the religious kaleidoscope they would love to wrap around the conflict. But just as Islamists are more about power than religion, so is the conflict less about religion than land.

Which is why it always rankles to hear the Egyptian-born cleric Youssef al-Qaradawi opine about the conflict as he did when asked if he had a message for Arab leaders who held a two-day summit in Saudi Arabia recently to revive an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan.


SaudiDebate.com – Wife beaters set the tone as backward Imams threaten to overwhelm 21st Century Muslims

To appreciate the absurdity of what it can mean to be a Muslim woman today you need a few fools

Enter stage right: German judge Christa Datz-Winter, whose claim to infamy was her refusal to grant a fast-track divorce to a German Muslim woman who had complained that her husband beat her. The judge said both partners came from a “Moroccan cultural environment in which it is not uncommon for a man to exert a right of corporal punishment over his wife,” and she cited passages in the Qu’ran that she said sanction physical abuse.

How cruelly ironic for the unfortunate wife who tried to make the most of western laws that are always waved in the face of Muslims as the pinnacle of civilized behaviour if only we would learn from them. Here was a Muslim woman who really did need to be saved from an abusive husband – not the ‘Evil Muslim Man’ imagined as lurking in all our closets, but the real thing – a brutal man who beat his wife. Right at the moment when she pushed to take advantage of those laws, the Muslim woman who really did need to be saved was kicked back – by a woman no less – into the arms of the very misogyny that the West is always trying to save us from.

So we’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t.
[…]
If God included us in the narrative, who has kept us out? Answer: The YouTube imams and scholars and their ilk around the world who have let the Muslim world down. Their apathy and disinclination to speak out against misogyny in the name of Islam long ago turned many of us off and encouraged us to move beyond them and towards setting our own agenda. The Muslim world is large and diverse. Issues that concern women in Saudi Arabia – where they cannot be admitted to a hospital without a male guardian’s signature – are very different from those in Malaysia, where women recite the Koran on national television.

Things are changing and it is largely thanks to the efforts of Muslim women who are reinterpreting our faith and standing up to the centuries of misogyny. And thanks are due also to the liberal Muslim men who are our allies. A few days before news broke of the fiasco in Germany over Judge Datz-Winter’s misstep, Iranian-American Laleh Bakhtiar was profiled in the New York Times for her translation of the Qu’ran that is being published this month. Her new translation does not include the word “beat” but substitutes for it “to go away”. As I said, I do not care for the semantics performed around that verse because I do not think it is a husband’s right to discipline his wife. But the New York Times article brought to light interesting challenges to our YouTube imams and scholars.

0 comments.

SaudiDebate.com & Mona Eltahawy

Posted on May 1st, 2007 by .
Categories: Internal Debates.

A very interesting website I’ve come across is SaudiDebate.com. Interesting in particular are the articles of award-winning journalist, commentator and lecturer Mona Eltahawy. You may or may not agree with her, but she certainly provides out with some food for thought in a very well written and accessible style. Read for example the following two articles:

SaudiDebate.com – Qaradawi damages Palestine’s cause by turning global issue into Islamist weapon

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is not a Muslim issue. It is a dispute over land, it is about an occupation that must end and it is about a people who deserve a state. But it is not a religious dispute. Clerics, rabbis, priests and any one else who claims religious authority for his opinion should stay out of it. As a Muslim, I’m particularly eager to keep our clerics away from Palestine.

For too long the easiest Friday sermon to give began and ended by cursing the “Zionists”, often interchanging Zionist with Jew, stopping along the way to enflame the worshippers with news of the latest humiliations or atrocities committed by the Israelis against the Palestinians.

The conflict has been one of the most jumped upon bandwagons in both the Arab and the Muslim world – but framing it in religious terms serves no one’s interest, least of all the Palestinians. With the Islamist Hamas at the helm of the Palestinian government the temptation is great to lose ourselves in the religious kaleidoscope they would love to wrap around the conflict. But just as Islamists are more about power than religion, so is the conflict less about religion than land.

Which is why it always rankles to hear the Egyptian-born cleric Youssef al-Qaradawi opine about the conflict as he did when asked if he had a message for Arab leaders who held a two-day summit in Saudi Arabia recently to revive an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan.


SaudiDebate.com – Wife beaters set the tone as backward Imams threaten to overwhelm 21st Century Muslims

To appreciate the absurdity of what it can mean to be a Muslim woman today you need a few fools

Enter stage right: German judge Christa Datz-Winter, whose claim to infamy was her refusal to grant a fast-track divorce to a German Muslim woman who had complained that her husband beat her. The judge said both partners came from a “Moroccan cultural environment in which it is not uncommon for a man to exert a right of corporal punishment over his wife,” and she cited passages in the Qu’ran that she said sanction physical abuse.

How cruelly ironic for the unfortunate wife who tried to make the most of western laws that are always waved in the face of Muslims as the pinnacle of civilized behaviour if only we would learn from them. Here was a Muslim woman who really did need to be saved from an abusive husband – not the ‘Evil Muslim Man’ imagined as lurking in all our closets, but the real thing – a brutal man who beat his wife. Right at the moment when she pushed to take advantage of those laws, the Muslim woman who really did need to be saved was kicked back – by a woman no less – into the arms of the very misogyny that the West is always trying to save us from.

So we’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t.
[…]
If God included us in the narrative, who has kept us out? Answer: The YouTube imams and scholars and their ilk around the world who have let the Muslim world down. Their apathy and disinclination to speak out against misogyny in the name of Islam long ago turned many of us off and encouraged us to move beyond them and towards setting our own agenda. The Muslim world is large and diverse. Issues that concern women in Saudi Arabia – where they cannot be admitted to a hospital without a male guardian’s signature – are very different from those in Malaysia, where women recite the Koran on national television.

Things are changing and it is largely thanks to the efforts of Muslim women who are reinterpreting our faith and standing up to the centuries of misogyny. And thanks are due also to the liberal Muslim men who are our allies. A few days before news broke of the fiasco in Germany over Judge Datz-Winter’s misstep, Iranian-American Laleh Bakhtiar was profiled in the New York Times for her translation of the Qu’ran that is being published this month. Her new translation does not include the word “beat” but substitutes for it “to go away”. As I said, I do not care for the semantics performed around that verse because I do not think it is a husband’s right to discipline his wife. But the New York Times article brought to light interesting challenges to our YouTube imams and scholars.

0 comments.

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