'She is complicit in her own degradation, as are countless others. Their acquiescence in a free democracy is a crime against their sisters who have no such choices in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan and elsewhere.'
I am a Muslim woman and, like my late mother, free, independent, sensuous, educated, liberal, contrary and confrontational when provoked, both feminine and feminist. I style and colour my hair, wear lovely things and perfumes, appear on public platforms with men who are not related to me, shake their hands, embrace some I know well, take care of my family.
I defend Muslims persecuted by their enemies and their own kith and kin. I pray, fast, give to charity and try to be a decent human being. I also drink wine and do not lie about that, unlike so many other "good" Muslims. I am the kind of Muslim woman who maddens reactionary Muslim men and their asinine female followers. What a badge of honour.
Female oppression in Islamic countries is manifestly getting worse. Islam, as practiced by millions today, has lost its compassion and integrity and is entering one of the darkest of dark ages. Here is this month's short list of unbearable stories (imagine how many more there are which will never be known):
Iranian painter Delara Darabi, only 22 and in prison since she was 17, accused of murdering an elderly relative, was hanged last week even though she had been given a temporary stay of execution by the chief justice of the country. She phoned her mother on the day of her hanging to beg for help and the phone was snatched by a prison official who told them: "We will easily execute your daughter and there's nothing you can do about it." Her paintings reveal the cruelty to which she was subjected.
Meanwhile Roxana Saberi, a 32- year-old broadcast journalist whose father is Iranian, is incarcerated in Tehran's Evin prison, accused of spying for the US. She denies this and says she has been framed because she was seen buying a bottle of wine. This intelligent, beautiful and defiant woman is on hunger strike. Over in Saudi Arabia, an eight-year-old child has just divorced a 50-year-old man. Her father, no doubt a very devout man, sold his daughter for about £9,000.
I have been reading Disfigured, the story of Rania Al-Baz, a Saudi TV anchor, the first woman to have such a job, who was so badly beaten up by her abusive husband that she had to have 13 operations to re-make her once gorgeous face. Domestic violence destroys females in all countries, but in Muslim states, it is validated by laws and values. As Al-Baz writes, "It is appalling to realise that a woman cannot walk down the street without men staring at her openly. For them she is nothing but a body without a mind, something that moves and does not think. Women are banned from studying law, from civil engineering and from the sacrosanct area of oil."
Small optimistic signs do periodically appear in this harsh desert, says Quanta A Ahmed, a doctor who worked in Saudi Arabia and then wrote her account, In the Land of Invisible Women. She describes the love she finds between some husbands and wives, idealists who think better rights will come one day.
That faith in the future is echoed by Norah al-Faiz, the Deputy Minister for Women's Education, chosen in this week's Time magazine list of the world's most influential people. They hope because they must, I guess, even though they can see the brute forces lining up on the horizon ready to crush them by any means necessary. This country has spread its anti-female Wahabi Islam across the globe, its second most important export after oil.
In Afghanistan Ayman Udas was a singer and songwriter who wore lipstick and appeared on TV, defying her family. She was a divorced mother of two who had remarried. Ten days after this she was shot dead, allegedly by her brothers, who must think they are upright moral upholders with places reserved in paradise. In March President Karzai gave monstrous tribal leaders what they demanded, absolute control over wives by husbands and the right to rape them on the marital bed. Protests by brave women in that country and international outrage has forced him to step back from this commitment but there is concern that he is too weak to hold out, and once again women will become the personal and political playthings of men.
Let's to Pakistan then shall we, the country that once elected a woman head of state. The divinely beautiful Swat Valley has, for reasons of political expediency, been handed over to the Taliban, and there they have blown up over a hundred schools for girls and regularly flog young females on the streets. The girls are shrouded and forbidden to scream because the female voice has the potential to arouse desire. Or pity perhaps.
I am aware that my words will help confirm the pernicious prejudices that fester in the minds of those who despise Islam. Yet to conceal or excuse the violations would be to condone and encourage them. There have been enlightened times when some Muslim civilisations honoured and cherished females. This is not one of them. Across the West - for a host of reasons - millions of Muslims are embracing backward practices. In the UK young girls - some so young that they are still in push chairs - are covered up in hijabs. Disgracefully, there are always vocal Muslim women who seek to justify honour killings, forced marriages, inequality, polygamy and childhood betrothals. Why are large numbers of Muslim men so terrorised by the female body and spirit? Why do Muslim women encourage this savage paranoia?
I look out of my study at the common and see a wife fully burkaed on a sunny day. She sits still. Her children and husband run around, laughing, playing cricket. She sits still, dead, buried, a ghost. She is complicit in her own degradation, as are countless others. Their acquiescence in a free democracy is a crime against their sisters who have no such choices in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
Al-Baz says: "I am a disruptive presence because I give women ideas." Me too. To transgress against diehard obscurantists and their unholy rules is an inescapable sacred duty. Yet how pathetic that sounds. Progressive believers tilt at windmills driven by ferocious winds of self-righteousness. Our arms and legs weaken and we are brought to our knees. I fear there is only worse to come.
There were socialist Afghan women soldiers fighting the Muslim fundamentalist guerrillas that Reagan called "freedom fighters" and to whom he gave billions to turn the country into a conservative theocracy.
Image from a 2006 report on the alarming rise in suicide among women in Afghanistan: "Five years after the fall of the Taliban and the liberation of women hailed by Laura Bush and Cherie Blair, thanks to the US and British invasion, such has been the alarming rise in suicide that a conference was held on the problem in the Afghan capital just a few days ago."
Nato's head says it could be difficult to persuade European countries to contribute more troops to Afghanistan because of controversial new laws.
Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said the planned laws violated human rights and were unjustifiable when Nato troops were dying to protect universal values.
Critics say the law limits the rights of women from the Shia minority and authorises rape within marriage. Link.
Juan Cole observes that the US has actually only managed to install a fundamentalist government in Afghanistan, which is rolling back rights of women and prosecuting blasphemy cases. No one seems to have noted that the Shiite regime in Baghdad is more or less doing the same thing.
In Iraq, the US switched out the secular Baath Party for Shiite fundamentalist parties. Everyone keeps saying the US improved the status of women in both countries. Actually, in Iraq the US invasion set women back about 30 years. In Afghanistan, the socialist government of the 1980s, for all its brutality in other spheres, did implement policies substantially improving women's rights, including aiming at universal education, making a place for them in the professions, and so forth. There were socialist Afghan women soldiers fighting the Muslim fundamentalist guerrillas that Reagan called "freedom fighters" and to whom he gave billions to turn the country into a conservative theocracy. I can never get American audiences to concede that Afghan women had it way better in the 1980s, and that it has been downhill ever since, mainly because of US favoritism toward patriarchal and anti-progressive forces.
Aziza Ahmed writes: I am a South Asian not for Bobby Jindal.
Why is this relevant? Because I am South Asian American in a country where race and politics is an inextricably linked conversation. And of course, race matters. Race discourse can be about a common life experience, a shared narrative of a community's history, and an opportunity for solidarity.
Enter Bobby Jindal, our conservative, "Pro-Life," Indian American, touted as the GOP's "rising Republican star." Attention on Jindal's life and career as a politician peaked in recent days, following his response to Obama's State of the Union Address. While the speech was criticized for being (simply) a "disaster," others continue to call Jindal the Republican Party's "great beige hope."
Being "beige" myself, all this attention on Jindal has me thinking - is this guy good for South Asians? Is he good for immigrant women? As the daughter of Indian immigrants I feel for Jindal. I find his badly combed hair endearing. His awkward posturing and southern accent remind me of the struggle we all go through to fit in as an American in communities that can be harsh to people perceived as different (read "strange"). And honestly, it's nice to see someone who looks like he could be my cousin on the news for reasons unrelated to terrorism.
What else do we South Asians have in common? Well, when it comes to the story of South Asians in America there is one that prevails for most: young South Asians can't tell their parents they are dating. Justified by culture, and often religion, "hanging out" with the opposite sex is not something one does, especially not girls. For girls, dating ruins your reputation, your chance for marriage to a decent boy from a decent family, and in turn, an opportunity for a good life. (Good life, of course, is defined by another series of assumptions).
So you can imagine how South Asian parents must feel about sex. And pregnancy (before marriage). And abortion. For the hundreds of South Asian girls I have known througout my life these things are dealt with in private. If sex is talked about its only amongst those other girls that you know won't judge. Pregnancy tests are taken in public bathroom facilities or friend's homes. Abortions are done on borrowed money and hidden by an intricate series of lies. South Asian women and girls that are undocumented and don't have insurance are even worse off - often with no place to turn.
When I think about these often traumatic experiences we South Asian women have, I stop feeling the love for Jindal. Why? Because Bobby Jindal is the man who supported the 2006 "Abortion Pain Bill" requiring physicians to tell women that their fetus will feel pain during an abortion, a medically unresolved claim. For all women, including South Asian women, this is just one more emotionally manipulative obstacle in seeking necessary services. He also voted for a bill that criminalizes transporting a minor across state lines to have an abortion. (Remember that time when you strategized about how you would get an abortion if you needed one - I bet that plan involved someone who could drive).
Sayed Parwez Kambakhsh's brother Yaqub travelled to Italy and other European countries last month to try and muster support for his brother's release. He says he fears for his brother's safety in prison.
Kabul, 9 March (AKI) - Afghanistan's Supreme Court has upheld a 20-year jail term for blasphemy handed to Afghan journalist Sayed Parwez Kambakhsh, who claimed men and women were equal. Kambakhsh's brother said the family had just learned of the closed-door ruling delivered a month ago in the absence of Yaqub Kambakhsh, his lawyer or family members, the Information Safety and Freedom media watchdog reported on Monday.
"We thought there would be some justice in the capital of Afghanistan and even at the highest level of the judicial system," wrote Yaqub Kambakhsh in a letter sent to Information Safety and Freedom.
"But their silent decision seems that first of all there is no justice in Afghanistan at any level. "Kambakhsh is the latest victim."
Twenty-eight year-old Kambakhsh's troubles began in 1997, when he wrote in his blog that "extremist mullahs" had distorted the true meaning of Islam's holy book or Koran.
"If a Muslim man may have four wives, why shouldn't a wife have four husbands," he wrote.
He was arrested on blasphemy charges in the northern town of Mazar-i-Sharif in 2007 and in October that year a local court condemned him to death
The death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment following pressure from international human rights organisations.
Yaqub Kambakhsh visited Italy and other European countries last month to try and muster support for his brother's release and fears for his safety in prison.
"We, Parwez's relations, his colleaues and his lawyers fear he could be murdered in prison, possibly by poisoning - he wouldn't be the first such victim," he stated in an interview with Italian daily Corriere della Sera.
Corriere della Sera quoted Italy's under-secretary for foreign affairs, Alfredo Mantica as claiming the government was concerned about Kambakhsh, but considered it better to intervene after presidential elections due in August 2009 to avoid "politicising" the case.
"If a woman reaches the level of education that enables her to issue fatwas, then she has the right to work as a mufti and issue fatwas on all possible issues," Haddad said in his ruling.
The Grand Mufti of Dubai, the leading Islamic legal scholar, has ruled that women can hold the position of mufti and issue religious rulings relevant to both men and women on every aspect of life.
Dr. Ahmed al-Haddad, Director of the Dubai Fatwa Department, issued a fatwa stating women can apply alongside men for the position of mufti.
"If a woman reaches the level of education that enables her to issue fatwas, then she has the right to work as a mufti and issue fatwas on all possible issues," Haddad said in his ruling.
Since issuing fatwas means informing people of the laws of God, anyone who has the required knowledge has the right to do so, said Haddad, citing a verse from the Quran that requires those who know about God's laws never to withhold the knowledge they have.
"These instructions from the Quran include everyone, male or female" Haddad said.
'The world is about change. This is the galloping reality that is taking place in Malaysia,' she said, adding that statistics showed that 47% women in Malaysia were working and 60% to 70% of students at universities were women and women now wanted laws and practices that recognised these realities in their lives today.
Shahanaaz Habib writes: KUALA LUMPUR: Muslim women activists championing equality and justice in the Muslim family said they will no longer accept the use of Islam to justify discrimination against women.
Project director of Musawah (the global meeting for equality and justice in the Muslim Family) Zainah Anwar said that, very often, Muslim women who demand justice and want to change discriminatory laws and practices were told that this was 'God's law' and, therefore, not open for negotiation or change.
She also said, often, reports were made against them to the police, religious authorities to take action against them, to silence them and charge them for purportedly insulting Islam to have their group banned.
"But we will not be silenced and intimidated. As activists, we all know that in order to bring change, we must not be afraid to speak the truth as we see it, to be angry in the face of injustice, to take difficult positions and to be marginalised and condemned.
"For many of us, it is an article of faith that Islam is just and God is just. If justice is intrinsic to Islam, then how can injustice and discrimination result from the codification and implementation of laws and policies made in the name of Islam.
"This is the 21st century. And today, we once again assert there cannot be justice in this world, without equality," she said in her opening speech on Saturday.
The Musawah brings together 250 participants from 47 countries.
Zainah believed it is possible to find equality and justice within the framework of Islam.
She said it should not be left to the conservative forces to define and dominate the parameters of what Islam was and what was not.
She stressed that these conservative forces had prescribed laws and policies that have kept women "shackled as second class Muslims and citizens", so far, and that, as a Muslim, a woman and a citizen, she was now claiming her right to speak up.
At a press conference later, Zainah said people uncomfortable with the push for reform, often hurled accusations at them that they were "Westernised elites" to demonise and de-legitimise them from speaking up.
"We should be aware that these are strategies and not fall into their trap. We know that even those who are against us - know in their hearts - the oppression, injustice and suffering that Muslim women have to go through," she said.
On objections raised by the Persatuan Ulamak Pulau Pinang and PAS Youth over the Musawah programme, Zainah said, she felt rather sorry for them.
"The world is about change. This is the galloping reality that is taking place in Malaysia," she said, adding that statistics showed that 47% women in Malaysia were working and 60% to 70% of students at universities were women and women now wanted laws and practices that recognised these realities in their lives today.
She said that, now, there was an "incredible disconnect" between laws and today's realities with regards to Muslim women.
The report also notes that the under or poor performance of Muslim women in employment and education remains a problem often related to class.
Salaam writes: The study author's drop a big value-judgment turd right in the middle of this with their comment about "not all Muslim women have the internal drive, strength, or have been exposed to sufficient stimuli to take such a step (to social mobility)." Really? I'm reminded of the criticisms of some feminists in the US in the 1980s for looking down their noses at housewives.
Muslim women in Europe are proud to live in and belong to Europe, despite facing a daily struggle against prejudice from both within and outside their own communities, a new research suggests.
The study, carried out at the University of Cambridge, indicates that Muslim women believe life in Europe has given them freedom, opportunities and security.
It also reveals that an emerging generation of Muslim women are becoming increasingly independent and are determined to assert their right to a full education, a career and to follow their own dreams.
The study, however, adds that many do so in the face of archaic patriarchal cultural traditions on the one hand, and discrimination and suspicion from the non-Muslim majority population on the other.
These challenges, combined with the relatively poor family backgrounds of many European Muslim women, threaten to limit their social mobility, whatever their aspirations.
The study, titled Europe's Muslim women: potential aspirations and challenges, was commissioned by the King Baudouin Foundation and carried out by Dr Sara Silvestri, a Research Associate at Cambridge University's Von Huegel Institute.
It is the first academic study to investigate the topic of Muslim women in Europe in a comparative way, examining it beyond the questions of the wearing of the hijab (veil) and the migration experience.
A total of 49 women from Belgium, Italy [Images] and the United Kingdom -- most of them European citizens -- were interviewed to provide a snapshot of the experiences, views and aspirations of Muslim women.
Apart from the interviews, a wide range of academic reports, national statistics, government and EU reports, policy papers, speeches, media reports and blogs were also analysed.
"The subject of Europe's Muslim women has been under-researched and under-considered," Silvestri said.
"It has left a gap in our knowledge that can lead to misunderstandings, stereotyping and prejudice. The aim of this report was to find out about these women's daily lives, their thoughts, feelings and problems, and the contribution they are making to European society."
The study found that European Muslim women are keen to assert their right to take charge of their own lives and that many see that as entirely compatible with retaining an Islamic identity.
Of the women interviewed, those who chose to wear the hijab saw doing so not as an attempt to distance themselves from wider society, but as an expression of their freedom to make their own choices.
The study warns, however, that "not all Muslim women have the internal drive, strength, or have been exposed to sufficient stimuli to take such a step."
Doing so not only involves breaking free of the narrow-mindedness, which still exists in some closely-knit Muslim communities, but ignoring assumptions that they are "oppressed and illiterate".
"They are daily resisting and negotiating on two fronts," the report says: "With patriarchal norms and family structures in the community, and externally with prejudice coming from the non-Muslim environment."
The report also notes that the under or poor performance of Muslim women in employment and education remains a problem often related to class. Improving their upward social mobility, it says, is made more difficult still by the fact that most European Muslims come from relatively poor socio-economic groups.
In spite of these disadvantages, however, the report found that many Muslim women are asserting their right to govern their own lives, seize opportunities and engage with wider society and civil organisations even in the face of occasional prejudice.
She said that she relied upon simplicity and clarity in the explanations and interpretations, and an easy and accessible language, in order for it to be understood by both the young and the old. Her Quranic interpretation is titled 'A Clear Interpretation of the Quran for the Youth.'
Asharq Al-Awsat- Al-Azhar Scholars have welcomed the publication of the first Interpretation of the Quran [tafsir] written by a woman, saying that it confirms the equality between men and women in Islam.
Kariman Hamzah, the author of this Quranic interpretation and a former presenter of an Islamic television program in Egypt, told Asharq Al-Awsat that the Interpretation is the culmination of her 35 years working in the media. The Islamic Research Academy, the highest authority at the Al Azhar University, approved the printing and distribution of the first Quranic interpretation written by a woman, and which will appear in local bookstores soon.
Sheik Mohamed Al Rawi, head of the Quranic Interpretation Committee of the Islamic Research Academy stated to Asharq Al-Awsat that any work dealing with the Holy Quran must be subject to careful review, and is not approved until it is examined letter by letter and word by word, and has to be approved by all the scholar in the field of Quranic studies and Quranic interpretation. Therefore Muslims can be assured of the authorship of any interpretation approved by the Islamic Research Academy, and need not hesitate in accepting what has been written.
Sheik Abdul-Zaher Abu Ghazala, Director of the Islamic Research Academy's Research, Translation and Publication department revealed to Asharq Al-Awsat that the academy had approved a 20-part Quranic Interpretation by Kariman Hamzah, and that there were no inconsistencies between this Quranic interpretation and Islamic Shariaa Law. He confirmed that Kariman Hamzah's Quranic Interpretation was carefully reviewed before it was granted approval.
Sheik Abu Ghazala added that Kariman Hamzah's interpretation of the Quran is fully consistent with previous Quranic interpretations, and that it contained no inconsistencies or contradictions with Islamic Shariaa Law. He denied that this is a new Quranic interpretation providing a female point of view, emphasizing that this interpretation addresses men, women, the youth, and children, just as the Quran itself speaks to all. Therefore there is no such thing as a "male interpretation" or a "female interpretation" of the Quran; he said that "what is important for us is that the interpretation is consistent with the Quran itself, and does not contradict Islamic Law."
Sheik Abu Ghazala concluded by revealing that the Islamic Research Academy had recently approved a number of Quranic interpretations by women including one written by a pediatrician Dr. Fatin Al Faliki, and one by Mrs. Fawqiyah Ibrahim of Alexandria, Egypt.
Sheik Mohamed Al Birri of Al Azhar University welcomed Kariman Hamzah's Quranic Interpretation, saying that it shows the awakening of Muslim women, and their emulation of the female Companions [of the Prophet]. He added that the Quran makes equal between men and women in every way, including religious education, as well as the task of spreading the message of Islam.
Dr. Mustafa Al Shakaa, a member of the Islamic Research Academy of the Al Azhar University said that Al Azhar's approval of Kariman Hamzah's interpretation shows the equality between men and women in Islam, and confirms the women's right to religious education in Islam is the same as a man's. He added that Islamic Shariaa Law gives Muslim women the right to be religiously educated and make religious decisions in the same way that the female Companions [of the Prophet] did in the time of the Prophet (PBUH), and this refutes the rumors and slander which describe the Islamic religion as a religion that restricts the freedom of women, at the fore-front of this a woman's right to education.
The author of the first Quranic Interpretation to be written by a woman, Kariman Hamzah, informed Asharq Al-Awsat that this work is the culmination of 35 years of work whether it was presenting religious programs on television, or writing Islamic articles in newspaper or magazines, and which allowed her to witness a large proportion of Islamic culture. She emphasized that the object of this undertaking [of writing a Quranic Interpretation] was to serve Islam and spread its message.
Kariman Hamzah said that although she is not a graduate or Al Azhar, or another religious institute, her love for spreading the message of Islam has called her to enter this field [of Quranic interpretation]. She said that in writing her Quranic Interpretation she relied upon simplicity and clarity in the explanations and interpretations, and an easy and accessible language, in order for it to be understood by both the young and the old. Her Quranic interpretation is entitled "A Clear Interpretation of the Quran for the Youth."
In the same article, Samir Abu Hamza, is also described as having "urged followers to spread the word of Islam to save Australians."
Let's look at this from the perspective of Dawah in the West. How are educated people in Western cultures going to respond to this discussion by a Muslim authority figure that seeks to legitimize these behaviors in marriage? You can assume they aren't going to respond well. (This is not to imply that the West doesn't have problems with marital violence too, but in the West it happens outside the bounds of permitted behavior) People will still convert, but is the demographic that is untroubled by these comments the only slice of the population we want to be talking to? I hear the Hells Angels motorcycle club is growing it's membership in Australia too, but we shouldn't be limiting ourselves to competition with the Hells Angels for the "I'm OK with violence" slice of the West.
When someone says, "I'm going to keep it real and tell it like it is" with your own vision of authentic violent Muslim masculinity, then you turn away vast swaths of educated western society that hold core values that reject interpersonal violence. Criticisms of US suburban culture as too feminized, effete and 'corrupt' make these Muslim's vision of widespread Islamic transformation sound less like Andalous and more like the Khmer Rouge, especially in how it would relate to the lawyers, doctors, teachers, engineers, scientists and other educated professional people that live in those suburbs.
Some thoughts about the Australian media As a general rule I'm more cautious and leery of posting stories out of the Australian media because I've seen some other stuff published there by that country's MSM that I considered to be inflammatory and anti-Muslim, and not news (something could be inflammatory and anti-Muslim and news, in which case it should still be published because part of what makes something news is that it has to do with the well-being of society and in a democracy the people are enjoined in the decision-making process about the laws that govern their own well-being).
By the standard of timeliness, one could question whether this is news because the video in question is six years old. What made this 'new' is that the video was posted online, and apparently Samir Abu Hamza has never repudiated the comments. Having said that, I do think society and the state have an interest in considering questions of rape and violence, even within the marriage bed, so I think it was fair news judgment to run this story.
Day said Hanan Ghaith "has much to gain" if a jury convicts her father. Hanan wants to remain in the U.S., and Day added "it's going to be a lot easier with her dad out of the way, and that's going to be the result - perhaps - of this trial."
Hanan Ghaith, 19, testifies Wednesday of the alleged abuse she received from her father, Fawaz M. Ghaith.
Fawaz M. Ghaith's lawyers claim police targeted the Jordanian-American truck driver due to his Middle Eastern descent.
Prosecutors, however, say officers arrested him because he threatened to kill four people while trying to force his adult teenage daughter from Bay County back to his native Jordan.
A jury in 18th Circuit Court heard both sides on Wednesday, as a trial got under way for Ghaith, 47, accused of two counts of extortion in connection with threats he allegedly made on Sept. 2, 2008.
"If Fawaz's name wasn't Fawaz - if Fawaz's name was Jeff, and we had this same factual situation - would we be here in this situation?" Jeffrey M. Day, one of two lawyers representing Ghaith, asked jurors in his opening statement.
Bay County Assistant Prosecutor Richard I. Dresser alleges Ghaith threatened to kill 18-year-old Hanan Ghaith, her mother and Hanan's grandparents in a Sept. 2, 2008, phone call to the grandparents' home in Gibson Township.
Dresser wants to introduce testimony from Hanan Ghaith, now 19, that her father physically abused her repeatedly when she lived with him in Jordan.
Hanan Ghaith later moved to the U.S. to live with her grandparents in Gibson Township. Police said Hanan Ghaith told her grandparents that her uncle, back in Jordan, had beaten her with a belt for speaking with boys via a cell phone.
Hanan Ghaith appeared in court Wednesday, but Circuit Judge William Caprathe required her to testify outside the presence of the jury, explaining he wanted to hear the woman's testimony before deciding whether to let the jury hear it.
Hanan Ghaith testified that while she lived in Jordan, her father beat her a number of times - with a wooden stick, a slipper and his hands - for various reasons.
In his opening statement Wednesday, Jeffrey Day, a Bay City lawyer, told jurors Fawaz Ghaith will testify he doesn't try to control his daughter or wife, but that he treats them with great respect.
"He's going to tell you that his (four) children are the most important thing in his life," Day said. "They remain so, and I suspect he'll tell you, very emotionally, that he would never consider harming any of them."
With the jury out of the courtroom, Dresser told the judge that such statements by Day in front of jurors should entitle Dresser to introduce "other acts of violence between the defendant and his daughter, and his wife."
Caprathe then had Hanan Ghaith testify, and also asked to review a transcript of Day's opening statement, before deciding whether to allow Hanan's testimony about prior alleged beatings by her father.
The judge could issue his decision today - when the trial resumes - and said he expects jurors to begin deliberations Friday.
Hanan Ghaith's grandmother, 65-year-old Marian Breasbois of Gibson Township, testified Fawaz Ghaith threatened to kill her and her husband if Marian Breasbois didn't let him take his daughter back to Jordan.
Breasbois also said Fawaz Ghaith - a dual citizen of Jordan and the U.S. - would kill Hanan Ghaith if she didn't agree to return to Jordan.
Michigan State Police arrested Ghaith on Sept. 2 after he arrived at the Breasbois home at 2897 W. Brown Road.
Day said Hanan Ghaith "has much to gain" if a jury convicts her father. Hanan wants to remain in the U.S., and Day added "it's going to be a lot easier with her dad out of the way, and that's going to be the result - perhaps - of this trial."
Marian Breasbois testified Hanan Ghaith would get mad after speaking to her father by phone while Hanan stayed at the Breasbois home.
"I'd hear her tell him 'You can't make me go (to Jordan). I'm too old. I'm old enough to stay here,'" Breasbois said.
The Director General of the Hisbah, Saidu Dukawa, said the idea of street protests were "un-Islamic", and "morally wrong. Never in the history of Islam have women taken to the street to press for their demands."
Islamic authorities in the northern Nigerian city of Kano have told organisers of a planned protest by divorced women to cancel the event.
The head of the Sharia police, or Hisbah, said the planned protest was an "embarrassment", and is "un-Islamic".
The organisers have agreed to postpone their protest scheduled for 29 January.
Women's rights activists say divorced women are often thrown out of their homes, lose custody of their children, and many end up destitute.
The Director General of the Hisbah, Saidu Dukawa, said there were also security concerns over the protest.
"We fear what could happen in the streets if there is a large gathering of people, it could get out of control," he told the BBC's Hausa Service.
Large gatherings of people can be volatile in Nigeria, which has been rocked by violence between Muslims and Christians over the last 10 years.
Quarrelling spouses He also said the idea of street protests were "un-Islamic", and "morally wrong".
"Never in the history of Islam have women taken to the street to press for their demands," he said.
The Hisbah were reported by local media to have said they feared the demonstration would "ridicule Kano in the eyes of the world".
Kano is one of 12 northern Muslim-majority states governed by Sharia law.
The Hisbah are in charge of policing the morals of Muslims to make sure they are "Sharia-compliant".
They do not have the authority to ban the protest from going ahead, but told organisers they would report the demonstration to the police if they continued with it.
One of their duties is to reconcile quarrelling spouses and prevent divorce.
Yousafzai said the militants had destroyed 170 schools in the valley where about 55,000 girls and boys were enrolled in government-run institutions.
MINGORA, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani Taliban insurgents blew up four schools in the northwestern Swat region Monday hours after a cabinet minister vowed that the government would reopen schools in the violence-plagued valley.
The scenic Swat Valley was until recently one of Pakistan's prime tourist destinations but Islamist militants aiming to impose a harsh form of Islamic law began battling security forces in 2007.
Residents say the militants are now virtually in complete control of the valley, which is 130 km (80 miles) northwest of Islamabad and not on the Afghan border, including its main town of Mingora, where the schools were destroyed early Monday.
"Militants blew up two girls schools and two boys schools," a top government official in the valley, Shaukat Yousafzai, told Reuters. "Attacks on troops are understandable but why are they destroying schools?"
Schools are closed for a winter break and no one was hurt in the attacks.
As with Afghanistan's Taliban, their Pakistani counterparts oppose education for girls and they recently banned female education in Swat altogether.
The militants also see schools as symbols of government authority and they say the army posts soldiers in them.
Yousafzai said the militants had destroyed 170 schools in the valley where about 55,000 girls and boys were enrolled in government-run institutions.
'Girls, their parents, teachers and even drivers transporting students to and from schools are frightened while the owners of buildings have also asked us to vacate their property in view of fear of damage due to bombing.'
Some 200 Taliban fighters used electric drills to vandalize the face of a massive 7th century Buddha sculpture, according to locals in Pakistan's Swat Valley. (John Moore/Getty Images)
PESHAWAR: About 400 private schools in Swat have announced to abandon girls' education in their institutes in the wake of the deadline (Jan 15) given by the militants to discontinue the practice, depriving more than 40,000 students of their basic right to get education.
In addition, 84,248 girl students of state-run schools are unlikely to attend schools due to the fear of militants despite the resolve by the local administration to reopen the schools on March 1.
Maulana Fazlullah-led militants had asked all the government and private schools on December 24 to stop imparting female education by January 15. The announcement triggered an outcry from all and sundry, prompting the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan's central spokesman, Maulvi Omar, to distance his movement from the decision of the Swat militants and said they would ask them to withdraw the threat.
Also, the private schools' management appealed to the militants in black and white to take back their decision in the interest of thousands of girl students and hundreds of female teachers, most of them lone breadwinners of their families.
The Swat TTP reviewed the decision a couple of weeks ago at a meeting held at its headquarters in Peuchar with Maulana Fazlullah in the chair. They did not withdraw their threat, but softened their stance and allowed girls to attain education up to the fourth grade. However, the chief of the terrorists renewed the threat of bombing educational institutions if any school continued higher education for girls.
The expiry of the deadline would have no immediate repercussions due to the winter vacations at present. However, the private schools' management, a body of 400 educational institutions including 20 colleges, has decided to discontinue the female education after the vacation despite assurances from the administration to provide security to their schools.
"The district coordination officer offered security to our schools during our meeting with him but we think it will not work," the owner of a chain of institutes told The News. He said that security to schools could not ensure female education until complete peace was restored to the valley, now almost under the control of the militants, who have also entrenched in Barikot, a militant-free Tehsil. "Girls, their parents, teachers and even drivers transporting students to and from schools are frightened while the owners of buildings have also asked us to vacate their property in view of fear of damage due to bombing.
"Thus, posting a few personnel at schools is of no use. So, we have decided to close female sections in private institutes to avoid the militants' wrath," he said and hastened to add that they would restart female education only after the militants allowed them to do so.
Salaam writes: Cycads, who is perhaps the only blogger - Malaysian or otherwise - doing feminist analysis of life in that country, has written a piece about why the feminism movement has been stillborn there.
Cycads writes, "Feminism was, and still is, the temporally-frozen, bra-burning, anti-men boogiewoman of the general Malaysian imagination." American political progressives will immediately recognize this as the legendary DFH (Dirty F***ing Hippy) stereotype that US rightwingers are always throwing around to freeze out progressive/leftist alternative ideas.
Anyway, herewith follows an excerpt of Cycad's attempt to address and respond to the criticisms and fears of feminism:
Conversations with Malaysian anti-feminists are almost always destined to doom. But I think it's only fair that we understand their grievances by teasing out their usual beef with gender equality.
Feminism is a Western, secular ideology. (This includes claims of feminism as elitist)
This is a good enough reason to forget about feminism altogether for many. Truth is, third-world, indigenous concepts of feminisms are growing in numbers around the world and are constantly in negotiations between non-racist, non-patronising feminist frameworks and local cultures in many societies.
Feminism has failed in its objective and fragmented into in-fighting groups. Many developed nations that are pro-women in law and socially have struggled to establish equal pay between the sexes and to achieve a greater female presence in the top ranks of politics. These issues are still being addressed and debated in the public sphere, and are not the failings of feminism. Feminism is a political movement, and is bound to break into different sub-ideologies based on values that are not represented by constituted powers-that-be. These values, of course, sometimes do not see eye to eye, like socialist feminism vs lipstick feminism for example.
The Superwoman is a myth. The woman who has it all: a family and a great career, is often blamed for family breakdown, neglected children, high rates of singlehood, and late motherhood, among other things. We still live in a culture that often turns a blind eye to neglectful fathers and castigates women for delaying marriage and motherhood in favour of high-flying careers. Men are congratulated for being a father at 80 - just don't expect the same for women. Yes, I know that women are normally not fertile at 80, but the risk of miscarriage and fathering a child with congenital defects such as autism and schizophrenia increases for men beyond the of 35. So everyone has a biological clock. Bummer for you and me.
Feminism supports the right to abortion. That means ending the life of an innocent human being for anti-choicers. Now, feminism sees that women should be given the right to her every aspect of her body, and that includes terminating an unwanted pregnancy. Abortion is never an easy decision to make. It is traumatic, painful, and risky.
Feminism is to blame for all that gender role confusion and so-called social construct stuff. (This includes supporting the sexuality rights of LGBQT groups).
Girls are not hardwired to play with make-up and the mini washing machine, and boys are not born to shoot and kill. Children brought up with gender specific toys grow up internalising their respective roles. As a result, men don't expect to do the washing, sewing, or cooking, and women are not expected to work with power tools.
Feminism justifies morally-questionable acts of empowerment. Can pole dancing, shopping sprees, and binging on alcohol be empowering? This is something that might have little to do with what feminism stands for, that is against oppression and exploitation. If women choose to sexually exploit themselves and submit to oppressive standards of beauty for the enjoyment of men, let them.
Feminism encourages women to compete rather than working with men and then take over the world. Not like that is a bad thing, of course, but this is born out of an ancient male insecurity of female sexuality and its power to give birth, hence the need to contain it.
More passive and insidious forms of violence work in tandem (with the more high profile) - like sex selective abortions, sustained nutritional deprivation and delayed health care for female infants, or the unequal allocation of household resources detrimental to the health of the girl child.
Salaam writes: Earlier this year CAIR trumpeted its accomplishment of having had the FBI remove the label "honor killing" from the wanted poster for Yaser Abdel Said, who murdered his daughters Sarah and Amina last year on New Year's Day. CAIR's reasons for even paying attention to the case were reported as follows:
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) was involved in negotiations with the FBI to remove the term that it said was offensive to the United States' 7 million-strong Muslim community. Many Muslims had said the term 'honor killing' assigned a religious motive to a crime and instigated hate crimes against Muslims.
The term is not offensive to Muslims because honor killings are not sanctioned by Islam, and therefore not Islamic. Honor killings and honor-related violence however are a real problem. CAIR did a disservice to the larger community, Muslim and non-Muslim alike, by browbeating the term honor killing out of the lexicon of the FBI and therefore out of sight from where policies to address the specific issues that come in to play when a women is threatened with honor-related violence. Instead of letting the FBI do its job and protect women's lives, it let a public relations mission on behalf of Islam take precedent, which shows poor commitment to Islamic values, and is in itself a black mark on the reputation of Islam.
I was reminded of this when I read the article linked below, which identifies the most recent victims of honor killing in India (at least as reported in the media) to be two Hindu girls beaten nearly to death and then set on fire by their Hindu village.
One item of note: I had to dig around to identify the two girls as Hindu, whereas I've noticed that in cases of honor killing in the Muslim community media stories seem to always make prominent mention of Islam. Just because the media wants to fake up a false meme that Islam sanctions honor-related violence doesn't mean Muslims should buy into it too.
Deepali Gaur Singh writes: Five women were buried alive in the tribal region of Balochistan in Pakistan and only a national outcry led to the arrest of the persons involved -- months after the incident had actually happened. The killings had even been defended as "tribal tradition" by some senior members of the Senate, the Parliament's Upper House.
What "crimes" had these women committed? Three of the women were teenagers who wanted to marry men of their choice. The other two - the mother and an aunt of one of the girls - supported their decision. The women were abducted by men from their tribe, shot and thrown into a ditch while still alive; the older women were buried along with them for protesting, according to a report by the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC).
Across the eastern border in India, a region that was still some days celebrating the Olympic glory of its homegrown pugilist -- Vijender Kumar's bronze medal -- was recently shrouded by the hushed whispers of another honor killing. Two girls were killed on their return from a late evening outing, escorted by unidentified men. The entire village is believed to have watched as both were assaulted with sticks and axes, hauled to the cremation ground half-dead and set on fire by their family for the sake of "honor" -- quite ironically on Diwali, a day celebrated as the festival of lights in many parts of the country.
But what was even more shocking was the evidence of the system's casual acceptance of this family's act. Not even a "First Information Report" was registered until a fortnight later.
Numbers of women killed frequently go unreported, the perpetrators unpunished as the concept of family honor tacitly justifies the act in the eyes of the immediate community. And while such incidents elicit attention due to the intrigue and horror attached to them as some primordial custom practiced by certain sequestered communities, the fact is that this form of violence is just a part of a much larger problem of violence against women and an issue that transcends cultures and religions. Complicity by other women in the family and the community only helps strengthen the notion of women as property and the perception that violence against family members is a family matter and outside of the judicial and public domain. But at the center of the problem of violence against women is the imbalance of gender relations that assume men to be superior to women. And against the background of this subordinate status of women, much of gender violence is considered normal and enjoys social sanction.
When women are considered vessels of family, clan and tribal or community honor, they will almost always be the direct victims of crimes against a community or violence between groups. And one does not have to look too far for evidence of these manifestations of violence in the public sphere, tacitly supported by state and society either by directly perpetrating it or rarely taking proactive measures to curb it and punish the guilty.
....
In the hierarchical structure of gender violence, women from the lower castes of Indian society are even more vulnerable. By virtue of their position in the social structure they are the ones that find themselves the most vulnerable to exploitation of all kinds, while assaults are carried out with impunity with the knowledge that avenues for redress are even fewer and farther in between. Documented evidence and narratives by several human rights groups indicate that sexual abuse and other forms of violence against these women are used as tools for teaching political "lessons" for what is perceived as rebellion or attempts at dislodging the old, existent social order. Threatened by sexual exploitation of various kinds, these women have also been arrested and raped in custody as a means of punishing their male relatives both by the law enforcers themselves or powerful men within their communities.
Many women learn to accept violence very early in life. The family itself socializes them to accept predetermined social relations expressed in unequal division of labor between the sexes and control over the allocation of resources. And it is within the so-called secure walls of the home that women, very often, are most exposed to violence as they grow up watching the violence perpetrated against the other women in the household by the male members of the family. These violent actions are often closely linked to the concept of a woman as property and dependent on a male protector be it father, husband or son.
Despite the recognition of gender-based violence as a human rights violation, which also includes "violence perpetrated or condoned by the state," a large percentage of women continue to be unprotected against it -- whether it be in the context of the family, the community or the state. What is even more tragic is that at every point key social institutions not only fail to be critical of the violence but, in fact, play their role in legitimizing and maintaining the violence. And even as women find their own voice within these spaces, sometimes accepting the violence or negotiating space within it, adding another dimension to their condition are the more passive and insidious forms of violence that work in tandem -- like sex selective abortions, sustained nutritional deprivation and delayed health care for female infants, or the unequal allocation of household resources detrimental to the health of the girl child.
