 AN Afghan man strangled his wife with her veil after complaining she was "becoming Australian", a jury has heard. Mother of five Marzieh Rahimi, who was said to be trying to escape a violent arranged marriage, was killed in front of her baby and toddler. Soltan Ahmad Azizi, 45, has pleaded not guilty to her murder at their Hampton Park home in November 2007. The Supreme Court heard yesterday that Ms Rahimi, 33, had told social workers her husband had branded her a slave with no rights. Prosecutor Peter Rose, SC, told the jury Ms Rahimi had complained her husband punched her and said her only purpose was to have babies and raise children. Ms Rahimi, who spoke little English and communicated through an interpreter, had told a family violence officer and a health worker that she wanted to leave the marriage, but that she felt powerless, unsupported and fearful. "I'll kill you because I can't carry the shame," he allegedly said when she spoke of separation or divorce. The jury heard that about a week before his wife's death, Mr Azizi complained to his sister-in-law that she was "becoming Australian and had changed her religion". The cousins wed in an arranged marriage and came to Australia as refugees in 2005. Their eldest children were aged 11, nine and six. Mr Azizi told police he didn't plan to kill Ms Rahimi. He said he punched her, then "choked her with her veil"; he then rang 000, telling the operator, "I killed my wife ... come see. You come. My kids are only little." Police found Ms Rahimi on the floor with her baby, three months, and toddler, 22 months, nearby. "I'm ready for the handcuffs," he allegedly told them. Defence lawyer Stratton Langslow urged the jury to consider whether Ms Rahimi's claims of domestic violence were prompted by post-natal depression. He said they should examine the source of the abuse complaints and whether there was any independent evidence of ill-treatment. Mr Langslow said Mr Azizi admitted killing his wife, but the issue was whether he'd meant to. The jury heard that after one incident, in which she said Mr Azizi repeatedly punched her, she locked herself in a room for several days with her youngest children. He then began to treat her better, she'd said. The trial, before Justice Betty King, is continuing. Herald Sun
 And so, despite the all the naysayers and second-guessers, the lawyers in the Rifqa Bary case have negotiated a reasonable and potentially life-saving settlement which will allow Rifqa to remain in state custody until she becomes 18 (which will happen in August), at which time she herself will decide whether or not she wishes to be reunited with her family. According to the Columbus-Dispatch, Rifqa has admitted that she’d been “unruly” when she’d fled her home, and the “family will try to resolve their issues with counseling.” In a statement read by Rifqa’s attorneys, ‘both she and her parents said they loved each other and believe counseling is the best route.” Ahem. The family’s honor has now been slightly salvaged by Rifqa’s open admission (clearly, an admission that had been required) that she’d been…”unruly.” Is it “unruly” to choose one’s own God, or to try and save one’s own life? I’m just asking. In any event, in grand American tradition, “counseling” is seen as an all-purpose, face-saving panacea, a way of avoiding a more superficial or harsher rule of law—a way of dealing with problems that are far beyond (or beneath) a judge’s purview. Thus, “The case plan for Rifqa and her parents says they should talk about their respective religions and visit and communicate regularly.” Had there been no settlement, I would have testified as an expert witness in this case. Luckily, thanks to the good lawyering involved, my testimony was not required. And so, the Bary family (the teenager and her parents) will now enter counseling—always a dicey proposition in my opinion; girls and women are especially vulnerable to false promises of happy endings and true love. Many grown, battered women, report how well their sociopathic batterers bond with their counselors, and how their own anxieties and justified paranoia is minimized, scorned. Ultimately, these women may not only be diagnosed as “crazy,” they may also lose their children, their homes, even their lives—right under their counselor’s nose. One can only hope that the counselor in the Bary case will know a great deal about the nature of honor killings and the fate of apostates in Islam. For example, in the tragic case of Toronto’s Aqsa Parvez, the counselors at the shelter for battered women to which she fled did not understand the dynamics involved in an honor killing family and, when Aqsa’s mother called to say she missed her, they simply allowed Aqsa to go; Aqsa went home and was promptly killed by her father and brother. Aqsa’s crime? She did not want to wear hijab. Speaking of honor killings and what counselors do and don’t understand: I am about to publish a new study about honor killings (due out in the next issue of Middle East Quarterly) in which I studied 230 honor killing victims on five continents. Therefore, I am not at all surprised by the “surprising” news coming out of Finland concerning a potentially “new” kind of victim. Native Finnish women who marry “immigrant” men (the article simply will not use the word “Muslim”) have begun to flee for their lives to avoid being honor-killed—but not only by their husbands, but by their husbands’ family, even by his entire clan. One Finnish woman who married into an “immigrant” family says: “They’ve threatened to kidnap my children, and my husband has repeatedly threatened to kill me. He says nobody can stop them, that horrible things happen, and he doesn’t even have to do them himself, that revenge will come from the clan….
The Multicultural Women’s Association Monika, which runs a safe house for immigrant women and their children, says that more and more Finnish women are turning to them when Finnish authorities fail to understand the threat of honour violence.” According to Nasima Razmyar, Monika’s Project Manager: “You can have 200 people involved in honour-related violence, that is, the entire extended family. And not just the family in Finland, but relatives abroad and back in the home country. In general, our laws need to understand much better this type of group threat…One problem is that Finnish authorities in social services and on the police force treat honour violence just like any other case of domestic violence. They don’t take into account the fact that instead of a dispute between two individuals, honour violence pits a single woman against the wrath of a large group of people.” One hopes and prays that the counselor assigned to the Bary family understands the nature of honor killings. They can certainly read my first study, which appeared in Middle East Quarterly. And, I will gladly send him or her my new study as soon as it is published. P.S. Tundra Tabloids reports that Finnish state news had pulled the article about honor-related violence in Finland but restored it recently in a more sanitized form. Here’s what was deleted from the original article: “Among immigrants honor violence has occurred in Finland for many years.” “She said that her marriage was hell, but no one believed her.” “The woman is the man’s property and thus can assault the woman however he pleases, if the woman refuses to obey the rules.” “Honor violence has been increasing in recent years in Finland, when unmarried young women immigrants from a foreign culture struggle under the pressure. They may be forced to marry and be prohibited from socializing with Finns.” “We’re currently unable to secure and protect the lives of people in the way that the authorities should do, Hukkanen says.” Once again, I wish to acknowledge Esther’s fine work at IslaminEurope.blogspot.com Phyllis Chesler 
 Via Tundra Tabloids, who has much more on this story.More and more Finns confront honor-related violence in their lives.Among immigrants honor violence has occurred in Finland for many years.Finns, like immigrants, are applying for assistance in honor related violence, in places like multi-cultural centers for women, because the Finnish authorities did not recognize the honor violence and do not understand how serious may be the case. A Finnish woman told of her experiences in YLE's TV2 Ajankohtainen Kakkonen program this week. A woman encountered honor related violence from a religious man of foreign background. She said that her marriage was hell, but no one believed her. - I am afraid of my husband, his brother and the whole family. I have received threats of child abduction and the man has repeatedly threatened to kill me. The man has said that none of them can do nothing - that the horrors will happen, that he doesn't have to do it himself - the avenger can be found from his own tribe, the woman says. A man who believes in honor violence and his entire family think that a woman's chastity is in a man's control. The woman is the man's property and thus can assault the woman however he pleases, if the woman refuses to obey the rules. Honor violence has been increasing in recent years in Finland, when unmarried young women immigrants from a foreign culture struggle under the pressure. They may be forced to marry and be prohibited from socializing with Finns. ( more) See also: * Finland: Mixed marriages three times more likely to end in divorce* Finland: Growing numbers of women fear honor violence* Finland: Mapping honor related violence* Finland: Honor related violence* Finland: Increase in honour-related violence
 Police have seen 'honour' crime surge by 40 per cent due to rising fundamentalism, new figures show.
Honour-based violence, including crimes like murder, rape and kidnap has rocketed in London during the past year.
Reported instances of intimidation and attempts at forced marriage have also increased by 60 per cent.
A report into the scale of the problem by Scotland Yard found there were 161 honour-based incidents recorded in 2007-8, of which 93 were criminal offences.
But in 2008/9 the number of incidents had risen to 256, with 132 being criminal offences.
The latest figures indicate that the trend is continuing, with 211 incidents reported in the last six months until October, of which 129 were offences - more than double the number in the same period last year.
Police define honour crimes as offences motivated by a desire to protect the honour of a family or community.
Diana Nammi, of the Iranian and Kurdish Women's Rights Organisation, said the group is now dealing with four times more complaints relating to honour than two years ago.
She said: 'More women are coming forward. They are becoming more aware of their rights in the UK, that there is help available and they feel confident enough to report matters to the police.
'But I also think cases and violence are increasing.
'One reason is the rise in fundamentalism. The problem is increasing in communities around the UK.
'We are seeing a rise not only in honour killings, but also in female genital mutilation and polygamy.'
She added: 'The rise in Sharia courts is another indication of more fundamental beliefs.
'There must be more support from the Government to organisations who are working to combat this problem.'
(more)
Source: Daily Mail
Islam in Europe
By Stephen Brown It was as cold-blooded and vicious an honor crime as any the West has seen, but with one difference. This time, the victim was male. A 24-year-old Asian man is clinging to life in a British hospital after seven men attacked him last week in London for having a friendship with a married Muslim woman. The unidentified man, who is Muslim himself and has Danish citizenship, was stabbed twice in the back and beaten so severely with bricks that authorities report he is now blind in one eye and will probably lose sight in the other. Acid was also poured down the victim’s throat, damaging his tongue and throat so severely he will probably never speak again. “The poor man got up and ran straight into a tree, then staggered back to his house, tugging at his burning clothes and banging on doors, shouting for water,” said one woman who witnessed the attack. Read more ...Source: FPM
The Basque Autonomous Police (Ertzaintza) detained on Sunday night in Portugalete (Vizcaya) a 43-year-old man of Maghrebi origin, accused of stabbing his 20-year-old daughter 20 times and of hurting another two sons, according to the Basque Interior Department. The attack began inside the family’s home, in Ruperto Medina’s st, when the man stabbed his older daughter. Her teenage brothers, another girl and a boy, tried to end the quarrel and got hurt. She has a cut in one hand. He fell off the stairs.. Both of them suceeded in fleeing the house asking for help, while the stabbed girl got in one neighbour’s house. But the father followed the first ones and had a hard discussion with his son in the street. According to another neighbour, who was woken up by the “shouts”, everything happened very quickly. Several minutes afterwards, the Police arrived at the scene and arrested the man. “He was shouting like a mad man and was very difficult to handle”, the witness say. (…). Read more ...Source: Publico.es H/T: Tea and Politics
By Amelia Bentley A man used a butcher's knife to stab his stepdaughter up to 20 times because he believed she was a "slut" who was interfering in his marriage, a court has heard. Khaled Ibrahim Mohamed Ellaimouny, 38, was today jailed for 12 years for the attempted murder of his stepdaughter Amanda Lee Smith, who was 24 when her stepfather stabbed her in the chest, arms, legs and face as she sat on the lounge of the family's Shailer Park home in January 2007. In the Supreme Court in Brisbane, Crown prosecutor Philip McCarthy said Ellaimouny, an Egyptian national who married Ms Smith's mother after meeting her online, moved in to the Smith family home in January 2006. Mr McCarthy said Ellaimouny, who worked as a chef at a restaurant in the Logan area, got along well with his stepdaughter until late 2006 when he discovered semi-nude photos of her and her boyfriend on a family computer and began referring to her during arguments with Ms Smith's mother as "the slut daughter." Read more ...Source: Brisbane TimesH/T: Jihad Watch
 By Shamim Bano | Karachi
Thirteen-year-old rape victim Nasima Lubano recorded her statement in the court of District and Session Judge (South) Faheem Ahmed Siddiqi on Friday
Two types of statements were recorded during proceedings: the examination in chief which was conducted by Deputy District Public Prosecutor (DDPP) Abdul Maroof, and a cross-examination conducted by Defence Counsel (DC) SM Iqbal Shah.
Revealing her plight, Lubano, a resident of district Ubaro, said that two men, Abdul Sattar and Mohammed Anwer Hussain, raped her on January 27, 2007. She said that later, on she was taken to a courtyard where nine other people abused her and physically humiliated her. Hearing her cries, two men, Jamaluddin and Mohammed Sardar, barged into the courtyard, allowing her the opportunity to escape, albeit naked, and reach home, where she narrated the entire gruesome tale to her parents. Lubano’s medical examination and treatment was conducted the same day, while the very next day, she recorded her statement under section 164 of the criminal procedure, and her thumb impressions were taken.
After the DDPP had completed questioning, the court asked the DC to initiate cross-examination, however DC Shah said that he was not prepared for cross-examination and needed time. The court censured the DC, stating that he should have come prepared, but adjourned the hearing till May 20. It is worth remembering that the DC was only recently appointed to the case. He is the third lawyer to take up the case. Nasima Lubano was allegedly gang-raped by 11 men, of which three, Abdul Sattar, Morozado and Munawar Hasan, are still at large. Another accused, Long Khan, expired during the jail trial. The other seven accused include: Shahzado, Abdul Jabbar, Anwar Hussain, Khadim Hussain, Ali Hasan, Shah BAig and Bashir Ahmed.
Hamza Lubano had lodged a report at the police station Ubaro under section 354-A, 387-a, 337-F(10 147, 148, 149 of the Pakistan Penal code, FIR 07/2007, stating that a dispute took place between Abdul Sattar and him on a children-related matter, upon which Sattar threatened to violate his honour so that “he could no longer live in society”.
Labano’s relative reportedly kidnapped the daughter of Anwar Khan some time back; and in order to avenge her honour, Anwar Khan and his ten accomplices abducted Nasima, and took her to Sattar’s residence, where ten persons allegedly raped her. The sexual assault by ten persons has also been proved by the medical report. Source: The NewsH/T: Weasel Zippers
The two-minute video, shot using a mobile phone, shows a burka-clad woman face down on the ground. Two men hold her arms and feet while a third, a black-turbaned fighter with a flowing beard, whips her repeatedly.
"Please stop it," she begs, alternately whimpering or screaming in pain with each blow to the backside. "Either kill me or stop it now."
A crowd of men stands by, watching silently. Off camera a voice issues instructions. "Hold her legs tightly," he says as she squirms and yelps.
After 34 lashes the punishment stops and the wailing woman is led into a stone building, trailed by a Kalashnikov-carrying militant.
Reached by phone, Taliban spokesman Muslim Khan claimed responsibility for the flogging. "She came out of her house with another guy who was not her husband, so we must punish her. There are boundaries you cannot cross," he said. He defended the Taliban's right to thrash women shoppers who were inappropriately dressed, saying it was permitted under Islamic law.
The Guardian received the video through Samar Minallah, a Pashtun documentary maker and anthropologist who lived in Swat for two years in the late 1990s. It has been passed between Swat residents by mobile phones.
Ms Minallah said the punishment had been inflicted within the last 10 days, following the signing of a controversial peace deal under which the provincial government ceded control of the valley's judicial system to the militants.
"This video is being widely circulated because the Taliban want people to see it. They want to give the message that this is taking place after the peace deal because this is something they ideologically believe in," she said.
Local sources including journalists and human rights workers, some of whom declined to be identified, confirmed the video was recent, although estimates of its timing varied between one and three weeks ago. The Taliban spokesman said it predated the peace deal.
Sher Muhammad Khan, an official in Swat with the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, said: "They have committed so many atrocities since the peace deal. They have taken entire control of the district. There is nobody to control them; they decide disputes according to their whims."
Since the 15 February deal, a hybrid of traditional and Islamic law has been operational in Mingora, the largest city in Swat district. The qazi courts, as they are known, are not operated by the Taliban but by a related political movement. They have a murky legal status because the changes have yet to be signed into law.
Floggings and other physical punishments have not been imposed in Mingora, where some residents have praised the system's efficiency. However, in outlying districts, where government writ has been entirely crushed, a crude form of gun justice prevails.
The woman in the video, named as Chaand and believed to be aged 17, was punished in Matta, a district further up the Swat Valley.
Minallah and other sources said the girl was punished on suspicion of having had an illicit relationship with a married man. She did not receive a trial. "The whole case is based on the suspicions of one neighbour," said Minallah.
The woman's brother is among the men pinning her down, she added. "It's symbolic that he does it with his own hands. It gives him honour in local society, that he has done it for the sake of religion."
The Swat Valley is controlled by Maulana Fazlullah, a charismatic preacher who initially gained popularity through radio broadcasts, then seized control through gun battles, suicide attacks and intimidation of the local population.
Since the peace deal, women have been beaten for shopping unaccompanied in Mingora's main market and dozens of girls' schools remain closed, many of them bombed.
Fazlullah has sworn loyalty to Baitullah Mehsud, the overall Taliban leader from South Waziristan who claimed responsibility for last Monday's eight-hour assault on a police centre in Lahore and has vowed to mount attacks in Washington.
On Wednesday a presumed American drone fired rockets at a compound controlled by his network, killing at least 14 people.
The effective surrender of government authority in Swat has caused great alarm across Pakistan and among western allies.Minallah said she feared Talibanisation would spread across Pakistan.
"I have distributed this video because I feel people are in denial. They don't want to believe what is happening." Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/02/taliban-pakistan-justice-women-flogging
Schools can have a major role to play to protect children from domestic violence such as 'honour'-based violence and forced marriage. Jenni Whitehead looks at a report by the House of Commons Home Affairs CommitteeA new report published by the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee looks at domestic violence, including forced marriage and so called ‘honour’-based violence, and its effect on children. The report pulls together findings from the recent investigation into how local authorities are tackling these issues, particularly that of forced marriage. The report calls for early intervention and prevention strategies and views schools as having a major role to play in early recognition and reporting and ongoing support of pupils at risk. Read more ... Source: Teaching Expertise
 An Afghan teenager is in a serious condition in hospital after her mother and brother allegedly sliced open her belly to remove a five-month-old foetus from a rape, officials said.
The girl's relatives, who are farmers, had apparently decided to remove the unborn child to protect the family's honour, a local Governor told AFP.
Rape and pregnancy outside marriage are seen as a disgrace in the conservative society.
Bamiyan Governor Habiba Sarabi said the girl had not told her family she was pregnant.
"When the family realised two days ago, the mother and brother of the girl tied up her hands and legs and took her to a stable where they sliced open her belly with a blade and took the foetus away," she said.
They then sewed up the wound with a large needle of the sort used to seal flour sacks, Ms Sarabi said.
It became infected and started bleeding and the girl fainted, prompting the family to take her to hospital.
"She is not in good health now," she added.
Authorities had arrested the alleged rapist and were investigating, Ms Sarabi said.
Provincial health director Nadir Ali confirmed the girl was in hospital.
"Her wound is badly infected and we are trying to control that first. We don't know how bad are her internal wounds," Dr Ali said.
The nature of the wound showed the procedure was not carried out by health workers, but further investigation was needed to establish what had happened to the girl, he said. Source: AFPH/T: Dhimmi Watch
Schools must be more alert to honor-murder. Offenses based on honor-violence happen more often than realized. Intervening in time can prevent victims, according to a study by research agency Sardes for the Ministry of Integration. The results were published Thursday in the conference "Honor related violence in and around the school" (Eergerelateerd geweld in en om de school).
Sardes studied 40 middle-schools and regional educational centers (ROCs) all over the Netherlands. Twenty four of these had dealt with honor-related violence in previous years. Students were threatened or even murdered by family members because they had blemished the family honor. Sometimes the perpetrators sat in class. Most victims were girls of Turkish or Moroccan origins who had lived too loosely, according to their families. Source: Islam in EuropeH/T: Europe News
Domestic violence is more common in Muslim households because men think they have a "God-given right" to beat up their wives, according to a leading female Muslim medic.  By Martin Beckford Fatima Husain, a consultant in obstetrics and gynaecology, has told how she sees Muslim women coming for treatment with strangle marks around their necks and bruises on their pregnant bumps. She also claimed that problems develop because many followers of Islam are fearful of discussing sex, contraception and infertility. Dr Husain, who works at Heatherwood and Wexham Park Hospitals in Berkshire, told the Muslim News that many women ask to be referred to her specialist clinics because she is a hijab-wearing Muslim, allowing her to discover the true scale of domestic violence in her religious community. She said: "I've seen injuries on some of my patients that I wouldn't dream would happen to pregnant women. "I've seen strangle marks, finger marks on their necks and bruises on their pregnant abdomens. "Domestic violence is supposedly equally divided amongst the various groups but I get the impression it is more common in Muslims. "Some Muslim men think they have a God-given right to be physically violent to their spouses. I see the result of all this when they are admitted as my patients." Read more ...Source: TelegraphDr. Fatima Husain
Latest recipient of The MASH Award
An Algerian who burned her daughter's hand with a white-hot knife because she was seeing a French guy was sentenced to six months suspended sentence by the Mulhouse (Haut-Rhin) court. The case first went to court September 19 but the court first ordered a psychiatric evaluation of the defendant. The defendant received a suspended sentence of six months, three years probation and required treatment. Friday the public prosecution demanded eight months suspended sentence with probation of two years and required treatment. The court rejected the aggravating circumstances of religion against the 49-year old Muslim mother, who told her daughter that even if her French boyfriend would convert he would 'always have Christian blood in his veins'. She repeatedly asked her 20 year old daughter to end the relationship. Read more ...Sources: Le JDD, Cabinets Avocats, La Nouvelle Republique, 20mins H/T: Islam in Europe
 In Somalia, 16 year old Aisha Ibrahim Duhulow was killed on Monday, 27 October, by a group of 50 men who stoned her to death in a stadium in the southern port of Kismayu, in front of around 1,000 spectators. According to Amnesty International, the victim was a 15 year old gang rape victim who had reported her crime, but was instead convicted of ‘adultery’; one of her relatives was also killed as he tried to prevent the executionAmnesty International and Women Living Under Muslim Laws have condemned this action. In Pakistan, news emerged that 225 women have died in so-called ‘honour’ killings so far this year, and in every 24 hours in Karachi, more than one hundred women are raped, according to the Aurat Foundation. This month it was also revealed that in an horrific murder, 17 year old Tasleem Solangi’s uncle set dogs upon her who mauled her, and then shot her in front of her father. This was justified as an ‘honour’ killing, although it appears to have been motivated instead by a land dispute between the brothers and was carried out with the full approval of a tribal judge. Later reports indicate that Ms Solangi was pregnant at the time of the murder. In Egypt, a Christian father killed his daughter Mariam Atef Khilla, her husband and their child in fury at her decision to marry a Muslim. In India, seven people have been arrested over the death of Lalmati Verma, in a case of ‘sati’ in Chattisgarh, and an eleven year old girl was set on fire for the alleged offence of wearing lipstick. In Syria attempts to change the penal code which allows for shorter sentences in the cases of ‘honour’ killings met predictable opposition from a few politicians who claim that ‘honour’ killing is required under sharia law. Good news from Britain where the police have strengthened measures for the protection of potential victims through using the witness protection scheme. Source: International Campaign Against Honour Killings
 Syrian leaders have recommended reforming laws under which criminals convicted of so-called “honour crimes” get lenient sentences.
The commission for family affairs – a government body – proposed the change last week at the end of a state-sponsored forum on honour crimes, the first of its kind in Syria. More than 100 civic, religious and government leaders as well as legal experts attended the conference in Damascus, which also drew support from the ministry of justice and the ministry of religious endowments.
Under Syrian law, men who catch a female family member engaging in adultery or other “illegitimate sexual acts”, or even in a “suspicious state”, are exempted from the standard punishments for murder and assault. Those convicted of murders deemed to be honour killings face only six months to a year in prison.
The conference called for the honour crime exemption to be eliminated from the statute books, so that individuals convicted of murder in honour-related crimes would face a minimum of 15 years in prison.
“Article 548 gives permission for half of the [Syrian] people to commit murder,” said family affairs commission chair Simwa Astor. “We want to eliminate this article… for the sake of the sovereignty of the law, and to protect human beings.” Source: Institute for war & peace reporting
KARACHI, Pakistan - A 17-year-old Pakistani girl was mauled by dogs and shot to death in front of him over a land dispute disguised as a so-called "honor killing," her father said. Female senators staged a walkout from the federal parliament Monday to press for action on better protections for women after a national newspaper published details of Tasleem Solangi's death. "How long will women be buried alive and made to face hungry dogs? Women are not given their rights," opposition lawmaker Semi Siddiqui said. Ibrahim Solangi, 28, has been in custody ever since Taslim's death in March and is awaiting trial on murder charges, said Pir Mohammad Shah, the police chief of the Khairpur Mirs district in southern Pakistan. Taslim's husband was also her first cousin. Human rights groups say hundreds of women are killed by male relatives every year in Pakistan for alleged infidelity or other perceived slights to the family name, and activists say many more cases go unreported. Read more ...Source: AP
 By Nadia Abou el Magd CAIRO // While the Quran permits a husband physically to discipline his wife should she disobey him, a recent wave of rulings by Islamic scholars are encouraging women to fight back. This week, Sheikh Abdel Hamid Al Atrash, who heads the committee for fatwas, or religious edicts, at Al Azhar University in Cairo, Sunni Islam’s highest institute, ruled that women are entitled to use violence to defend themselves from abusive husbands. “A wife has the legitimate right to hit her husband in order to defend herself,” the independent daily Al Masry Al Youm quoted Sheikh Atrash as saying on Monday. “Everyone has the right to defend themselves, whether they are a man or a woman … because all human beings are equal before God.” Sheikh Atrash’s fatwa comes on the heels of similar rulings by religious leaders in Saudi Arabia and Turkey. Last week, Saudi Sheikh Abdel Mohsen Al Abyakan was quoted by Shams, a Saudi newspaper, urging women to resort to “the same kind of violence” their husbands use against them, whether it be with a leather strap or a wire cable. Sheikh Abyakan confirmed his views on a popular Muslim website. Read more ...Source: The NationalH/T: Weasel Zippers
 The FBI removed all mention of the controversial term “honor killing” from the wanted poster of a double-murder suspect after FOXNews.com ran a story announcing the use of the term. Yasser Abdel Said, wanted for the murder of his two daughters, has eluded authorities for almost a year. The bodies of the young women - Sarah Said, 17, and Amina Said, 18 - were discovered in the back of a taxicab in Irving, Texas, on New Year's Day. According to family members, Said felt he was compelled to kill his daughters because they had disgraced the family by dating non-Muslims and acting too "Western." The girls’ great aunt, Gail Gartrell, has always called the case an “honor killing.” And for a few days - until last Friday - the FBI publicly agreed. “The 17- and 18-year-old girls were dating American boys, which was contrary to their father's rules of not dating non-Muslim boys,” The FBI "wanted" poster read early last week. “Reportedly, the girls were murdered due to an 'Honor Killing.'” Read more ...Source: Fox NewsThe FBI
Latest recipient of The Dhimmi Award
An 11-year-old girl has been set on fire by a relative in India's northern city of Jaipur for wearing lipstick and being inappropriately dressed.
Police say the girl suffered burns over 90 per cent of her body and her chances of survival are bleak.
They've arrested her great uncle who allegedly poured kerosene on the girl and set her alight yesterday.
Investigators say the 55-year-old man, a conservative Muslim, told the police he was enraged at the girl wearing lipstick and being scantily dressed.
But relatives have accused the man of trying to molest the girl and setting her on fire when she objected. Source: AAP
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AN Afghan man strangled his wife with her veil after complaining she was "becoming Australian", a jury has heard. 
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