MEDIA: Media, violence and imams

Some readers will remember the 2006 media assault on Shaykh Hilaly over his infamous "catmeat" comments. Many of you would rather forget it. I guess it's all rather academic now.

It was hard to get a nuanced word in back in those days, with politicians and shockjocks and columnists baying for blood. And they weren't just after Hilaly's blood either.

AAP ran a story which was published on the Sydney Morning Herald website under the headline Lawyer attacks cleric media coverage. Here are the first few paragrasphs.

A Muslim human rights lawyer has attacked the media over its coverage of Sheik Taj Aldin Alhilali during a women's rights function.
Alhilali's explosive comments comparing women who don't wear the Islamic headscarf to "uncovered meat" were also condemned at Australia's launch of the White Ribbon Day campaign in Sydney.

Er, the two functions were one and the same.

White Ribbon Day was created by 14 Canadian men in 1991 to denounce violence against women. The United Nations declared it an international day of activism the same year.
More than 200 politicians, sports stars, health professionals and cultural representatives will promote the worldwide campaign as "ambassadors" during the lead-up to White Ribbon Day on November 25.
One of the ambassadors at the launch, in the rocks, human rights lawyer and columnist Irfan Yusuf, condemned Sheik Alhilali's comments as "nonsense".
:If it weren't nonsense, then how do we explain the fact that women wearing head scarves sitting at home often get attacked as well?" he asked.

Fair enough. But what about the media? Is it the entire media? Or just select newspapers?

Then Mr Yusuf hit back at the media over the extent of the coverage of the sheik's sermon and its aftermath, calling responses by politicians and "allegedly conservative" columnists "sectarian-wedge politics".
The sheik's controversial remarks, condemned by Muslims and non-Muslims alike, received media coverage worldwide.
"I found it amazing that one particular newspaper spent eight pages on the issue of Sheik (Alhilali) and his comments," he said.
"You would have thought Sheik (Alhilali) just delivered the budget, or he just won his third election in a row."

Actually much more was said. But then you can't control how your words are reported and then interpreted. Or vice versa.  Still, it's all academic.

VIDEO: Protecting victims of violence against women in Dubai

This is a report from 2007 about an American woman living in Dubai who has set up an organisation providing shelter to victims of domestic violence, sex trafficking and other forms of abuse. Yes, it happens in all societies including nominally Muslim ones. And even the wealthiest of them are not immune.



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COMMENT: A useful note with a pompous headline ...

... and with a few bits worth reading. I'm not sure what I was thinking when I wrote the headline. It was first published on the Aussie Mossie blog on 23 November 2005.

A Message To Imams Across Australia, New Zealand & The World

25 November 2005 falls on a Friday, the day regarded as sacred to Muslims. On this day, Muslims gather at the mosque to pray in congregation. Part of that process includes the delivery of a sermon or “khutbah”.

The Prophet Muhammad has provided guidelines for the delivery of sermons. One od these guidelines is that the khatib (the one who delivers the sermon) is to deal with current issues facing the Muslim community.

Although I am no scholar, I have a humble suggestion for our imams and khatibs for a topic which affects all Muslims, especially Muslim men. I also have a humble request for our imams and khatibs to wear a certain item with their clothing.

The United Nations has designated 25 November to be the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. As part of this day, men wear white ribbons on their chests as a symbol that they will not commit, condone or tolerate any forms of violence against women carried out by other men.

I urge our imams and khatibs to wear a white ribbon on that day, and to encourage the male members of their congregation to also wear the white ribbon.

Islam gave dignity to women. It gave women rights and liberties. But some men, Muslim and non-Muslim, choose to take those rights away. Moreover, some men choose to act violently toward women.

Our greatest exemplar in conduct was the Prophet Muhammad. There is no instance of him ever behaving violently toward a woman. He never engaged in physical or sexual violence toward any women, be they his wives, his daughters or women outside his family.

The Prophet Muhammad brought a scripture which states that husbands and wives are like “garments unto each other”. Which man would rip up or punch or kick his garments?

The Prophet is reported to have said: “The best of you is he who is best to his wife. And I am the best amongst you because of my behaviour with my wife.”

The measure of a man is how he treats his wife. Yet we all know that Muslim men do exist who beat and act violently toward their wives. Often such violence is carried out in the presence of children, or at least comes to the knowledge of the children.

When violence against women is perpetrated in the home, it isn’t just the women victims who suffer. The children are traumatised, and this can last even after they reach maturity. Other men who care for the woman victim – fathers, brothers etc – also suffer.

Indeed, even the perpetrator of the violence suffers. He loses respect of his children. He is increasingly unable to control the anger or other causes of the violence. Most importantly, he eventually loses the woman who could have offered him unconditional love.

Society as a whole loses. And we are losing. Our women are suffering physical and sexual violence at the hands of their husbands and other men. We know it is happening. But many of us come from cultures where domestic violence is hidden.

In Australia and other Western countries, there are laws which forbid domestic violence and which provide women with remedies against the perpetrators. Similar laws exist in Muslim countries.

Yet it troubles me that when I visit a court located in an area of Sydney with a substantial Muslim community, I see names like “Ali” and “Muhammad” and “Umar” and “Abdullah” figuring prominently on the court list as perpetrators of violence toward their female partners.

It also troubles me that I see so many women with names like “Aisha” and “Khadija” and “Yasmin” and “Fatima” as victims.

Women make up at least 50% of the Muslim population, and at least 50% of the human race. Violence against women is condemned across all faiths and schools of thought. So why is it on the increase?

This is not just an issue for Muslims. It is eating at the soul of mankind. We know that God is “ar-Rahman” (absolutely gracious) and “ar-Rahim” (absolutely merciful). We know that these two primary attributes of God come from the root word “Rahm” which means “the womb”.

God uses the example of the female womb to describe His own absolutely mercy. Yet instead of respecting the wombs that carried us, we see women being subject to the worst forms of physical, mental, sexual and emotional violence in our communities. We even see fathers and brothers perpetrating violence for the sake of protecting family honour.

Yet the most honourable and best of men is the one who is best to his wife. This is the standard set for us by our Prophet. It is the standard we have failed.
The Prophet said: “Help your brother, both when he is oppressed and when he oppresses.” Those hearing asked: “How do we help someone when he oppresses?” The Prophet responded: “By stopping him from his oppression.”

Muslim men need to stop their Muslim brothers who deem it acceptable to oppress their wives and other women. The violence against women will only stop when men take a stand. If Muslim men sit by and not stop the evil from occurring, we might as well be lending a hand to the violence.

I humbly call upon all imams and khatibs to deliver this message to the men in their congregations on 25 November 2005.

Words © 2005-11 Irfan Yusuf



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VIDEO: Should she be allowed to wear it?

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OPINION: Fourth Column in Crescent Times - Why Pain Matters More Than Prejudice ...

These days Alexander Downer finds himself working for the UN on a big fat tax-free salary. He travels between freezing New York, sweltering Adelaide and the even hotter Cyprus. Not bad for our longest serving (and some would say worst) foreign minister.

But things weren’t always so exciting for Mr Downer. Back in 1995, his reign as the Federal Liberal Parliamentary Party’s shortest serving leader ended with the release of a set of motherhood statements parading as policies entitled The Things That Matter.

In the presence of journalists, Downer made this ... er ... joke:

When we release our domestic violence policy, [it will be] the things that batter.

In one verbal swoop, he managed to offend at least a certain 51 per cent of the electorate born female. Downer later explained it was all a joke. His party colleagues weren’t laughing, and made sure he didn’t last in the job beyond a few days over eight months.

Jokes about domestic violence are no joke in Australia, making insensitive remarks about female and/or child victims of physical or sexual violence and their families
shouldn’t be seen as funny anywhere.

So one could hardly expect imams and Muslim preachers like Melbourne’s Samir Mohtadi (also known as Abu Hamza or “Hamza’s dad” presumably because his eldest child is named Hamza) to get away with advising Muslim men that it is permissible to bash one’s wife. Presuming, of course, that’s what he actually said. But anyone taking the time out to watch the 4 minute excerpt of Abu Hamza’s speech on the website of the Melbourne Herald-Sun and other News Limited tabloids across the country during the week of the Australia Day long weekend would soon realise Abu Hamza didn’t exactly endorse wife-beating.

However, the part of what Abu Hamza said that I think is worth focussing on is his suggestion that it’s impossible for a man to rape his wife. At least that’s how I interpreted what he said. We cannot be sure exactly what Abu Hamza meant by these words when he said them in 2002, since only a badly edited excerpt is available. Exactly why his words were reported by tabloids across the country on the eve of Australia Day in 2009 is also unclear. Is it yet another case of American-owned tabloids wanting to spread prejudice under the guise of Australian patriotism?

What we do know is that the vast majority of incidents of sexual assault are by men against women they have a pre-existing relationship with – an acquaintance, a date or even a partner or spouse. It is estimated that at least 10% of Australian women will be sexually assaulted by their husbands.

Rape is under-reported as it is, and too often its victims suffer in silence. Indeed, as the South African Muslim scholar Farid Esack says, female victims of rape are double victims. They are victims of the act itself and are then victims of a kind of enforced or pressured silence based on false notions of shame. Imagine being a victim and having an extra layer of shame due to the perpetrator being the father of one’s children.

What hurts much more than double standards and prejudice and bigotry of tabloid editors is the too-often silent pain of female victims of all races and creeds and classes. Violence against women is all too common in Australian households. What kind of sick man gets his kicks out of forcing any woman, let alone his own wife, to have s-x with him?

Sadly, the answer all too often is an Australian man. That man can belong to any religion or no religion at all. That man can be of indigenous or immigrant stock. But if we focus on one set of perpetrators, it means we ignore other perpetrators. And that does injustice to all victims.

When news reports of the words of imams create an environment of prejudice, inevitably it is Muslim women who suffer more. Your average Muslim bloke, even if he wears an impressive beard, could easily be mistaken for a Sikh or a fanatical ZZ Top
fan. But not a Muslim woman wearing a hijab or niqab.

It’s hard enough for our female folk to have to cop nasty stares and abuse for most visibly personifying a despised religious culture. But when these same women cannot even feel safe from their own husbands, when our sisters know that imams and shaykhs are teaching husbands that raping your wife is okay, surely this must magnify the burden of prejudice our sisters in faith already face.

In an environment like this, where non Muslim men and women abuse them and where Muslim husbands are taught it’s okay to rape them, is it any wonder so many of our sisters who would regularly wear hijab in public are now removing it? Why should Muslim women cop the lion’s share of abuse when Muslim men (including imams) are silent on issues of domestic violence?

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf


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COMMENT: The honour killing they seem to have forgotten about ...

We've all heard of Amina Lawal, of Mukhtar Mai and of the various victims of honour killings over the years. But one woman's honour doesn't seem to figure very highly in European and Western media outlets. Indeed, in Australia, not a single News Limited newspaper has reported the murder of Marwa al-Sherbini. Not a single News Limited blogger has commented on the incident, including xenophobic bloggers like Andrew Bolt who frequently pluck poorly-reported stories of violence against women of nominally Muslim heritage.

Funny, that.

Marwa al-Sherbini is in her early thirties, smart and attractive. She comes from an educated middle class family, both her parents working as pharmacists. She grew up in the cosmopolitan Egyptian city of Alexandria. She now lives in Dresden, a city once famous for a severe allied bombardment at the end of the Second World War.

Every morning, Marwa readies herself for work. She puts on her pharmacy uniform and her headscarf. She stands in front of the mirror, check her makeup and smiles. But Marwa’s smile hides her secret dread. Each morning, Marwa’s honour is sullied and her security threatened by the violent and vicious taunts of a man.

“You slut!” he screams at her, “You whore!” The man doesn’t stop at mere words. He threatens her with violence. He even follows her to work, shouting taunts at her in the presence of horrified onlookers.

Marwa has had enough. She talks to her employers who put her onto local police. She brings an application to court. The man appears and is fined. She appeals. She knows the fine will not stop him. If anything, it will make him angrier and give him more reason to carry out his threats.

The date for appeal arrives, and Marwa attends accompanied by male relatives. The accused also attends. In the presence of the judge, the prosecutors and other persons present in court, the man screams out the same violent abuse. “You slut! You whore!” But this time he goes even further. He produces a knife and stabs her. Not once. Not twice. Marwa is stabbed at least 18 times.

It must have been a Herculean effort for the man to find the time and strength to stab Marwa 18 times. Readers might consider the effort involved by merely stabbing the air that many times.

Marwa is three months pregnant at the time. Her three year old son witnessed the whole incident.

Now let’s imagine for a moment that the man involved in the taunts and the stabbing was Marwa’s husband. Imagine if Marwa had applied to the court for an order restraining her husband from making violent threats toward her, stalking her and harassing her. Imagine if he had then stabbed her in court. No doubt this honour killing would have made a prominent story in your metropolitan daily newspaper. No doubt it would have been treated as yet another story of an honour killing. No doubt some columnists would have frothed at the pen about how Muslim migrants don’t integrate and are typically violent to women while good white-skinned European men (as if Muslims cannot be white or European!) never engage in domestic violence, let alone the kind of violence that led to the murder of Theo Van Gogh in the Netherlands.

But Marwa’s attacker was not her husband. Marwa’s husband, an academic working at the prestigious Max-Planck-Institut for pharmacology, was present in court. He tried to save his wife and was somehow confused by court security as the attacker. Perhaps they assumed that a Middle Eastern looking man was more likely to attack a woman than a German of Russian descent. Marwa’s husband was shot and at the time of writing was in a coma in hospital.

But then he also wasn’t a complete stranger but rather her neighbour. The stranger would taunt and threaten Marwa because she wore some cloth on her head and because she didn’t quite look like everyone else in Dresden.

It all started one day when she took her son to the local park. The man was seated on the swings, and Marwa politely asked if her son could use the swing for a short while. He responded with a continuous array of taunts and threats. He labelled her “terrorist”, “Muslim bitch”, “whore” and numerous other names. In court, he questioned what right she had to be in Germany. Before stabbing her, he declared:

Do you have a right to be in Germany at all? When the NPD comes to power, there'll be an end to that. I voted NPD.

Perhaps this is what’s worth contemplating. More and more European voters are turning to far-Right parties. Many of these parties have replaced virulent anti-Semitism with virulent anti-Muslim (and general anti-immigrant) sentiment. And mainstream European parties are meeting the far-Right challenge by co-opting far-Right rhetoric and attitudes, encouraging ugly sentiment.

What isn’t quite realised is that it isn’t just immigrants that suffer. Their children, their relatives, the descendants also suffer. When they marry Europeans and have children who don’t quite look European (whatever that means), the European spouses and their part-European children also suffer.

And inevitably it is women who suffer more than men. Women are easy targets for hate-filled men. When a man feels a woman has sullied his honour or the honour, he lashes out against her. She is the easy target. A harder target is the man’s own anger, his deeper issues.

Violence against women is violence against women. It is just as evil whether it is perpetrated by a particular kind of religious fanatic or by someone inspired by fanatical hatred of a particular religion. The result is the same. A woman is harmed. Her family mourns. Her community falls into a deep communal depression.

I could write more, but it's hard to keep up with the rage and anger I feel at those who only seem to care about a Muslim woman being killed when they can use it as an excuse to malign her culture and to make life difficult for her children and others she left behind.

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf


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VIDEO: The brutal practice of daughter exchange ...

Normally we should take for granted that people will mix religion and culture. The idea that religious practice can only exist in a cultural vacuum is absurd. But what happens when those cultural influence leads to the exploitation of women?

The following video from Al-Jazeera English shows the tragic results of certain cultural practices being enforced by religious leaders among Kurdish Muslims in Iraq. The text accompanying the video is as follows:

In the tribal areas of Kurdistan in northern Iraq, arranged marriages have been a way of life for centuries.

But society is changing. Families who engaged their daughters when they were still children are now renegotiating old contracts.

Nicole Johnston reports from Rania district, where some girls are choosing death over an arranged marriage.

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf




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BLOG: The Aussie Mossie on some Auburn chick named Yasmin ...

(The term "chick" is polite Aussie slang for a person of the female persuasion. This article has been written in response to a number of stories concerning the case of Yasmin Alttahir, a Year 11 student at Auburn Girls High School who was placed on detention for being "out of uniform". Her uniform violation consisted of wearing a 'mantoo', a popular form of overcoat commonly worn by women of Iraqi and Iranian background. You can find media coverage of the issue here and here. The article below was published on The Aussie Mossie blog on Sunday 15 May 2005.)

YASMIN'S CHOICE

A Year 11 female student at a state school is punished with a detention for refusing to wear the school uniform. Fair enough.

A Year 11 female student of Shiite Muslim background attending a high school in Auburn, a suburb containing 5 mosques, a large Muslim population and with at least 4 Muslim councillors on the local council, is placed on detention for wearing what she regards as an essential symbol of her “descent, … ethno-religious or national origin” (to quote the words of Section 4 of the Anti-Discrimination Act 1977). Very strange.

If this incident had occurred during the early 1970’s, it may have been acceptable. But almost 3 decades have elapsed since the Act was passed. And it is a poor reflection on the Department that it cannot properly train and supervise its staff to ensure that such blunders are not made and the Government is not exposed to legal liability.

It is not unusual to see women in Auburn of various racial and faith backgrounds covering their hair and wearing loose-fitting clothes. Indian women, whether Hindu, Muslim, Sikh or other denomination tend to wear loose-fitting ‘shalwar kameez’. Catholic and Muslim women cover their hair. I have even seen the State MP for Auburn, Barbara Perry wear a head scarf when visiting the Gallipoli Mosque or the Turkish Welfare Centre.

Women who choose to dress in a certain way should not be subject to harassment, discrimination or inferior treatment. Australians of all denominations were offended when a young sheik from Liverpool made his remarks some weeks back. Regardless of what faith you choose to follow, the common denomination of all sensible people is that a woman can dress howsoever she wishes.

Section 17 of the NSW Anti-Discrimination Act clearly applies rules prohibiting racial discrimination (including on the basis of "ethno-religious origin") to educational institutions. Its provisions include a prohibition on “subjecting the student to any … detriment”. One would think that punishing a student with a detention may constitute a detriment. Where the detention arose from her dress, and where this dress is regarded as part of her ethno-religious origin, the school would be breaching the Act.

Muslim women in Auburn run accounting practices, work as solicitors, manage shops and arrange home loans. Two Muslim women can be elected to Auburn Council without their religion being made an issue. The covering page of the Council’s own website shows a photo of Muslim school children in the library (including girls wearing headscarves). And yet a Muslim student cannot wear a jacket over her uniform.

Imagine if the same scene were repeated in the Eastern Suburbs. Imagine if a Jewish boy were stopped from wearing a traditional cap. There would be community outrage. And rightly so.

Some will argue that, as a matter of policy, state schools should insist on strict adherence to school uniform and should not make allowances for religion. Yet overriding any policy must be the will of Parliament. And policies developed by unelected bureaucrats cannot be allowed to override Acts of Parliament passed by elected legislators. If some provisions of the Anti-Discrimination Act are wrong, people can lobby their MP’s to revoke them. But whilst in place, the Act must be followed.

The law is the law. And Yasmin’s choice is clearly the will of the Parliament.

Words © 2005 Irfan Yusuf


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VIDEO: A debate on women's rights, hijab and honour killings in Turkey ...

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COMMENT: Abuse of women continues in Saudi Arabia ...

A disturbing report has been published in the Arab News about child marriage in Saudi Arabia ...

Mother calls for law against child marriage
Walaa Hawari | Arab News

RIYADH: Despite continuous efforts by private and government bodies to eliminate marriages involving minors, such marriages do take place every so often. In a recent case, two sisters from Al-Jouf, aged 13 and 14, were married off by their father to two elderly men.

“Their father held their hands as they signed their marriage contracts. They did not know what they were signing,” said the mother of the two girls, Nowayer. “When I was informed, I rushed to their father’s house and confronted the marriage contractor asking him whether he heard the girls consent to the marriages, and whether he had seen results of their premarital tests. He replied it was the father’s prerogative to marry them,” she added.

All this is being done in the name of enforcing sharia law. Sad.

The father of the children is in fact the mother's ex-husband. The wife complains he hasn't been paying any child maintenance, but was happy to get his young daughters married off.

... her ex-husband totally ignored her children for 18 months before their marriages. “One day, last month, he called asking the older girls, who are 13 and 14, to dress up as he would be picking them up and taking them to a family occasion,” she said.

It was only when she received a phone call from her sister that she realized what was going on. “I rushed to his house barefoot to find that the marriage contractor had begun my little children’s marriages,” she said.

The mother contacted Saudi Arabia's allegedly Islamic government. Here's how they rushed to her assistance ...

Nowayer sent a telegram to the minister of justice and the minister of health asking them to interfere, but received no response. “I even informed the Social Services Department in Riyadh who promised to interfere but as soon as the issue reached the Al-Jouf province, where I live and where my ex-husband has many connections because of his line of work, things got stalled,” she said.

Nowayer had no choice but to contact human rights organizations to try and reverse the marriages or postpone consummation for at least three years until the girls grow older.

Ms Nowayer did receive some assistance from the Human Rights Commission. The HRC have had a few cases like this, and see their mission as follows:

It’s our mission to introduce human rights into society and create awareness about them.

So people in an allegedly Islamic country and society need to awareness of human rights created in them? Aren't human rights an essential part of the faith? Which religion are people in the Kingdom following?

Saudi Arabia doesn't seem to have laws setting out the minimum age of marriage ...

Al-Harithy said the HRC and the ministries of Justice and Health share common interests. The Ministry of Health recently issued a report on the physical and emotional problems women endure as a result of early marriage.

The report was subsequently sent to the minister of justice, along with recommendations to set a minimum marriage age.

So in theory, a 60 year old Saudi bloke could marry a 5 year old Saudi girl. And they call this legal system "Islamic"?

Meanwhile, King Abdullah has decided to appoint a woman to his ministry. Here's how the Guardian reports the news:

Nora bint Abdullah al-Fayez, a US-educated former teacher, was made deputy education minister in charge of a new department for female students, a significant breakthrough in a country where women are not allowed to drive.

"This is an honour not only for me but for all Saudi women. In the presence of a comprehensive operational team, I believe I'll be able to face challenges and create positive change," she told Arab News. Fayez said she would study the state of girls' education in Saudi Arabia before commenting on the task before her.

The King also removed his nation's Chief Justice, Sheikh Salih Ibn al-Luhaydan. Among Sheikh Luhaydan's more memorable judgments was this ...

Luhaydan ruled last year that it was permissible to kill owners of satellite television channels broadcasting "immoral" programmes.

Charming.

(Thanks to BC)

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf


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CRIKEY: Jonathan Greene's piece on the Abu Hamza pseudo-scandal ...

I normally don't do this. I only reproduce on my blogs Crikey items I have written myself. But in the circumstances, I think the following is warranted ...

I am posting the complete Jonathan Greene story on Abu Hamza (including graphics) for a reason. From time to time, we are all prone to being over-affected by media spin and journalistic bullsh*t. I always thought I was immune from this. Well, in fact I wasn't quite as immune as I thought.

Crikey is a subscription-only service which is a terrific read and well-worth subscribing to. It has been a key force in keeping media magnates, journalists and politicians honest. I strongly recommend readers take out a trial subscription or even fork out a small amount for a full subscription. Find out more here.

When the Abu Hamza story first hit the media websites, I thought I would do something many Herald Sun and Daily Telegraph readers wouldn't do. I thought I would watch the video.

Anyone who watched the video will see that News Limited and/or the lecture organisers have done a rather clumsy edit. It is quite clear from the video that, far from promoting domestic violence, Abu Hamza was emphasising just how evil it is.

Today, the tabloids are going nuts over Abu Hamza's comments about Australia being allegedly a nation of drunks and gamblers. Again, a complete fabrication. If it is true that Abu Hamza really did make this gross generalisation about Australians, is it any worse than Rupert Murdoch's gross generalisation to the effect that all Muslims suffer from genetic defects because they marry their cousins?

Of course, none of this detracts from the fact that any suggestion that marital rape is OK should be condemned in the strongest possible language.

Anyway, enough from me. reproduced below is Jonathan Greene's analysis of the media lynching of Abu Hamza.

UPDATE I: This article is also available to non-subscribers at the Crikey website here.

Words © 2009 Irfan Yusuf

_______________

Muslim cleric the YouTube hit of ... 2003

Crikey editor Jonathan Green writes:

"Outspoken Islamic cleric" Abu Hamza has been top of the pops for the past two days, incurring no lesser thin-lipped wrath than that of the Prime Minister yesterday for YouTubed comments on s-xual violence and r-pe. He backed up again in this morning's tabloids, accusing Australians of an over-fondness for booze, gambling and s-x.

More of the last later, but the sudden flurry over these six-year-old recordings must have left Hamza more than a little bemused, not only for the Australian tabloid press's capacity to recycle the ancient as fresh front page news, but also for the way on which the media wheel can turn.

Hamza, also known as Samir Mohtadi, has been a feature of significant media coverage before. Three years after the recordings that so enraged Kevin Rudd, the Daily Telegraph and the Herald Sun he was much discussed as the "moderate cleric" who appeared as a star prosecution witness in the case against accused terrorist Abdul Benbrika.

This is how the ABC's AM described Mohtadi in August 2006:

Samir Mohtadi is the director of the Islamic Information and Services Network for Australasia, based in Melbourne. He's a moderate Islamic cleric who preaches regularly at the Preston mosque in north-east Melbourne. He's also a teacher, who gives lectures about the meaning of Islam, mainly to young people.

Through his work, Samir Mohtadi knows some of the men who have been charged with various terrorism offences, and today he gave evidence at their committal hearing.

And this is how news.com.au described him at the time of the 2006 trial:

Mr Mohtadi is the director of the Islamic Information and Services Network of Australasia, in Coburg, in Melbourne's north.

The network provides information and services to Muslims and non-Muslims about Islam.

He said he had known Mr Benbrika as they both attended the same mosque, also in Melbourne's north.

According to sources close to the Benbrika trial, Samir Mohtadi had been cultivated by Australian security agencies since the events of September 2001. He became a key Crown witness in the Benbrika case and gave evidence about a meeting he had with Benbrika in 2004 in which he said to Benbrika that he had heard Benbrika was planning a terrorist attack in Australia. Benbrika denied it. Mohtadi said he would go to the government if he got wind of any plan. According to some, it is not too greater stretch to wonder of Mohtadi was not something of an ASIO mole within Melbourne Muslim circles.

He gave evidence at the long Benbrika trial, and was cross examined at length about Islamic practices, scholarship and views about Israel and jihad. Richard Maidment SC, the lead prosecutor for the Crown, said in his closing that:

... you saw Mr Mohtadi and he was a credible witness, in our respectful submission.

How times change.



Which takes us to today's outrage at Hamza/Mohtadi's comments -- 2003 remember -- that Australians

... think happiness can be achieved by being intoxicated, by going to the casino and blowing your money away.

The Herald Sun demanded his removal from the continent in its editorial today:

Mr Hamza would be better off living somewhere else. His inflammatory teachings are not welcome here.

That was on page 46 of the paper. Here's a look at some other content from the same edition:





Which is not to say that across town The Age is any less dependent on alcohol fueled display advertising. Au contraire:


All of which goes to show that Mohtadi might have a point. Or at least he did in 2003.

VIDEO: Extremists attack Afghan schoolgirls with acid ...

A group of girls determined to receive an education have been scarred for life in southern Afghanistan.

They were walking to school in Kandahar when battery acid was thrown into their faces by two men. Three of the girls are now in hospital with serious burns.




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COMMENT: Social Cohesion's misleading report on FGM ...

Allegedly conservative UK Thinktank Civitas has produced a report entitled Crimes of the Community. The report deals with various forms of violent crime typically perpetrated against women.

I cannot comment on the entire contents of the 169 page report. However, I have read a section on what Islam says about Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).

A large number of Muslimphobic and jaundiced pundits have made it their business to claim that Islam endorses any and all forms of FGM. There is no doubt that FGM of various kinds is practised in certain parts of the Muslim world, including Indonesia, Malaysia, Egypt and other parts of Africa. It is also true that some Muslim religious authorities have justified this practice, as have religious authorities of other faiths in places where FGM is common.

The Social Cohesion report cites the views of a Shafei jurist (Ahmed ibn Naqib al-Masri) contained in his Umdat as-Salik, which has been translated and edited by Shaykh Nuh Keller). The report then speculates as to why Shaykh Nuh Keller would include the section on FGM whilst leaving out sections of ibn Naqib's book dealing with slavery.

The clear imputation is that Shaykh Nuh wishes to promote ibn Naqib's viewpoint. Perhaps the report's authors are even trying to suggest that Shaykh Nuh endorses FGM. No other evidence is provided to support these imputations.

The report then cites an opinion of Yusuf al-Qaradawi, who is described as "the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood". No evidence is provided from any MB source to confirm this claim.

The report then provides a reference to page 24 of Anne Sofie Raold's book Women in Islam: The Western Experience as source for the claim that:

The Hanafi and Maliki schools traditionally also regarded FGM as ‘noble’.

Roald's book is freely available on GoogleBooks. Nowhere on page 24 is FGM mentioned even once. Either this is a misprint or a complete fabrication.

What isn't mentioned is the attitude of Hanafi scholars in the Indian sub-Continent or Turkey to FGM. The report does acknowledge that the practice is rare in South Asian Muslim communities, who make up around 25% of the entire Muslim world. No South Asian religious texts or South Asian scholars are cited at all. No authorities from the Barelwi or Deobandi schools of thought are mentioned.

Further, no mention is made of what Shia religious authorities have said on the subject. This despite the fact that Shia Muslims represent at least 10% of the Muslim world and are increasing in number in Western countries.

All in all, the report attempts to show that the dominant position in Muslim communities and amongst religious authorities is that FGM is condoned. The enormous number of religious scholars and authorities who have actively campaigned against the practice is conveniently ignored.

The report ignored an international conference held in Cairo in November 2006 which condemned the practice. The report does mention Shaykh Tantawi, but doesn't mention Egypt's Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa whose views were reported by the BBC as follows ...

Ali Gomaa, Egypt's top official Islamic scholar, or grand mufti, told the gathering no examples of the practice could be found in the Prophet Muhammad's life.

The authors of the report journalists and include one Arabic speaker named Salam Hafez. Both are ex-employees of al-Jazeera. The only article of Salam Hafez I could find on the al-Jazeera site was about Dutch bikies. Further, as an Arabic speaker, one wonders whether Hafez would have been capable of reading influential books on Hanafi law written in Urdu or Turkish.

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf


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COMMENT: Why I am still a dirty lyin' taqiyin' Mozzlem ...

Well, it was only predictable that, following publication of this essay in Eureka Street, far-Right nutbags would come out and issue their FF's (i.e. fascist fatwas) joyfully declaring that they had managed to convince me to leave my ancestral religious heritage. And what has led them to this conclusion? The Australian Islam Monitor (it's official name is "Australian Islamist Monitor", but the url is islammonitor.org) makes this perceptive remark:

Perhaps Australia has had some influence on him.

Well, given that I have lived here since I was 5 months old, and given that I'm now almost 40, you'd think Australia's impact on me might be slightly greater than donning the Wallabies jersey during holiday trips to New Zealand and knowing the lyrics to just about every song sung by genuine Aussie musicians like Tim and Neil Finn.

(And calling them Aussie when in fact they are Kiwi. Now that's the mark of a genuine Aussie!)

Amateur (and indeed, amateurish) journalist Wendy Larkkson of the Australian (or should that be Kiwi?) Islam Monitor writes under the headline of "Sydney Muslim Speaks Out - Slams Gender Inequality". But is this really news? Or do the simple folk at the AIM only read headlines imposed on my articles by sealous sub-editors? Haven't they noticed another (albeit much shorter) article written for the New Zealand (or should that be Australian?) Herald and which can be found here? And other articls of similar import?

Larkkson's summary of my 1,500 word essay is ...

No you have not read a misprint. A Sydney Muslim, Irfan Yusuf, who often speaks out in defence of Islam, has written an article, which will surprise many readers. He has expressed lament about the appalling treatment of women in Islam. Perhaps this is a new venture for him in speaking out what the evidence of his eyes cannot deny. Perhaps Australia has had some influence on him. It is interesting that his article has been published in a left of centre Australian Catholic magazine ‘Eureka’, which has a caring, sharing, feel-good agenda most of the time.

No doubt the AIM's anti-Catholic arm will soon be publishing an article announcing that Eureka Street have come out and declared they are no longer Catholic. And no doubt Larkkson will be wondering whether, in a previous article, I had declared that I was now no longer a person of part-Indian heritage.

What the good folks at AIM don't seem to understand is that there is a difference between criticising (allegedly) Islamic cultures, countries, leaders etc and abandoning one's faith. A huge difference.

I've been doing the former for years. I haven't yet (and certainly have no plans to, unless someone puts a gun to my head and insists otherwise) done the latter i.e. abandoned my faith and heritage.

And with 1.2 billion Muslims around the world, even if only 1% were as crazy as the folk at AIM, I'd have plenty to write about. The fact is that you don't cease to be Muslim by defending Sudanese teddy bears or castigating pro-American dictators or condemn madcap terrorists or even lambast the nasty rants of former muftis. Just as you don't cease to be liberal if you manage to upset Liberal backbenchers.

The AIM take the matter further and pontificate ...

Working as a lawyer in Australia, he would be exposed to a number of situations and of course, to Australian law. At some point the evident maltreatment of women within his own society would have become crystal clear and would have forced some response from him.

Yes, I have done plenty of cases involving applications for Apprehended Violence Orders, some of them in the context of domestic relationships. I've unfortunately had to see Australian women and children of all ethnic and religious backgrounds be forced to resort to court orders. The Local Courts' AVO lists aren't exactly full of happy news. Domestic violence, much of it alcohol and drug related, affects Australians across all communities. But don't tell that to AIM. Let them assume this is a uniquely Muslim problem.

And as if to underscore the inherently anti-Semitic nature of AIM's rhetoric, they again repeat the taqiya smear, albeit in a rather amusing manner ...

On a more suspicious note – could Yusuf’s attack on Islamic maltreatment of women be an advanced form of Taqiyya? Have we moved beyond Taqiyya 101 and gone on to Taqiyya 202 or 303? Is this an attempt to ingratiate himself with the leftie Christians who would hold gender equality in all its forms as a fundamental principle? Does he want to make inroads to this section of the
Catholic community? Does he want more invitations to their barbeques? Is it espionage?

Indeed? Or am I part of that giant Judeo-Islamic conspiracy to impose unitarianism? Will I join Barack Obama's Muslim-in-hiding plot to take over the world? Does this all-American fruitloop have a point?

But it isn't just the AIM nutbags who have discovered that Irfan occasionally criticises Muslims. Australia's self-declared representative of the views and aspirations of all Christians, the Australian Christian Lobby, has suggested that I have written ...

... [a]n article ... for which he deserves thanks.

Well all I can say to ACL is thanks, but no thanks. It's interesting that ACL's "thanks" to me also carries a link to the AIM's note. And as if to confirm the imbecilic nature of the ACL thicksheiks, their last few lines are as follows ...

Related article White Ribbon Day - 25 November 2008 : http://www.acl.org.au/national/browse.stw?article_id=24715

Australia looks forward to hearing from Mr Waleed Aly, on this subject.

If the ACL researchers knew how to use the Rev Google, they'd know that Waleed has used his White Ribbon Day Ambassadorial status to pen sone devastating critiques of the treatment of women in nominally Muslim societies.

Still, as far as ACL are concerned, their mob never engage in domestic violence. You'd never see Christians engage in physical or sexual violence towards women or condoning such violence. Only nasty Mozzlems do that kind of stuff. If you don't believe me, check out ACL's moronically jaundiced analysis here.

So now that the bigotry brigade have declared their approval of my writing, what next? Will I get a guernsay to address the Big Ideas Forum hosted by Centre for Independent Studies? Will Daniel Pipes be singing my praises on his blog? Will I get to write an op-ed for that part-Saudi and part-American-owned newspaper that calls itself The Australian? Will I be appointed a fellow to the American Enterprise Institute, the Heritage Foundation and/or the Hudson Institute?

And will I finally be awarded a book deal by Allen & Unwin? Speaking of which, I'd better get back to writing the damned thing!

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf

OPINION: Something rotten in the states of Islam ...

Those wonderful people from the Eureka Street ezine have just published an essay I sent them as part of the Inaugural Readers' Feast/Eureka Street Award for a human rights essay.

The headline put on the essay is Something rotten in Islam. This is a deliberately provocative headline designed to get people to read the article. But will Muslims read it? Or will they be turned off it?

Before reproducing the article, I've reproduced a brief exchange of e-mails between myself and the editor. I think these e-mails will provide readers with a better understanding of the editorial process.

Eureka Street is not and has never been a racist or Islamophobic publication. Another colleague of mine, Saeed Saeed, also writes for the publication.

________________________

When one submits an article for publication, it is the sub-editor/editor's job to write the headline. It isn't for the contributor to select a headline. The editor also chooses a graphic if appropriate. It isn't my role to tell you what headline to place on this article.

With that in mind, I should tell you that this article was addressed to all men but in particular men of Muslim faith/heritage/background/ancestry. The headline is good in that it will attract and perhaps even shock people to read the article.

On the other hand, many Muslims will find it offensive. This in itself isn't a bad thing, though it might turn out to be counterproductive.

Many will argue that the graphic is the sort of graphic fit for the Daily Telegraph. I myself have hacked into the Tele for using such graphics. Still, when the Tele uses them, it is often on issues unrelated (or tenuously related) to Muslim women.

I cannot say for certain as I doubt any research has been done on the topic, but my own experience is that the vast majority of Muslim women don't wear a face-veil. Further, many do not associate the face-veil with physical or sexual violence against women.

In this sense, some Muslims will argue that the graphic does little more than entrench stereotypes. Hence Muslim women may find the graphic offense.

Perhaps a better graphic may be a photo of one of the victims. Perhaps a better headline could be "Something rotten in states of Islam". That way a distinction is made between Islam as theology/law/texts and Islam as modern post-colonial political orders.

However, this is only my view. It isn't for me to be telling Eureka Street how to edit an article in their own publication.

People should be free to say what they like about any faith tradition. My own personal practice is not to criticise faith traditions but rather to criticise people whilst praising traditions. Hence my last piece attacked Hindutva as a political movement but pointed out that Hinduism itself was above all this.

Just some feedback.

Regards
Irfan Yusuf
___________________________

Hi Irfan,

Thanks for feedback. Our title was, as you acknowledge, designed to pique people's interest and get them to click through and read the essay. It is lifted almost directly from the essay itself: the subtitle 'Something is rotten' is followed by the sentence 'Something is rotten in the state of Islam', adapted for the title to 'Something rotten in Islam'. But I take on board your comments regarding sensitivity.

Your point about image selection is also fair. I confess it crossed my mind that I was running the risk of 'entrenching stereotypes' by using that image. Ultimately my intention was to use something that would be immediately recognisable to the general public as a 'Muslim woman'. Perhaps that is just another way of saying the same thing! I'm sorry if you feel the image reflects badly upon your essay.

In any case, you are most welcome (and I would encourage you) to post your feedback at the base of the article, as it adds to the dialogue about Islam and makes valid points about the editorial process.

Thanks again Irfan.

Cheers.
__________________________


EUREKA STREET/ READER'S FEAST AWARD
Something rotten in Islam
Irfan Yusuf October 22, 2008

A Muslim proverb says that a child's first university is her or his mother's lap. Young children at this age are like soft clay and can be moulded into more or less a permanent shape that will prove difficult to change in later years. It's a process that might be called education by osmosis.

I graduated from the university of my Indian mother's lap with a fear of the prayers of others, especially those I have wronged. The word for oppression in both Arabic and Urdu (my mother's North Indian dialect) is zulm. An oppressor is zaalim and the oppressed is muzloom. Mum's Urdu formula was fairly straight forward.

Zulm na karo. Kiyun kar Allah Ta'ala muzloom ka dua hamesha soontahey, chahe muzloom kaafir ho aur zaalim musalman.

Literally this means: 'Do not oppress. Because God Almighty always hears and responds to the prayers of the oppressed, even where the oppressed refuse to acknowledge Him and the oppressor believes in Him.'

Collective oppression

What happens when the oppression is collective? What happens when communities oppress themselves? And do so in the name of establishing God's law?

I could apply mum's proverb to many Muslim communities and come up with an explanation as to why so many are politically, economically and socially backward. At least 51 per cent of Muslims are women. And whether Muslim men accept it or not, many are the subject of the collective negative prayers of their mothers, sisters, daughters and wives.

So often I hear Muslim imams, preachers and apologists reminding me that Islam gave women certain rights at least a thousand years before Europe did, that the rules of Islamic sacred law (also known as the sharia) cannot be legitimately applied in a manner which causes injustice to women, and that Muslim women have equal (if not always the same) rights as men.

That might be the case in textbooks of theology and sacred law. But what is the current reality on the ground?

Something is rotten

Something is rotten in the state of Islam. Perhaps not in the sacred texts nor even in the vast legal tradition. Muslims can debate among themselves whether the source of the problem lies in the religion itself. But the reality is beyond debate.

Something certainly is rotten in many of the 58 states that make up the organisation of Islamic Conference. A cruel sickness of absurd and oppressive gender-based practices and attitudes is poisoning the lives of men and women in Muslim societies.

Such practices and attitudes aren't limited to ignorant villagers, nor are they random acts of murder committed by strangers. It wasn't an unlettered stranger who murdered 17-year-old student Rand Abdel-Qader in Basra on 16 March this year. She was murdered by her father, a government employee who worked in Iraq's Health Department.

Rand's mother tried to save her from this barbarism but to no effect. The Observer reported on 11 May:

Though her horrified mother, Leila Hussein, called Rand's two brothers, Hassan, 23, and Haydar, 21, to restrain Abdel-Qader as he choked her with his foot on her throat, they joined in. Her shrouded corpse was then tossed into a makeshift grave without ceremony as her uncles spat on it in disgust.

What was her crime? This young student at Basra University had worked as a volunteer with displaced Iraqi families. Over a period of some four months, and after a few short conversations, the young woman had become infatuated with a 22-year-old British soldier.

That's it. She had feelings. Her father came to know of this. He saw her talking to the British soldier in public. He dug a makeshift grave. He murdered his own daughter. His sons joined in, spilling the blood of their own sister, their own flesh and blood.

Why? Apparently this act has become known as an 'honour killing'. It seems that for some men, the only way to restore the honour of their family is to kill family members.

Concentric circles of oppression?

Some have argued that this incident was a symptom of the wider oppression of Iraqis, of the foreign occupation which hasn't brought the promised peace and order promised by the self-styled Coalition of the Willing.

It is true that the brutality of occupation can lead to other forms of brutality. Tortured, humiliated and oppressed men need some kind of outlet. All too often, such men end up torturing, humiliating and oppressing their wives, sisters and even mothers.

But such incidents also happen where there are no brutal occupiers present. In April 2006, hacked pieces of 20 year old Bahnaz Mahmod Agha's body were found in a suitcase in London. In June 2007, a London court had convicted Bahnaz's father and uncle of her murder.

Bahnaz had entered a marriage arranged by her Kurdish-Iraqi father when she was just 17. Her husband had repeatedly raped and abused her, even knocking out one of her front teeth after she called him by his first name in public. In late 2005, by which time she was 20, Bahnaz had left this abusive relationship and fallen in love with another Kurdish man from a different tribe.

Bahnaz's uncle convened a family council during which it was decided that the family's honour could only be restored by killing her. Bahnaz's mother alerted her to the plot, but police didn't believe the story. With her family against her and the police refusing to assist, to whom could this young woman turn?

Again, concentric circles of oppression operated. Again, Muslim religious and community leaders had more important things on their mind, such as the pressure of the post-7/7 environment, the increased public scrutiny, the struggle against oppressive anti-terror laws.

The ultimate victims of these concentric circles of oppression are the 51 per cent of Muslims that happen to be female. So what is the solution?

It's true that these practises are not religiously sanctioned (though theological justification is often found by misogynistic religious authorities), are not limited to Muslims and are found in non-Muslim communities in South Asia, the Middle East and Africa also. But Muslim men can not afford to live in denial about their prevalence.

The double standard

Muslim faith communities suffer from multiple personality disorder, applying one standard to the male and another to our female side. And we impose our double standards under the garb of tradition or sharia.

We speak of reviving the age of Muslim glory, when Muslims were the most civilised nation on earth. But what characterised that civilisation?

There is the story of one Muslim woman who was kidnapped by the Byzantine empire. The Caliph in Baghdad wrote a letter threatening to send an army whose length stretched from Baghdad to Constantinople.

Today, Muslim Presidents and Kings and Generals do nothing to help women being mistreated and held in captivity in their own countries. Without international pressure, one wonders whether Pakistan's General Musharraf would have allowed Mukhtar Mai liberty within her own homeland.

Perhaps the most obvious example of our double standards is in our domestic relations. Many Muslim men regularly beat their wives. Unlike their non-Muslim brothers, Muslim men don't require excessive alcohol or narcotics in their system to beat their wives.

There are few laws in Muslim countries protecting women from domestic violence. Worse still, those responsible for enforcing the law — police and the judiciary — are open to bribery by the usually wealthier male perpetrators. What makes the problem worse is that imams rarely mention the problem to their (mostly male) congregation.

Muslim and ethnic language newspapers commonly read by Muslims rarely mention the issue. It is as if we are pretending the problem just doesn't exist. Or worse still, it's as if it isn't even a problem.

Raising voices

Some years back, a group of men in Canada decided that they would take a stand on violence against women. The result was UNIFEM White Ribbon Day. Each year, men where white ribbons to take a stand, to show that they regard violence against women as an abomination.

I'm not suggesting that the solution is Muslim men merely wearing white ribbons. But the philosophy of WRD is one worth promoting — that violence against women is a men's issue and that the situation won't change until men speak out against it.

Because if we stay silent, we might as well be lending a hand to the perpetrators of violence. Today it may be a stranger. Tomorrow, it could be our mother, our sister, our daughter. Paradise can be found under the feat of mothers. Yet millions of Muslim mothers and sisters and daughters are living in hell on this earth.

I wish more Muslim men stopped justifying theology or pointing to historical precedents and address current gender realities in Muslim communities. I wish more influential men in nominally Muslim communities and countries raised their voices against the continued exploitation of at least half of their community.

With that in mind, I'll start by raising my voice.

First published in Eureka Street on Wednesday 22 October 2008.

UPDATE I: Some discussion on the piece can be found here.

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf

RADIO: Islam and women in Indonesia

Click here and here to listen to some interesting perspectives on Islam in Indonesia. One of the interviewees is a journalist. Some really interesting stuff. The interviewees are all participants in the Australia-Indonesia Institute's Muslim Exchange Program, an excellent initiative sponsored by the Department of Foreign Affairs & Trade (DFAT).

Words © Irfan Yusuf 2008

COMMENT: Dudes and Hijabs …

I’ve just received a report about the Ayn Academy in Adelaide holding a conference to launch a book by Afroz Ali, a Sydney architect who claims to be a qualified imam with ijaza certificates kept at the Zaytuna Institute. Mr Ali's book is entitled UnVeiling Hijab.

Mr Ali’s biography on the Ayn Academy website includes a claim that he is “on the Board of Advisors at Markaz Aleem in Cairo, Egypt”. So what is this “Markaz Aleem”? What is its role in Islamic studies or in the accreditation of imams in Egypt? No details are given.

My concern isn’t so much with Afroz Ali’s claims about himself. At least, not in this post. Rather, I have another concern.

The issue of hijab is an extremely sensitive one. There are differing views on the subject. I have read various interpretations and rulings on the issue of women’s dress and the extent of their covering as required under the sharia or sacred law of Islam.

I have read views that state that women are required to cover their faces in the presence of non-mahram men (i.e. men whom they can marry) at all times except at the Haj. I have read views that state that women are required to cover everything except their face and hands in the presence of non-mahram men. I have read opinions that state that it is permissible for women to show the front part of their hair (as is common in South Asia, Central Asia and Iran). I have also read opinions that state that women need not cover their hair all the time in the presence of non-mahram men.

Each of these opinions has some scholarly basis. I have a preference for one of these views. However, I am not qualified to give any authoritative expression as to which view is correct.

And neither is Afroz Ali.

But there is another reason. Adelaide’s Muslim community, like that of Sydney and Melbourne, is going through a slight adjustment. A number of prominent Muslim women have chosen to cease wearing the hijab in public on a full time basis.

The choice of these women needs to be respected, whether we agree with their choice or not. Further, it is not for unqualified men with only rudimentary knowledge of Islamic sacred law to be writing on this issue.

I have every respect for Muslim sisters who choose to wear hijab, whether full-time or part-time. I also have every respect for sisters who choose not to.

Men have absolutely no idea how difficult it is walking out their front doors and being ambassadors of their faith in an environment when so much hatred is invested in that faith. We are living in a time when many people who claim to follow Jesus actively degrade and despise women who choose to dress like his mother just as much as (if not more than) they despise people who look like they might have been born in the Palestinian town of Bethlehem.

Muslim women need to be free to make their own choices. We may not agree with their choices, just as much as they may not agree with ours.

I’m no hadith scholar, but I do recall reading a hadith in which the prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings of God be upon him) remarked:

There will come a time when holding onto Islam will be harder than holding onto hot coals.

Are we in that time right now? I’m not sure.

I do know that making a commitment to wear the hijab is an enormous one. Many of our sisters last the distance. Some stop for a break before continuing. Some choose to walk on leaving the issue by the wayside.

The confusion in the metaphors I have used in the paragraph immediately preceding this one is but a partial indication of just how difficult this issue is. I think it is a matter that should be left to our sisters to decide among themselves. If they need our advice and opinion, we should offer it honestly and with respect. We should keep in mind just how difficult this issue is.

It might also make it easier if our men decided to wear some openly Muslim symbol or dress. Perhaps our lectures to women on hijab should be accompanied by lectures to men about wearing caps and/or kufiyyeh's and/or sporting beards. In the present environment, what’s good for the gander should be just as good for the goose.

I myself used to lecture sisters on wearing hijab. I even considered sisters who didn’t wear hijab to be inferior Muslims or not worth talking to. At one stage, I even stopped returning their salams. We all make mistakes. We live and we learn.

There are Muslim women making enormous sacrifices in the cause of human rights and civil liberties in their countries. They are women like Irene Khan and Shirin Ebadi. In Australia, Muslim women with or without hijab are making enormous contributions to Muslim communities and the broader Australian community.

Muslim women who choose to wear the hijab, whether on a full or part time basis, must be respected. Muslim women who choose not to must also be respected. Whether hijab is compulsory or not under Islamic sacred law should be left to qualified scholars prepared to outline the full extent of their qualifications and provide clear proof of same. Everyone else should just shut their mouths.

That includes both Irfan Yusuf and Afroz Ali.

Words © 2008 Irfan Yusuf