Pakistani Hardliners- New Law Protecting Women Is Un-Islamic

Pakistan isn't like Afghanistan. And it's a tad more progressive than say, Iran or Saudi Arabia when it comes to its women folk. There are no religious police out on the streets making sure women are covered. Unlike Saudi Arabia, they can drive. Universities are not segregated. Heck, they even elected a female Prime Minister. Twice. Although Benazir Bhutto was eventually assassinated she served two terms from 1984 through 1993. Of course, that was back then when Muslims weren't quite so fanatical and hardline as they are today. But although their legal system is rooted in British common law, the Penal Code often adheres to Islamic Shariah law and many of its barbaric practises, including death for apostasy and blasphemy. Any attempts to change the more radical Islamic laws, like Blasphemy and child marriage laws are met with major resistance, and often violence from a slew of religious hardliners.

The latest child marriage law ban never came to fruition because of opposition from the hardliners who actually want girls as young as nine to be eligible to marry, as per Shariah law.  And now, they want a new law protecting women to go bye-bye. There's a lot of domestic abuse within the Islamic nuclear family, so that's not surprising.

More than 35 religious parties and groups in Pakistan have come together to call on the government retract a new law in the country's largest province of Punjab that protects women from abuse. Claiming that the law is unIslamic, they accuse the law of being part of the West's agenda to destroy the family system in Pakistan.

The Women's Protection Act was passed by Punjab in February to protect women from domestic, psychological and sexual violence. It also calls for the setting up of a toll-free abuse reporting hot line, women's shelters and district-level panels to investigate reports of abuse. The new law also mandates the use of GPS bracelets to keep track of offenders.

The law however seems to have fallen foul of the mainly conservative clerics and religious leaders. They have said it is in conflict with both the Koran and the Pakistan constitution.

"This controversial law to protect women was promulgated to accomplish the West's agenda to destroy the family system in Pakistan," reads the joint declaration from the conference comprising the religious parties and groups. "This act ... is redundant and would add to the miseries of women."

[snip]

Pakistan Today said the Council of Islamic Ideology, a Pakistani religious body that advises the government on the compatibility of laws with Islam has declared the Women's Protection Act as un-Islamic. On 14 March, Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the chief of the Jamiat-i-Ulema Islam, the country's largest religious party, claimed that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had promised to address the reservations of the religious parties.

The rest here.

Afghan Man Chops Off Wife's Nose and Lips For Disobeying Him

Drugs and alcohol are haram (forbidden) in Islam, but those Afghan men love their heroin.  Not sure how they reconcile the use of hardcore drugs with their religion, but they don't seem to care much since they grow the opium freely. In fact, Afghanistan grows more than any other country in the world. Not surprising they'd get hooked. And hooked Afghan men do beastly things when they need a fix, actually they do horrific things regardless, and tragically women bear the brunt of their anger and aggression.

Domestic violence is prevalent in places like Afghanistan and the Middle East. Maybe that has to do with the fact that the Quran says it's okay to beat your wife, or wives. Yes, some will quibble about what that actually means, claiming men should only use something like a toothbrush to punish disobedient spouses, but that's usually not the case.  Some men maim or kill their wives for disobeying them. Like Azim, the Afghan man who just chopped off his 30-year-old wife Sitara's lips and nose in front of their kids because refused to sell her jewelry to pay for his heroin fix. He left her there bleeding, and fled like a coward.

People have rallied around Sitara, and she is now getting treatment and reconstructive surgery in Turkey, but Azim has yet to be found.

This is what happens to females in a religious and cultural society that has no respect for women. According to RFE/RL Afghanistan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world. And can you blame them? They live in a world where they are forced into marriage at a very young age, most are not allowed to go to school or work, they are bred like animals, hidden under burqas, and beaten and abused. Some are forced into prostitution. What kind of life is that?  They live lives with no hope.

According to Sitara's 14-year-old daughter Fereshta, Azim was a long time drug abuser and would often beat the kids and his wife:

 "Every time my mother refused to give money to my father, he would beat her."

One of the problems is that in spite of the fact that in 2009 Afghanistan implemented an Elimination of Violence Against Women law, which includes criminalizing child marriage, violence against women etc., abusers are rarely prosecuted.

More here.

Egyptian Girl Commits Suicide After Refusing To Wear Hijab

Amira, a 15-year-old Egyptian girl, allegedly committed suicide as a result of the domestic abuse she suffered at the hands of her family after refusing to wear the hijab. The girl apparently shot herself with her father's gun, but you have to wonder if it was actually suicide or did her family kill her for dishonoring them by refusing to wear the headscarf.  Not an impossibility, considering people have been honor killed for equally ludicrous reasons.

Either way, I'm sure they are probably happy to be rid of a rebellious child.

How incredibly sad.

Source: Al Arabiya

Jordanian Dad Tortured His Five Daughters In The UAE

Allegations of torture and abuse of 5 daughters- 10 to 16- by a Jordanian expat and his two sisters. Cigarette burns while forced to kneel naked, broken noses, beatings with ropes and sticks, pierced by needles, underfed.

Recently divorced after 18 years of marriage, the mum- who had also been abused- had moved back to Jordan and was unable to take care of the girls.  According to the mum, the dad, who is a jail warden in the UAE, hated her for not having boys, and obviously hated the girls as well.

Dad and his two wicked sisters have been arrested.

Full story here.

Not that this kind of thing doesn't happen in the West, it does, but many claim that domestic abuse is minimal in the Muslim population, which is clearly untrue.

Egyptian Husband Beats Wife For Mocking Morsi- Wife Asks For Divorce

After being subjected to beatings by her husband for mocking President Mohammed Morsi, an Egyptian woman has filed for a divorce after twelve years of marriage.

Filing for divorce this week, the 31-year-old schoolteacher, who was not named by Egyptian press, told the court that her 35-year-old partner battered her on several occasions, for speaking about the embattled Egyptian president in a “disrespectful way.”

The violence resulted in her often leaving home to stay with her parents, according to local media reports.

The husband confessed in court that his wife continually mocked Mursi.

“I cannot live with him anymore,” said the woman, as quoted by Egypt-based al-Masry al-Youm. “We’ve been fighting over this for 8 months.”

At least she's still alive.  This Egyptian plumber beat his pregnant wife to death for not voting for Morsi.

Then again, Arizona housewife Holly Solomon ran over her husband because she blamed him for Barack Obama's win after she discovered he did not vote.

Saudi Arabia's Anti Domestic Abuse Ad Campaign

"Some things can’t be covered – fighting women’s abuse together."

Is this why the niqab and burka are so popular in Muslim countries?    They would like us to believe that there is little domestic abuse in Islam, but this just isn't so. At least Saudi Arabia is finally acknowledging the problem with an anti-domestic violence ad campaign.

The slogan simply reads: “Some things can’t be covered – fighting women’s abuse together.”

The campaign is backed by the King Khalid Charitable Foundation and aims to “provide legal protection for women and children from abuse in Saudi Arabia.”

In literature for the advert, it admits “the phenomenon of battered women in Saudi Arabia is much greater than apparent”, and encourages Saudis to report cases of violence at locations around the Kingdom including Madinah, Najran, Makkah and Riyadh.

They should add court-mandated domestic violence therapy for the perpetrators, like they do in the US.  And ban niqabs while they're at it.

Expat Palestinian's Money Making Scheme- Demand Money To Divorce Wives

An expat Palestinian living in Saudi Arabia came up with a great money-making scheme: marry a woman and abuse her until she could no longer bear it; when she asked for a divorce, the only way out of the marriage was to pay him lots and lots of money.

Lawyer Mofleh Bin Hamoud Al-Ashjaie, who represents a Syrian woman, said the Palestinian expatriate mistreated his client who filed a lawsuit asking for divorce.

“When the husband came to know about the lawsuit, he started blackmailing his wife to pay him a large sum of money to divorce her,” he said.

The lawyer said when his client refused to succumb to the blackmailing demands, he started threatening her that he would publish photos which showed her in a bar with him when they were both outside the Kingdom.

“When my client refused to give in to his threats, he asked her to reimburse the dowry he paid her which he claimed to be SR500,000,” he said.

The lawyer said the husband showed a fake receipt to prove his claims. “It was obvious that the receipt was forged. There are also suspicions surrounding the source of his wealth,” he added.

Al-Ashjaie said the attempts of the Palestinian expatriate to marry a Saudi woman were foiled by wise men who warned the woman against him.

The lawyer also said there were a number of lawsuits in courts involving the Palestinian expatriate including one in which he accused one of his wives of adultery.

“In reality, these are methods being used by the man to blackmail his wives to extort money,” he added.

The lawyer accused the defendant of trading in humans and said his practice was a clear evidence of this fact.

What a dog.

Abused Wives In Yemen Killing Their Husbands

Domestic violence is very prevalent in the Muslim world. This is not so surprising considering the beating of wives is actually sanctioned in the Quran.

QURAN Surah 4:34 - "Men have authority over women because God has made the one superior to the other, and because they spend their wealth to maintain them. Good women are obedient. They guard their unseen parts because God has guarded them. As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them. Then if they obey you, take no further action against them. Surely God is high, supreme."

Some women have been lucky enough to escape the abuse, like this Algerian ex-Muslimah, Samia Sharif, who fled with her five kids to Quebec, Canada, and now lives under an assumed name, for obvious reasons. But many aren't as lucky, though they are fighting back in their own way. Abused wives in Yemen are actually murdering their abusive husbands, oftentimes with the help of a male relative. 50 women from 25-50 years of age, in 2012 alone, were arrested for doing away with their violent hubbies.

Inequality, domestic violence and “emotional motives” were just some reasons behind such crimes, said the report, adding that the killings took place in Mahweet, Taiz, Hajjah, Sana'a, Amran and Marib.

However, the ministry said that the number of women who were victims of attempted murder was nearly double the number of women involved in killings.

Dr. Mujib Abdul Bari, a specialist in psychiatric and neurological disorders, told AlArabiya.net that constant physical and psychological abuse drastically changes a person.

Daily abuse makes a woman feel despair at her seemingly hopeless situation, said Bari, adding that women in such situations “forget their femininity and resort to killing their spouse.”

He said that the most notable crime in Yemen took place on August 7, 2012 in a village in the province of Marib, in which a 40-year-old woman killed her husband and two sons following a family dispute.

Bari wants the government to help women realize there are alternatives to dispensing with their husbands, by establishing "awareness programs":

The programs would help women to realize that they are contributing members of society and “to learn not to accept humiliation and be able to make their own decisions,” said Bari.

“In case women have taken a wrong decision in marriage, they should resort to legal solutions, such as divorce or going back to their families [who can] help them on a psychological level.”

Unfortunately, it's going to take a lot more than educating the women. He has no idea how hard it is to extricate oneself from an abusive relationship with a controlling male. And he obviously has no clue how difficult it is for a controlling male to relinquish power, one who believes his religion gives him the right to beat his wife. With a  religion and culture that considers women subservient to men, you would need to re-educate the whole male population, and change the religion itself.  That's not going to happen.

Honor Killings, the latest rash of Muslim Misogyny

Al Arabiya reported that a 33-year-old woman was murdered in an alleged "honor" crime. Although it later claimed she was only 22, the Jordanian woman, who apparently had been divorced about a year, was stabbed by her older brother in the chest. Brother wasn't too happy about his sister's new found freedom:

“It seems that the suspect was constantly arguing with his sister about her movements and was attempting to restrict her mobility because she was a divorced woman,” a source told The Jordan Times.

Police official Col. Khatib An, however, claims the "honor motive is ruled out" and it was just plain old domestic violence. Because brothers always get so pissed off at their divorced sisters for disobeying them, they plunge knives into their chests. Al Arabiya goes on to say that the brother is being held for 15 days until the case is investigated, which means brother will more than likely walk free. They always do. Because, dang, that hussy should have just stayed home.

Al Arabiya goes on to say:

“Honor killings” occasionally happen in some parts of the Middle East.

Occasionally? Really?

The article goes on to describe the murder of another Jordanian woman who was stabbed to death by her brother in October 2011 after he saw her photo on a friend's cell phone. I would venture to say the friend was not harmed.

Then it mentions the recent murder of a Palestinian woman, Nancy Zaboun, whose husband slit her throat after her divorce hearing. The woman had been abused for the 10 years of her marriage.

But no mention of three honor killings, in a matter of a week, back in Jordon in mid July:

Police on Wednesday were questioning a man who reportedly killed his divorced sister in Jerash in a so-called honour murder earlier in the day.

The suspect, who was not identified by officials, reportedly stabbed his sister then threw her in the street and ran over her with his vehicle until he made sure she was dead.

“The suspect then headed to the nearest police station and turned himself in to the police and informed them that he had murdered his sister to cleanse his family’s honour,” a senior judicial source told The Jordan Times.

The suspect claimed that he had murdered his sister after learning that she had delivered a child out of wedlock, according to the source.

The victim was the third woman in Jordan to be murdered in the name of “family honour” this week and the second in less than 48 hours.

On Monday, a 28-year-old man in Zarqa reportedly murdered his divorced sister with a brick and a knife at their home in Zarqa for reasons related to family honour.

On July 18, a 60-year-old man allegedly stabbed his 25-year-old divorced daughter seven times at his home in an Amman suburb, claiming family honour as a motive because she had delivered a baby girl out of wedlock.

Wednesday’s victim was the seventh woman to be murdered in the Kingdom for reasons related to family honour this year.

Or the mother who murdered her three-year-old child because she had been born out of wedlock, and the family who she had been given to didn't want her. The woman supposedly murdered her own flesh and blood because she feared a scandal- read, she wanted to spare her own hide.  We all know (including the woman) that someone in her family would have snuffed her out. That's how it works.

Oh, and what about this Jordanian brother who killed his sister after her husband accused her of adultery.  Who knows if that was even true. He killed her in 2010 and was just sentenced to life this year.

And how about the Egyptian brothers,  Ahmed Mukhtar, 35, and Abd al-Basit, 24,who "slaughtered" their sister along with their mother and aunt, in June,

after discovering their sister's actions were contrary to morality."

After chaos erupted in the house, including gunfire, local police surrounded and broke into the home, only to find the aunt, Saida Muhammad Mukhtar, 55-years-old and a housewife, "with her head sliced off"; the mother, Amina Ahmed Muhammad, also 55 and a housewife, found "drowned in blood by the entrance of the house"; and the sister, Sana Mukhtar, 39-years-old and a widow, found butchered in a room.

Of course no mention  of the rash of honor killings in that other region, Afghanistan, including the woman and her two children who were beheaded. She too had divorced her husband after being battered during their 10 years of marriage.

And that's just a very, very small sampling of Muslim misogyny. The bulk of honor killings are female, and the few males that might happen to be the subject of an honor killing are usually gay.

So, occasionally, Al Arabiya?  Wishful thinking and the typical denial.

In fact, Chechnya's leader Kadyrov actually condones honor killings.

Honor killings are a major problem not only in the Middle East, but anywhere in the world where Muslim immigrants congregate with no desire to integrate and evolve.

Palestinian Women Protest Police After Man Murders Wife Seeking Divorce

Domestic violence is as prevalent in the Arab/Muslim world as it is in the West. For all their religious piousness- praying and bowing to mecca 5 times a day, fasting for a month during Ramadan - they can be just as brutal and violent, if not more so. They, of course, are in total denial about the whole issue. No, according to them Muslim men cherish their women, are tasked with taking care of them. However, actions speak louder than words. I remember having heated debates with my mostly Asian and Middle Eastern readers when I blogged over at Instablogs- they vehemently denied there was a problem with rape and domestic violence in their culture. News reports, however, prove the opposite. Their world is full of honor-based violence and killings, and just plain old domestic abuse, but women are finally bringing the problem to the light.

After ten years of abuse, a mother of three- 27-year-old West Bank Palestinian Nancy Zaboun- finally asked her husband for a divorce.  But after the divorce hearing, 32-year-old Shadi Abedallah slit her throat in the middle of a packed Bethlehem market in broad daylight instead. He had started beating her soon after their marriage, when she was 17- which, of course is allowed in Islam- but not much of anything was done for all those years, in spite of the fact that she on several occasions was hospitalized for her injuries.
In response to the murder, Palestinian women took to the streets in protest, demanding more from police and the courts.

On Wednesday, several dozen brave women staged a memorial for Zaboun in the Bethlehem market alley where she was killed, holding signs and chanting, “No to violence against women.” One photographed sign read: “Shame on us Palestinians for killing our women.”

Women have scored a number of breakthroughs in traditional Palestinian society in recent years, including gaining a greater role in public life, but tribal laws still remain strong. Violence against women is generally viewed by police as an internal family matter, so even if a woman is able to call for help, the police are of limited value.

Though Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas signed a decree last year that ended a long-standing practice of treating killings within a family with leniency, Al-Azraq said violence against women appears to be on the rise. In her opinion, the deteriorating Palestinian economy and the fact that abusers don’t fear punishment is likely the cause.

Unfortunately, some police in the West have that same mentality, that it's a family affair. Well, it's not. We need tougher laws for domestic violence and abuse, wherever it occurs.

Afghan Woman and Her Two Kids Beheaded In Honor Killing

There has been a tremendous increase in domestic violence against women in Afghanistan recently, and rights activists claim much of that has to do with Hamid Karzai's pathetic interest in women's rights in the run up to the foreign troops withdrawal in 2014 and the government's attempt to negotiate with the anti-female Taliban.  As a result women (and children) are losing their heads, and no-one is doing a damn thing about it.

30-year-old Serata was beheaded (in an honor killing) by her ex-husband 38-year-old Mohammad Arif, and because her 8-year-old son and 9-year-old daughter witnessed the murder, he chopped off their heads too. He left their 2-year-old daughter unharmed.

Afghanistan's Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) has reported that 16 other "honor killings" occurred in March and April alone, of this Afghan year, as opposed to no more than 20 cases per year since 2001 when AIHRC began keeping records of this kind of violence. And that's just those that are reported.

According to commissioner Ms. Suraya Subhrang,

"And there are many that go unreported. Men make a quick decision in their own courts to kill a girl and hold a prayer for her the next day."

Serata was the victim of domestic violence for 10 years of her marriage and it was the reason she divorced her husband a year ago.  In the end he got her anyway, and as with most cases of honor killings in that region, Arif fled the area and police have yet to find him. Even if they do eventually find him, it's doubtful much - if anything- will be done, because of

 police carelessness, corruption and a growing atmosphere of impunity.

I'm not sure why anyone would find it surprising in a chauvinistic, male-centric religious society. And all the minor gains women have made over the past 10 years since the Taliban were ousted will be lost once the troops are withdrawn and the Taliban takes control either through violence or negotiations.

Source: ABC News Australia

Muslim Cleric Threatens To Kill Daughter Over Arranged Marriage

Muslim cleric Abid Hussain is on trial (along with two of his sons Nawab and Bahaud Uddin) for threatening to kill Rabiyah Abid, the 16-year-old daughter/sister after she refused to marry her first cousin. You might think this happened in Pakistan but, though Pakistanis, they all happen to live in Manchester, England.

Promised to his sister's son at the age of 15 (something common in those parts) Abid also allegedly physically attacked her for her disobedience, and for getting involved with a young student she met on Facebook. cxv

Mr Hussain, a dad-of-five, is alleged to have grabbed her by the throat and said, ‘follow my rules or I’ll kill you’, before hitting her on the head at the family home above the mosque he runs at Northmoor Road, Longsight, Manchester.

Mr Hussain, who denies assault, is on trial alongside two of his sons, Nawab Uddin, 23, and Bahaud Uddin, 21.

The two young men are alleged to have robbed their sister of the mobile phone she used to contact the boyfriend they disapproved of and to have beaten her until she was dizzy. They deny assault and robbery.

Opening the case, Henry Blackshaw, prosecuting, told the jury that the girl lived in a ‘very male dominated, patriarchal household’ where she was ‘exhausted’ by cooking and cleaning.

She had been ‘betrothed’ by her father to his sister’s son in Pakistan at just 15 years old, but ended up falling for a student she had met online months later.

In November last year, while her father was celebrating Eid in Pakistan, the student travelled from London to Oldham to stay with a pal and the girl left her home to stay with him.

This prompted her brother, Nawab, to report her missing. When police traced her, she told them of her fears that she would be forced to marry when she had finished her GCSEs.

When her father returned from Pakistan, he learned that she had stayed with her secret boyfriend, and to add ‘insult to injury’, was served with Forced Marriage Prevention Order that officers had helped her obtain.

Mr Blackshaw said Mr Hussain saw the order, which led to the girl’s passport being taken by the authorities, was a ‘combination of her and the UK judicial system depriving him of his right to choose her husband within his own family’. Weeks later, on December 26, he is alleged to have attacked her. In the aftermath of the incident, she sent a message to her boyfriend saying ‘I thought I was going to die last night’.

Describing the alleged attack to police, she said: “He used his right hand to grab my neck. It was quite painful. He said ‘If you don’t follow my rules I will kill you.’ He was quite angry, really angry.”

Two days later her brothers, Nawab and Bahaud, allegedly took her phone from her and struck her about the face and head, leading her to wear a veil to hide her injuries. The next day she reported them to police.

Mr Blackshaw said of Abid Hussain: “He is plainly a devout man retaining traditional values regarding family matters, which is the reason for what we say was the offending in this case, because his daughter was not going along with his wishes in following that cultural duty.”

This is the problem when people fail to assimilate- they hold on to traditional values that have no place in their new homeland. Arranged marriages are not a cultural norm or duty in the West, and certainly not marriage to one's first cousin.

I'm glad England is buckling down, and that the girl had to courage to contact the police.

Pregnant Wife Dies After Husband Beats Her For Not Voting For Egypt's Mursi

Because Muslim men are allowed to beat their wives.
No wonder he wanted Muslim Brotherhood's Mohammed Mursi.

Why are Arab men so angry?!  I think they should all be forced to take some anger managment classes.

Al Arabiya

An Egyptian plumber in Alexandria beat his pregnant wife to death upon learning that she had not voted for Muslim Brotherhood presidential candidate Mohammed Mursi, reported the Egyptian daily al-Wafd on Sunday.

According to police reports, the initial argument between the couple who was not named escalated into violence, despite her pleas. Battered and bruised, she was reported to have died at the hospital from injuries sustained.

Domestic fights have dominated Egyptian news headlines when the bid fell on the two most feared and most controversial candidates, Mursi and former prime minister Ahmed Shafiq.

Voters, along with Egyptian media personalities, heatedly defended their chosen candidates and eagerly await the result which will be announced Sunday.

Swedish Mosques Tell Women "Don't Report Abusive Husbands"

According to a Sveriges Television (SVT) undercover investigative report on Swedish mosques, six out of ten told women to shut up about domestic abuse and said polygamy was acceptable. SVT sent off two women (along with hidden video cameras) to pose as abused wives for the programme "Uppdrag granskning". They were tasked with finding out the mosques' position on domestic abuse, marital rape and polygamy, posing as women with those various problems. Those six mosques told both of the women to not report the abuse to police and that they should have sex with their men regardless of whether they wanted to or not. Only two mosques advised the women to report the abuse, and only one mosque said that polygamy was not allowed, given Swedish laws against multiple marriages.
Of course, Hanne Josefsson (the host of the television programme), got very different responses from two of the mosques.

The chair of the Islamic Association in Uppsala claimed in the story that people should follow Swedish law.

When confronted by what the imam at the Uppsala mosque told the women, the Islamic leader explained that the imam had expressed his personal opinion in urging the women to forgive their abusive husbands rather than report them to police.

The imam with whom the woman met at the mosque in Stockholm defended polygamy and also advised against filing a police report about husbands who beat them.

He suggested instead that the women try to show their husbands more love.

"Don't refuse to give him love, because then he might change," said the imam.

Upon seeing the SVT report, however, the board of the Islamic Association in Stockholm (Islamiska förbundet Stockholm) decided to suspend the imam immediately and launch an internal investigation.

"This is a clear breach of Swedish law and they commit professional misconduct in their capacities as imams and associations," Mohammad Fazlhashemi, a professor and author of books on Muslim intellectual history, told the TT news agency.

Fazlhashemi, who also appears in the SVT report, has reviewed a written transcript of the advice given to the women.

"What these men are saying to the woman violates their human rights. The men demean and insult the women when they say 'you need to tolerate that these men hit you'," said Fazlhashemi.

He is highly critical of the imams featured in the SVT report for not following Swedish law.

"Considering the fact that the mosques have received state funding, they have also committed to following Swedish law and the basic principles of democracy," he said.

Fazlhashemi describes the Muslim leaders featured in the piece as "conservative, letter of the law traditionalists".

"Now it's time for some housecleaning. They need to weed out the bad seeds," he said.

Fazlhashemi, who is also a Muslim, expressed concerns that such outdated mosque representatives benefit Muslim-haters and the far-right Sweden Democrats.

"They confirm the negative picture of Muslims. It's a real shame that they confirm the prejudices that Islamophobes have," he said.

We wouldn't have those prejudices, if this kind of  behaviour didn't exist. This is probably going on behind mosque walls all over the West, and more than likely in England, where Sharia law is allowed.

Here's a more detailed account of the programme "Uppdrag granskning" (Assignment Investigate).

UAE Court Ruling States Men Can Beat Wives And Kids

Domestic violence is a chronic, prevalent problem worldwide and something that should be strongly condemned and prosecuted, and yet women (and some men) wind up killed because rarely is anything done about it. Restraining orders can only go so far, but if a man is intent on killing his wife he will find a way, and it often starts with simple beatings that lead to uncontrollable rage and the desire to permanently harm the spouse. There are no justifiable reasons to ever beat your partner, but in Islam this is actually encouraged by some. Yes, I know there are clerics who like to use the whole toothbrush analogy, but sorry, I don't buy it. Never is it okay to hit your wife, and there is something fundamentally wrong with any religion that condones it, in this day and age.

And yet, the United Arab Emirates has just now ruled that it's perfectly okay (in fact it's a right) for husbands to beat their wives and kids- on one condition - there should be no visible, physical marks. In other words- go ahead men beat the women in your lives as long as you don't bruise them. What is most stupefying is the fact that this is applicable only to the female members of the household. Of course, there's that needed reconciliation attempt before the beating, but if that fails, knock her flat, just don't break her teeth.

The UAE can thank Judge Falah al Hajeri for this latest act of male chauvinism.

The judgment was made by one of the UAE’s most senior judges, Chief Justic Falah al Hajeri, who made the ruling in the case of a man fined £85 for slapping his wife and kicking his daughter.

The Emirati man in the case was found guilty of slapping his wife so hard he damaged her bottom lip and teeth.

He also slapped and kicked his 23-year-old daughter so that she suffered bruises on her hand and knee.

While the defendant, who has not been named, initially claimed he hit the two women only by accident, he was found guilty of assault.

However, he appealed, claiming that even if he had intended to strike his wife and daughter, under Shariah law he had the right to do so if he had first exhausted all other ways of resolving the dispute.

Chief Justice Falah al Hajeri said: 'Although the law permits the husband to use his right to discipline, he has to abide by the limits of this right.

'If the husband abuses this right to discipline, he cannot be exempted from punishment.'
Mr al Hajeri went on to explain that one of the ways of determining whether a man had breached this limit was to look for physical traces of beating.

Typical classic denial- not intending to hit the wife. These kind of abusive men love to blame the victim, as well as claiming it was the woman's fault. And if he has the right to do it under Shariah law, then Shariah law needs to be dumped or evolve. Women are not the property of men, and they are certainly not children in need of discipline.

There have been some enlightened souls in the Arab world who balked at the ruling, but others who see it as a "real-life compromise"

...between the competing demands of the petro-state’s highly Westernised population and its conservative Muslim heritage.

There should never be any compromise when it comes to domestic violence, I don't care whose religion thinks it's peachy keen to beat a wife.

The Qu'ran mentions something about the right of men to discipline their wives, and that particular verse has often been open to interpretation. Islamic scholars have been battling over that for a very long time. The following two men represent both sides of the argument.

Jihad Hashim Brown, the head of research at the Islamic think tank the Tabah Foundation said beating one’s wife was in conflict most Islamic texts, which encourage Muslims to treat their wives in 'love and kindness'.

He said a Quranic verse might appear to allow certain things but if the verse was not 'clear and concise', it should not enter courts of law.

However, Dr Ahmed al Kubaisi, head of Sharia Studies at Iraq’s Baghdad University, said that under Sharia law beating one’s wife was an option to prevent the breakdown of the family.

He said it should be used only as a substitute to resorting to the police. 'If a wife committed something wrong, a husband can report her to police,' Dr al Kubaisi said.

'But sometimes she does not do a serious thing or he does not want to let others know; when it is not good for the family. In this case, hitting is a better option.'

And what about when a man does something wrong, is the wife allowed to deck him, as long as she leaves no marks? She should!