Acid Attacks On Iranian Women For "Bad Hijab"

There has been an upsurge in acid attacks on Iranian women in the historic tourist town of Isfahan for allegedly being "badly veiled."

Police have declined to comment on a motive but suspects have been arrested and an investigation is ongoing, General Hossein Ashtari was quoted as saying by the official IRNA news agency.

He said four acid attacks had been reported in Isfahan, 450 kilometres (280 miles) south of Tehran, but he gave no other details.

The violence led to chatter on social networks that there had been up to 13 acid attacks against women drivers who were "badly veiled" with accompanying warnings against leaving car windows open.

The rest here.

Acid Attack On Unveiled Egyptian Woman - Young Activist Discusses

Here's an interesting article by a young Egyptian woman, Reem Abdel-Razek, regarding Egypt's horrendous problem with sexual harassment. Apparently what they are now doing is throwing acid on girls from behind, so she is initially unaware of what happened to her. It happened to the sister of a friend of hers in Cairo, in broad daylight.

Esraa [Mohamed] was walking in her own neighborhood at 3 p.m. when she realized she was being followed by a well-dressed, respectable looking stranger. He said, “I am not harassing you but don’t forget to wipe off your pants.”

She suddenly began to feel a burning pain in her backside and rushed into a cafe to see what was wrong. It was then that she realized she couldn’t remove her pants and took a cab home. By that time the pain was so excruciating that she almost fainted; her buttocks and the back of her thighs had been burned by acid that had eaten into her flesh. The doctor who examined her said she had second and third-degree burns, with cell necrosis in some areas. The diagnosis was “chemical burn by an unidentified corrosive.”

According to Abdel-Razek, this has also happened to others, most have just been too embarrassed to tell anyone.

Esraa does not wear a veil, and they think this might have been the reason she was attacked, at least that's what some Facebook users told her was the reason.

Abdel-Razek also talks about how sexual harassment was virtually unheard of in the 50s and 60s, during the time when very few women wore the veil. The harassment, she believes, has escalated (out of control) with the growing influence of Islamists.

The role of Islamist propaganda in promoting the acceptance of violence against women often gets overlooked by those who are afraid of appearing “Islamophobic” or racist. But addressing the roots of violence against women is one of the most important steps in eradicating it.

During the 1950s and ’60s, this level of sexual persecution was unheard of in Egypt. At that time, hardly anyone in cities wore the veil and Islamist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood, had virtually disappeared due to the Gamal Abdel Nasser regime’s systematic attempts to eradicate them. When Anwar Sadat became president in 1970, he eased up on the Islamists because he wanted their support against leftist groups. Thus the 1970s witnessed a religious revival. By the 1980s and ’90s, the Brotherhood’s influence and the social services it provided were entrenched in many villages and neighborhoods, and the number of women wearing the veil rose significantly as a mark of the influence of political Islam.

I remember a conversation about the hijab between my mother and a woman who belonged to the Brotherhood. She said, “Every time I think about how uncomfortable it is, I remember that by wearing it I am promoting our ideology.”

Islamists launched campaigns pushing the veil. One showed a picture of a three legged chair and said it was like a woman without a veil. Another showed a lollipop wrapped in paper next to an unwrapped lollipop covered with flies, which it compared to a woman who does not veil. These campaigns objectified women by comparing them to chairs and candy, and dehumanizing women is the first step in justifying violence against them.

Radio and TV channels that catered to Islamist agendas (most of which have been shut down in the past few months) endlessly justified wife beating, female genital mutilation, marital rape, and other forms of violence against women. They also promoted the idea that women are inferior to men and in need of constant monitoring and disciplining. Those on the receiving end of these messages aren’t just orthodox Muslims or Muslim Brotherhood members, but a much wider demographic.

And talking to the police about sexual harassment is futile because the police think the same way as the harassers.

Not to say that women wearing hijab don't get harassed, they do, they probably just don't get acid thrown on them.

More info- Source

International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women- Nov 25th - Video

In honor of  International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, I thought this video on RFE/RL was sadly appropriate.

It also reflects all that is horrendous about the life of women in places like Afghanistan.

According to Akhtara- a mother of four in her late twenties- she was married off to a rich older man at the age of 10. Then one day the old man's nephew wound up murdering him, and three years after Akhtara refused to marry the nephew (who then fled to Pakistan), he showed up at her door and threw acid in her face.  She now has to beg to support her kids, and one her boys works from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m. to help with the rent.

Pakistani Actress Burned With Acid For Refusing Marriage Proposal

Acid attacks aren't just a popular Islamic form of revenge, after all, Bolshoi Ballet's head Sergei Filin has been left almost blind by an acid attack that jealous company member Pavel Dmitrichenko set in motion; but they are more prolific and commonplace in countries like Pakistan.

And the Bolshoi acid attack isn't the only acid attack on someone in the entertainment industry.

A popular  young Pashto actress of TV/Film and Stage was attacked with acid by a married producer, Shaukat Khan, after she turned down his marriage proposal.

According to Pervez Khan, the brother of the 18-year-old victim, Bushra,

“A man climbed the wall of our house in the early hours, threw acid on my sister and fled."

Bushra was burned over 33 percent of her face and shoulders.

Acid Attack On Brit Woman By Niqab-Clad Person

A woman in London had acid thrown in her face by someone wearing a niqab (full face veil) on December 30, 2012 as she was walking home after a late night shift at Victoria's Secret.

This is 20-year-old Naomi Oni's story:

“I’d been working a late shift and was talking to my boyfriend about what we were going to do for New Year when I saw this Muslim woman wearing a niqab covering her face. I thought it was a bit strange at that time of night, but she didn’t say anything and I kept on walking.

“Then I felt a splash on my face. It burned and I screamed out. I started running and screaming, holding my face, all the way home. I didn’t look back.

“I got home and I was screaming and banging on the door. I was hysterical. Luckily my godmother, who is a pharmacist, was at home with my mum and she helped me and kept dipping my face in water and trying to calm me down until the police and ambulance got there. I was in shock. Saying: ‘Who would do that? Who would do that?’ How could anyone do this?”

Naomi's face and body, including her arms and legs, were badly burned, and is now partially blind in one eye.

The attack has devastated the young woman who is sole caretaker of her mother with whom she lives.

“I look in the mirror and it just isn’t me. I’ll never look the same again. I’ve always been outgoing and confident in my job and in my personal life, used to getting attention for the way I dress or my hair, but now I don’t want anyone looking at me.

“I don’t want people to see me in public. I don’t want to get the Tube or the bus. If I have to go to the hospital I take a taxi. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to go back to my job. I was planning to go to college in September to study media and fashion, but I don’t even know if I’ll be able to do that."

Naomi will need many more surgeries but more than likely be scarred for life.

Because the person was wearing a niqab, there are no clues and no arrests. This is why full face veils should be banned in every civilized Western land: there is no way to identify who was under that veil.

Read the whole story here.

Pakistani Parents Pour Acid On Their Teen For Talking To Boy

Here's a good one from a religion which inspires parents to think it's justifiable to torture their children because they dare talk to someone of the opposite sex. I realize that ignorance and religious fundamentalism is a recipe for disaster, but what happened to this young Pakistani teen is beyond the pale.

According to police officer Tahir Ayub, Mohammed Zafar and his wife beat their 15-year-old daughter Anvu Shah after they caught her talking to a boy in front of their home. Not satisfied with that, they then proceeded to pour acid over her face and body and left her in agonizing pain until the next morning when they finally took her to the hospital, where she later died.

The incident happened in Kotli, a small town in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. The parents allegedly confessed to the attack after she spoke with a boy outside their house.

[snip]

Local media reports, citing hospital officials, say her death was slow and excruciatingly painful. The girl was brought to hospital with third degree burns all over her body, including her face, arms, and chest. Police were reportedly alerted to the attack by one of Shah's female relatives.

Her parents have now been charged with murder.

Why is acid so readily available in places like Pakistan, where acid attacks are so prevalent? Who needs acid? Do people just buy a gallon or so to have handy just in case someone upsets them.

Shameful.

Source: ABC

New Life For Acid-Attacked Pakistani Girl In Houston

This is what happens to Christians in Pakistan.

But the horrific thing that 16-year-old Julie Aftab was subjected to only strengthened her faith. After 31 surgeries she is now 26, lives in Houston with a kind family that took her in, and is studying accounting.

This is her story:

She was 16 years old, working as an operator in a tiny, public call office in Pakistan, when a man walked in and saw the silver cross dangling around her neck.

He asked her three times: "Are you a Christian?"

Julie Aftab answered, "Yes, sir," the first two times, and then got frustrated.

"Didn't you hear me?" she asked.

They argued, and the man abruptly left the little office, returning 30 or 40 minutes later with a turquoise bottle. Aftab tried to block the arc of battery acid, but it melted much of the right side of her face and left her with swirling, bone-deep burns on her chest and arms. She ran for the door, but a second man grabbed her hair, and they poured the acid down her throat, searing her esophagus.

[snip]

Aftab was born in Faisalabad, Pakistan, the eldest of seven children in a Christian working-class family.

She dreamed of becoming a doctor, but dropped out of school at age 12 to work in a sewing factory after her father, a bus driver and the family's sole breadwinner, broke his back in an accident. After the sewing factory closed when Aftab was 16, she took a job as a telephone operator helping people place phone calls from the small office in the city's center.

It was June 15, 2002, two weeks into her new job, when the customer spotted her silver cross, a gift from her grand­father. She wore it despite knowing it branded her as Christian, a tiny minority in the Muslim-majority country.

You are living life in the gutter, the Muslim man told her.

She tried to ignore him, remembering what her mother had taught her since she was a child: "You are no one to insult someone's religion. If someone is insulting religion, they have to answer to God."

You are going to hell, the man told her. You are living in darkness.

"I am living in the light," Aftab replied.

So you think Islam is in darkness? the man demanded.

Aftab was frightened. She knew Christians had been accused of violating Pakistan's strict blasphemy laws in the past when others had twisted their words, to make it sound as though they had attacked Islam.

"No, you said that," she replied. "Not me."

But the man was enraged and returned with the battery acid and his friend. When she finally broke away from them, the acid searing her skin and throat, she ran down the street. As she screamed, teeth fell from her mouth and hit the ground.

A woman heard her screams and threw her head cover on Aftab so she could touch her without getting burned. The woman took Aftab to her home and poured water on her. Others eventually came to help take her to the hospital.

People in the neighborhood detained the two men who assaulted her until police arrived.

Why did you do that? the men were asked.

They said Aftab insulted Islam, that she said Muslims are living in the darkness and are going to hell.

"They all turned against me," she said. "Even the people who took me to the hospital. They told the doctor they were going to set the hospital on fire if they treated me."

The police let the two men go, and did not even file an official report on the assault until Christian leaders complained, she said.

Family persecuted

Aftab's family was turned away from one hospital, and then another. Her mother begged a doctor at a third hospital to treat her, and he relented.

Aftab could not speak or move her arms. Doctors said 67 percent of her esophagus was burned. She was missing an eye and eyelids. Her remaining teeth could be seen through her missing cheek. The doctors predicted she would die any day.

She was angry at first, she said.

"God, why did you do this to me? Why did you put me through this?"

Slowly, she started to heal. Three months and 17 days after being burned, she spoke again and was able to see through her left eye. She spent almost a year in the hospital.

Aftab quickly learned that in her old neighborhood, she was a pariah. Her mutilated face was plastered on the news, associated with insulting Islam. Her family was persecuted, and their house was burned down.

"They wanted to hang me," she said. "They thought it would be an insult to Islam if I lived."

Aftab and her parents went to a nondenominational bishop in Pakistan, who said he would try to help. He took her in, contacted Shriners Hospitals for Children, and arranged for her treatment in Houston.

He gave her one piece of advice before she left Pakistan in 2004: "If you forgive them," he said, "your wound will heal without any medication. You can heal from the inside out."

Read her whole story here.

Rise In Acid Attacks On Men By Women In Pakistan

Not that this is to be condoned, but it seems it's payback time for men in Pakistan. Women, the usual victims of acid attacks (which is used as a form of punishment for anything from dishonoring their families and/or husbands to rejecting a marriage proposal o husbands sexual demands), are now turning the tables on the male population. Apparently, there has been a recent increase in acid attacks by women, and no-one over there seem to know why. 

But it's quite obvious they've learned through example.  There's a great monologue in Will Shakespeare's "Othello" where villain Iago's wife Emilia explains to Desdemona why women do the things they do.

But I do think it is their husbands' faults
If wives do fall. Say that they slack their duties
And pour our treasures into foreign laps
Or else break out in peevish jealousies
Throwing restraint upon us. Or say they strike us
Or scant our former having in despite.
Why, we have galls, and though we have some grace,
Yet have we some revenge. Let husbands know
Their wives have sense like them. They see and smell
And have their palates both for sweet and sour,
As husbands have. What is it that they do
When they change us for others? Is it sport?
I think it is. And doth affection breed it?
I think it doth. Is ’t frailty that thus errs?
It is so too. And have not we affections,
Desires for sport, and frailty, as men have?
Then let them use us well, else let them know,
The ills we do, their ills instruct us so.

The last two lines sum it all up. Unfortunately, as the predominate targets of such horrendous acts of revenge, Pakistani women are learning that the best way to lash out is to use acid.

One male victim, 24-year-old Sheikh Mohammad Noman, had acid thrown on his face by his wife- she wanted a divorce so she could get back together with her ex-husband, and Noman refused since he still loved her. Although he was blinded and burned, his wounds don't seem as severe as so many photos I've seen of female victims, but he was blinded in one eye and will suffer pain for a long time. Noman's wife will be tried, but is currently out on bail.

According to a women's rights group The Aurat Foundation, the bulk of attacks are against women.

More than 8,500 acid attacks, forced marriages and other forms of violence against women were reported in Pakistan in 2011, according to The Aurat Foundation, a women's rights organization.

Up until recently, Pakistan has been very lax regarding honor crimes, and it wasn't until 2011 that they actually set up laws that criminalize acid attacks. Anyone convicted of an attack will be jailed for at least 14 years, which doesn't seem much for an act of violence that makes someone's life a living hell. And laws or not, will it make any difference? In a patriarchal/chauvinist society the men will more than likely still get off easy. Like Bilal Khar, the rich and powerful ex-husband of 33-year-old dancer/prostitute Fakhra Younus, who 12 years ago severely disfigured Younus with acid and still walks free today. Younus, in despair over Pakistan's lack of interest in such atrocities and the indifference and insensitivity of Pakistan's leaders,  recently took her own life by jumping out of a sixth floor building in Rome. Khar still denies he was the perpetrator, and says it was some other man with the same name.
According to this CNN interview regarding the rise in female generated acid attacks, there have been a whopping 3 attacks this year so far.

Four Pakistanis Including A Child Burned In Acid Attack

Some people in Pakistan don't sue to get back at folks they've had problems with. Nope, no Judge Judy for them,  they just use the weapon of choice in that region- acid. Because acid will make the lives of their adversaries a living hell. 

And they certainly don't care if the victims are women or children, as evidenced in the latest case near Lahore:

Four people, including two women and a child, were burnt in an acid attack over an enmity near Taunsa bypass on Sunday, say Sadar policeTwo assailants threw the deadly liquid on Nawaz, Hajra Bibi, Nusrat Bibi and Wasim who were going on a motorcycle.

The police said Aslam and his accomplice threw acid on them and fled the scene.

An onlooker called Rescue 1122 officials who shifted the acid attack victims to Dera District Headquarters Hospital.

Sadar Station House Officer Javed said the incident was the result of an old enmity.

Just easier to maim them for the rest of their lives.

Young Afghan Boy and Girl Killed After Acid Attack, No-One Claims Bodies

Here's another example of how religion and a twisted sense of honor is more important than the value of a life, or in this case, the lives of two young children. Dumped in the middle of nowhere, after being burned by acid, for unknown reasons.

Two children, unceremoniously dumped in the middle of nowhere.

GHAZNI: A 12-year-old girl and a 15-year-old boy have been killed in an acid attack in Afghanistan, an official said on Saturday, with witnesses claiming it was because of their friendship in what is an ultra-conservative country.


The bodies were discovered on Friday in wasteland in the Esfandi area of Ghazni province in south central Afghanistan, provincial police chief Zorawar Zahid told AFP.


“Their bodies and faces were burnt by acid,” he said.


The police chief said officers were investigating the motive for the attack, but witnesses who found the bodies told AFP the two were probably killed because of their friendship.


No one has claimed the bodies, which are still in Ghazni hospital, police said.

What kind of parents would do this to their own children?

Afghan Family Attacked With Acid After Daughter's Refusal Of Marriage

Apparently it's not just women who are targets of acid attacks, men are also victimized, though not to the same extent. In the case of  an 18-year-old Afghan woman, Mumtaz, whose whole family including her father were burned by acid, she was the catalyst for the savage attack, and for the usual reason: rejection
Some local goon had his eyes set on Mumtaz, but her parents trying to protect their daughter from marrying someone they believed was irresponsible.

With her parents support, she turned him down and instead got engaged to a relative.


A few weeks later, six or seven armed men burst into their home in the Bulk Awal area of the northern Kunduz city − the largest in the region − in the middle of the night.


“First they beat her father and then they attacked with acid,” said Mumtaz’s mother, who asked not to be identified.


All five are now receiving medical treatment, said Abdul Shokor Rahimi, head of the Kunduz regional hospital.


“The father and oldest daughter are in critical condition as they have been attacked all over the body,” Rahimi said.


“Their mother and two daughters who are 14 and 13 have some wounds only in hands and faces.”

“..started an investigation and those who have attacked them will be prosecuted."

Acid is the weapon of choice in Afghanistan, especially in regions where the Taliban still has a strong influence, as a punishment for women who refuse marriage proposals and as a means of frightening young school girls into staying at home in Afghanistan and Pakistan.  But it's not just Afghanistan where spurned lovers and others have used acid to get back at women, it also happens in Iran, Cambodia, in fact, all over the world.

Although the predominance of attacks are against women,  like Mumtaz's father, they're not the only ones who have been horribly disfigured by acid.

In January, veteran Afghan journalist Abdul Razaq Mamon, a presenter, commentator and author, was left with burns to his hands and face after acid was thrown at him in Kabul.  Officials said that attack may have been politically motivated.

Only a savage would throw acid on another human being, knowing that the victim will remain disfigured and in excruciating  pain for the rest of their lives. 

Ameneh Bahrami Iranian Woman Blinded By Acid Denied Compensation By Courts

It seems the Islamic way for some  men to deal with rejection is making sure that if they can't have a particular woman no-one else will either. One of the methods of choice is throwing acid on the face of the one who spurned them. This happens quite frequently in countries including Pakistan and Iran. A horrifying practice, the women are left permanently disfigured and the men usually get off with a light sentence; that is, unless the woman demands qisas (an eye for an eye) retribution.

Not common, but perfectly acceptable as part of Shariah law, a victim can request similar punishment for the perpetrator.   In the case of Ameneh Bharami, who had acid thrown in her face and was blinded in both eyes by Majid Movahedi after she refused his marriage proposal, Movahedi was sentenced to a similar fate.  But Bharami had to wait 4 years before her wish for retribution was granted in 2008, and another 3 years before it was actually to be carried out.  However, at the last minute she changed her mind and pardoned him, though she still was seeking monetary compensation. Reaction was evenly split between those who commended her for changing her mind (in spite of the reasons why), and those who felt the man deserved to suffer for the horrendous crime he committed.

But after all that, after sparing his eyes, Bahrami is being re-victimized, this time by the Iranian courts. According to Radio Zamaneh,  she was just informed that she is now not entitled to any compensation.

The Shargh daily newspaper reports: “Amaneh says she has foregone the ghesas ruling but wants to get the dieh (monetary compensation), but they say the minutes indicate that she has completely forgiven the crime.”


Shargh reports that Bahrami has rejected the veracity of the minutes, but officials have responded that the case is finalized. Bahrami has claimed, however, that she was not told what was written in the minutes, and since she was blinded by her assailant, she was not able to read for herself.

 She was eligible to receive  $200,000, money that she needs for medical treatment.  As a woman, of course, the likelihood of receiving that compensation is slim to none.

Movahedi, on the other hand, will only spend 10 years in jail, and 5 years of exile.

Taliban Hate Afghan School Girls

The Taliban despise their women folk so much that they want them covered head to toe in burqas, uneducated and at home, or dead.  Ever since the end of the Taliban reign of terror, young girls are back at school, getting the education every human being is entitled to. But the Taliban have been doing their best to make sure that doesn't happen. The cowards have no problem attacking innocent girls' schools with poison, or throwing acid on female students' faces.

The wonderful thing about these girls is that they are resilient. Scared but defiant even those girls who have been mercilessly attacked with acid are determined to get their education, in spite of the dangers and threats by the Taliban. In fact, according to the Quran, every Muslim should seek an education and that includes women, considering they too are Muslim.

"To seek knowledge is obligatory on every Muslim."
(Declared Authentic By Shaikh Muhammad Naasir-ud-Deen Al-Albaani)

And yet, the ignorant Taliban oafs seem to think knowledge is the privilege of men only. Thankfully the parents of these girls realize the importance of an education and allow their children to continue to attend school. The girl who suffered the most in the acid attacks had this to say:

“My parents told me to keep coming to school even if I am killed,” said Shamsia, 17, in a moment after class. Shamsia’s mother, like nearly all of the adult women in the area, is unable to read or write. “The people who did this to me don’t want women to be educated. They want us to be stupid things.”

Sometimes one has to make sacrifices and embrace the danger if one is to prevail. And I pray that the women of Afghanistan do just that.