West Bank: Women Serving as Judges in Islamic Courts

2 Palestinian women become judges in Islamic court

NASSER SHIYOUKHI and DIAA HADID (Associated Press

… [T]he female judges say they can help their [Muslim] sisters obtain their rights under Islamic law. They say a sense of shame surrounds women speaking to men, especially about intimate family relations…

UK, Media: Terrorism Double Standard?

When terrorism isn’t newsworthy

(Scottish Islamic Foundation Blog)

Imagine if a Scottish Muslim had pled guilty to threatening to blow up Glasgow Cathedral and behead one Christian a week until all British troops were pulled out of Iraq and Afghanistan.

There would be outrage, right? It would be splashed over the front page of every newspaper in the land. It would be the top of all news bulletins….

… So when news came into the Scottish-Islamic Foundation office this week of one Neil MacGregor pleading guilty to threatening to blow up Glasgow Central Mosque and behead one Muslim a week until all Scottish mosques were shut down, we thought it couldn’t possibly be true. There had been no build up to such a trial, no coverage during it and none on the verdict….

Iran: Worth a Visit; Iranians Kind and Welcoming

Iran: the friendliest people in the world

(London Times)

USA, Domestic Abuse: A Reality Check and Troubling Teen Attitudes

Many teens blame Rihanna, say dating violence normal

Megan Twohey and Bonnie Miller Rubin (Chicago Tribune)

Ed Loos, a junior at Lake Forest High School, said a common reaction among students to Chris Brown’s alleged attack on Rihanna goes something like this: “Ha! She probably did something to provoke it.”

In Chicago, Sullivan High School sophomore Adeola Matanmi has heard the same.

“People said, ‘I would have punched her around too,’ ” Matanmi said. “And these were girls!” …

and, also from he Chicago Tribune:

Restraining order against ignorance

Kari Ansari (Chicago Tribune)

Aasiya Zubair Hassan is dead of decapitation.

When we in the Muslim community received this news we prayed for her soul and held our collective breath, waiting for the negative associations to surface in media reports. Sure enough, the term “honor killing” has risen like green scum on a stagnant pond, giving every Muslim-bashing blog and ultraconservative media outlet a proverbial field day….

… Now I’m even reading comments from people who worked with her on a professional level using the term honor killing to describe her death. Women’s groups who know nothing about the situation are throwing the term around as if they know what it implies and what it entails, associating it with the murder of Aasiya.

First, let’s get one fact straight. Islamic law does not allow a man to kill his wife, for any reason. There is nothing in the teachings of the faith that says a man should protect the honor of his stature in the community by committing violence against a woman….

… When Nicole Simpson was savagely murdered, her throat was stabbed numerous times almost to the point of decapitation; did we call this an honor killing? Did anyone say the alleged killer, O.J. Simpson, did it because he was black, or a Christian? No. There was a long, documented history of domestic violence perpetrated on Nicole by O.J. This murder of Aasiya is no different. Violence against women has no educational, racial, socioeconomic or religious bounds. Aasiya’s story should give us the impetus to do more to protect all women from domestic violence. We as a society should not sully the memory of Aasiya Zubair Hassan’s mission to build bridges of understanding between people by painting her faith with a broad black brush of mistrust and intolerance.

USA: Bridges TV Founder Murders Wife

Any positive effect Bridges TV may have had on relations between Muslims and non-Muslims has been damaged by the founder’s brutal murder of his wife.

Not surprisingly, the television station’s web site is now unavailable. The victim, Aasiya Zubair, was the station general manager.

Orchard Park businessman charged in beheading of wife

Fred O. Williams and Gene Warner (Buffalo News)

Friends expressed shock on Friday that the founder of a Muslim TV channel — which he launched in order to counter violent images of Muslims — has been arrested in his wife’s brutal slaying….

Iran: Shirin Ebadi On Womens Rights After the Revolution

Women’s rights under Iran’s revolution

(BBC News)

Egypt: Great Expectations vs Reality of Obama

Why the Muslim World Can’t Hear Obama

ALAA AL ASWANY (NY Times)

We saw Mr. Obama as a symbol of this justice. We welcomed him with almost total enthusiasm until he underwent his first real test: Gaza. Even before he officially took office, we expected him to take a stand against Israel’s war on Gaza. We still hope that he will condemn, if only with simple words, this massacre that killed more than 1,300 Palestinians, many of them civilians. (I don’t know what you call it in other languages, but in Egypt we call this a massacre.) We expected him to address the reports that the Israeli military illegally used white phosphorus against the people of Gaza. We also wanted Mr. Obama, who studied law and political science at the greatest American universities, to recognize what we see as a simple, essential truth: the right of people in an occupied territory to resist military occupation.
But Mr. Obama has been silent….

Indonesia: Recent Fatwas Against Smoking and Yoga Largely ignored

Indonesians ignore religious edicts against smoking, yoga

Although Indonesia is an overwhelmingly Muslim country, many view Islamic clerics’ fatwas as anachronistic and unnecessary.

Paul Watson (LA Times)