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Ladies, what would you feel if you are being denied the right to
education? Being
denied the right to choose who to marry? Being denied the right
to drive a car?
If I was the one who had to faced this kind of situation I would
certainly felt that I am
being oppressed, that I am being denied the right to choose what
to do with my life. That I
am being denied a right to live.
This is what I felt when I was reading a book about the life of
a princess who lives in
Saudi Arabia, a land ruled by man whom in my opinion thinks with
their heart but not with
their head.
I have learn a lot about the injustices faced by the women of
the desert after reading
this book and since this book was written more than 20 years ago
I decided to do a further
research as to whether Arab women are still being subjected to
injustices or not, as it
intrigues me that Middle Eastern women are being badly treated
by the men.
So today I would like to inform you about the 3 injustices faced
by Middle Eastern
women. The three injustices are Middle Eastern women are being
subjected to honour killing,
they were not given the custody of their children in the event
of a divorce and women in
Saudi Arabia are banned from driving cars.
So what is honour killing exactly? According to UNICEF, honour
killing is an ancient
practice in which men kill their female relative in the name of
protecting their family honour
for suspected sexual activities outside marriage. The killing is
known as honour killing due to
the beliefs that the victim has brought dishonour upon the
family and the community and
because of that the victim has to be killed. Honour killing is a
type of injustice to womenbecause honour killing is a murder
committed to woman and girls for the purpose of
protecting the honour of the family.
According to Imam Hashmi of the Kingston Islamic Centre of
Canada, honour killing
was not even stated in the Holy Quran or in any other Islamic
religious text. The idea of
killing a woman who is involved in something that brings shame
to a family is a barbaric act
based on the customs and traditions of the Arabs and not based
on religion. Honour killing is
being associated with Islam as the world is perpetuated by the
fact that honour killing is
mostly committed by Muslims.
Honour killings occur with shocking regularity in the Middle
Eastern countries as it
has been apart of the culture of the Middle Eastern people. In
addition to that, people in the
Middle Eastern countries still commits honour killing as the law
themselves allows for such
killing to be carried out in the name of protecting the familys
honour.
In Jordan for example, families often get their minor sons to
commits honour killing
as the law allows convicted minors to serve time in juvenile
detention centre and be released
with a clean criminal record at the age of 18 years old.
Article 340 of the Jordanian Penal Code for example, exempts a
men who commitshonour killing form any criminal penalty.Rana
Hussein, a leading journalist on the topic of
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honour killing states that in Jordan under the existing law,
people found guilty of committing
honour killing often received lighter sentence, as light as a
six months imprisonment for the
punishment of committing honour killing.
In Saudi Arabia, honour killing is illegal. But people who
commits honour killing will
gets away with it, scout free as the judiciary body does not
prosecute those who commits
honour killing because in Saudi Arabia woman is being authorised
by the man and it is up to
the man to punish the woman in any way that he thinks is fit
.
Honour killing target women whose actions violate the honour of
their family, an
honour which is thought to depend on the sexual purity of its
female members. Anything
from speaking to an unrelated man, to rumoured pre-marital loss
of virginity and to an extra-
marital affair can be a cause for honour killing. In some tragic
instances, even women who
have been raped are killed to remove the shame from the family
honour.
In August 2008, the al-Arabiya website reported that a young
Saudi woman was
murdered by her father for chatting on Facebook, The unnamed
woman from Riyadh was
beaten and shot to death after she was discovered to be in the
middle of an online
conversation with a man. A Saudi preacher Ali al-Maliki claims
that the network is
corrupting the youth as it is a door to lust and because of that
Al-Maliki supports the fathers
decision of murdering her daughter for chatting on Facebook.
In June 2011, BBC UK reported that Libyan woman was raped by
Muamamar
Gadaffis supporters are being murdered by their own families as
rape in Libya is considered
as a dishonesty even if the woman are perfectly innocent of the
act of rapping.
If a family decides not to prosecute a woman who was a rape
victim, the family will
be assaulted by the community as what has happened to the family
of Kainat Samooro from
Pakistan. Kainat was 13 years old when she was raped by 4 man at
her village. The tribal
leader of her town calls for her to be killed but her family
refused to do so and because of that
her family was under constant threat by the villagers. In the
end, Kainats brother was
murder by the villagers as a punishment for her family for their
refusal to kill Kainat.
Transition 2: Enough about the brutality of honour killing. Let
us now move to my
second point, which is Middle Eastern women are being denied the
right to custody of their
children in the event of divorce.
