Warrior-Mentor
12-13-2009, 19:25
‘Honor killings’ exposed
Young Muslim women in West are increasingly vulnerable
By Nadi a Shahram
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
December 13, 2009
Since the brutal slaying of 37-year-old Aasiya Hassan and the murder charges filed against her husband, Muzzammil Hassan, in February, there has been at least one murder labeled as an “honor killing.” In Arizona, an Iraqi immigrant is accused of running over his daughter with his car.
These two cases have triggered a lot of writing and discussion about honor killings and domestic violence. Here in Erie County, a number of seminars have been offered in various communities in the hope of raising awareness of the widespread violence against women. Many of these community discussions have focused on the issue of whether Hassan’s killing in Orchard Park was in fact committed by the husband —who has pleaded not guilty— as a kind of Islamic honor killing. Some Muslims were offended by that labeling of her murder, and summarily oppose the use of any term but domestic violence to describe the act.
As a major part of my teaching at the University at Buffalo Law School, where I offer a course titled “The Effects of Culture and Religion on Family Laws,” I have been researching honor killings and domestic violence for the last several years. Hassan’s murder trial is scheduled for next year. Until we hear the evidence, none of us can really know if this killing was meant in some way as an honor killing or whether it was just another terrible act of domestic violence.
But although we don’t know the facts yet, we do know that this would not be the first time a Muslim woman has been killed in this country in the name of “honor” at the hands of her husband or her father. There have been numerous cases of such murders being committed in the United States, murders that clearly fit into the typical pattern of honor killings.
Nadia Shahram is an attorney with a private practice in divorce mediation, and an adjunct at the University at Buffalo Law School. Her book, “Marriage on the Street Corners of Tehran,” is scheduled to be published next year.
An honor killing refers to the death of a female by a male family member, usually in concert with other members of an extended family, for infringing on the honor of the family. Such dishonor is claimed to be caused by a woman’s actions — refusing to wear a hijab, assimilating into Western culture or rejecting arranged marriages, just to name a few. Sometimes even when the female has been victimized by others, for example by being molested or raped, she is still seen as somehow shaming and bringing dishonor to the family.
Simply put, any behavior that may have the perception of inappropriateness calling into question the “purity” of the female is suspect. However, it is the intent of the killer that is the main determinative factor in separating honor killings from domestic violence, and not whether it happens in the United States or overseas.
A woman asking for a divorce, even where there is domestic violence, has been cited by some Muslim men as an undesirable behavior supposedly justifying honor killings, not only in Muslim countries and in Europe, where nearly 25 million Muslims live, but right here. In my research I have concentrated on cases in the United States. Killings labeled by the press as honor killings, over the objections of the Muslim community, show the murders to be primarily but not exclusively a Muslim-on-Muslim crime.
In 2008, when Kandeela Sanwal from Atlanta, Ga., filed for divorce from an arranged marriage to a cousin twice her age, her father, a 52-year-old immigrant from Pakistan, strangled her. According to police, he could not accept the “disgrace” a divorce would bring on his family.
Here in New York, Fauzia Mohammed of Henrietta was stabbed multiple times by her brother in 2008 for planning to go to school in New York City. He pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree murder. In 2004, Hatice Peltek of Scottsville and her daughters were stabbed and bludgeoned to death with a hammer by Hatice’s husband because her brother-in-law had molested her.
In 2008, sisters Sarah and Amina Said of Dallas, Texas, were found shot to death in a cab. Their father, Yaser, was accused of killing them. Police documents report that Yaser’s wife fled their home with the daughters a week before the murders because she feared her husband might harm the girls. Yaser had previously tried to marry off Amina in his native Egypt when she was 16.
In 2004, Dr. Lubaina B. Ahmed of Ohio was murdered, along with her father, sister and child, by her husband because she asked for a divorce. Ahmed was a physician and had suffered domestic violence at the hands of her husband over several years before he killed her.
While statistics are hard to come by due to the private nature of such crimes and the fact that very few are reported, the U. N. Population Fund reports that a low estimate of 5,000 women are murdered in honor killings each year worldwide, and it is clear that young Muslim women in the West are becoming increasingly vulnerable. The cultural clash for families immigrating into the United States is highlighted when, as in the Arizona case, a woman is murdered because of her Western lifestyle. Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus view honor and morality as a collective family matter. Rights are collective, not individual. Family, clan and tribal rights supplant individual human rights.
The justification offered for honor killings all along has been the unfounded claim that Islam as a religion sanctions these heinous crimes. But a close examination of the Quran and interpretations of this religious text shows that honor killings are not religiously sanctioned acts, but rather are manifestations of an extremely patriarchal and perhaps misogynist culture.
Although no verse in the Quran mentions or encourages such acts of violence against girls and women, there are some verses that have been widely interpreted by backward-thinking Muslims as making women the possessions or property of men. Even though there is no justification for honor killings in the Quran, the perpetrators of these killings and their supporters always justify the killings by a deeply rooted cultural belief that it is men’s religious right to punish “their” women (as their property) for perceived transgressions.
The holy Quran, when read and interpreted correctly, never justifies the killing of a female family member. Starting in mid-sixth century Arabia, verses such as 2:223,4:3 and 4:34, given to limit abuse of women and to protect them, are indeed being used to subjugate in the 21st century. Therefore, reinterpretation of these verses is a vital part in eliminating these brutal practices.
Young Muslim women in West are increasingly vulnerable
By Nadi a Shahram
SPECIAL TO THE NEWS
December 13, 2009
Since the brutal slaying of 37-year-old Aasiya Hassan and the murder charges filed against her husband, Muzzammil Hassan, in February, there has been at least one murder labeled as an “honor killing.” In Arizona, an Iraqi immigrant is accused of running over his daughter with his car.
These two cases have triggered a lot of writing and discussion about honor killings and domestic violence. Here in Erie County, a number of seminars have been offered in various communities in the hope of raising awareness of the widespread violence against women. Many of these community discussions have focused on the issue of whether Hassan’s killing in Orchard Park was in fact committed by the husband —who has pleaded not guilty— as a kind of Islamic honor killing. Some Muslims were offended by that labeling of her murder, and summarily oppose the use of any term but domestic violence to describe the act.
As a major part of my teaching at the University at Buffalo Law School, where I offer a course titled “The Effects of Culture and Religion on Family Laws,” I have been researching honor killings and domestic violence for the last several years. Hassan’s murder trial is scheduled for next year. Until we hear the evidence, none of us can really know if this killing was meant in some way as an honor killing or whether it was just another terrible act of domestic violence.
But although we don’t know the facts yet, we do know that this would not be the first time a Muslim woman has been killed in this country in the name of “honor” at the hands of her husband or her father. There have been numerous cases of such murders being committed in the United States, murders that clearly fit into the typical pattern of honor killings.
Nadia Shahram is an attorney with a private practice in divorce mediation, and an adjunct at the University at Buffalo Law School. Her book, “Marriage on the Street Corners of Tehran,” is scheduled to be published next year.
An honor killing refers to the death of a female by a male family member, usually in concert with other members of an extended family, for infringing on the honor of the family. Such dishonor is claimed to be caused by a woman’s actions — refusing to wear a hijab, assimilating into Western culture or rejecting arranged marriages, just to name a few. Sometimes even when the female has been victimized by others, for example by being molested or raped, she is still seen as somehow shaming and bringing dishonor to the family.
Simply put, any behavior that may have the perception of inappropriateness calling into question the “purity” of the female is suspect. However, it is the intent of the killer that is the main determinative factor in separating honor killings from domestic violence, and not whether it happens in the United States or overseas.
A woman asking for a divorce, even where there is domestic violence, has been cited by some Muslim men as an undesirable behavior supposedly justifying honor killings, not only in Muslim countries and in Europe, where nearly 25 million Muslims live, but right here. In my research I have concentrated on cases in the United States. Killings labeled by the press as honor killings, over the objections of the Muslim community, show the murders to be primarily but not exclusively a Muslim-on-Muslim crime.
In 2008, when Kandeela Sanwal from Atlanta, Ga., filed for divorce from an arranged marriage to a cousin twice her age, her father, a 52-year-old immigrant from Pakistan, strangled her. According to police, he could not accept the “disgrace” a divorce would bring on his family.
Here in New York, Fauzia Mohammed of Henrietta was stabbed multiple times by her brother in 2008 for planning to go to school in New York City. He pleaded guilty to attempted second-degree murder. In 2004, Hatice Peltek of Scottsville and her daughters were stabbed and bludgeoned to death with a hammer by Hatice’s husband because her brother-in-law had molested her.
In 2008, sisters Sarah and Amina Said of Dallas, Texas, were found shot to death in a cab. Their father, Yaser, was accused of killing them. Police documents report that Yaser’s wife fled their home with the daughters a week before the murders because she feared her husband might harm the girls. Yaser had previously tried to marry off Amina in his native Egypt when she was 16.
In 2004, Dr. Lubaina B. Ahmed of Ohio was murdered, along with her father, sister and child, by her husband because she asked for a divorce. Ahmed was a physician and had suffered domestic violence at the hands of her husband over several years before he killed her.
While statistics are hard to come by due to the private nature of such crimes and the fact that very few are reported, the U. N. Population Fund reports that a low estimate of 5,000 women are murdered in honor killings each year worldwide, and it is clear that young Muslim women in the West are becoming increasingly vulnerable. The cultural clash for families immigrating into the United States is highlighted when, as in the Arizona case, a woman is murdered because of her Western lifestyle. Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus view honor and morality as a collective family matter. Rights are collective, not individual. Family, clan and tribal rights supplant individual human rights.
The justification offered for honor killings all along has been the unfounded claim that Islam as a religion sanctions these heinous crimes. But a close examination of the Quran and interpretations of this religious text shows that honor killings are not religiously sanctioned acts, but rather are manifestations of an extremely patriarchal and perhaps misogynist culture.
Although no verse in the Quran mentions or encourages such acts of violence against girls and women, there are some verses that have been widely interpreted by backward-thinking Muslims as making women the possessions or property of men. Even though there is no justification for honor killings in the Quran, the perpetrators of these killings and their supporters always justify the killings by a deeply rooted cultural belief that it is men’s religious right to punish “their” women (as their property) for perceived transgressions.
The holy Quran, when read and interpreted correctly, never justifies the killing of a female family member. Starting in mid-sixth century Arabia, verses such as 2:223,4:3 and 4:34, given to limit abuse of women and to protect them, are indeed being used to subjugate in the 21st century. Therefore, reinterpretation of these verses is a vital part in eliminating these brutal practices.