Honour Killings - What Kind of Insanity is That?

In the news this weekend is the horrific story of a beautiful, 21 year old woman, Hawa Akther Jui, in Bangladesh, who had the audacity to enroll in a college without her husband’s permission. He was away in the United Arab Emirates, and when he returned, he was outraged that she had done this without his permission. He blindfolded her – she thought she was getting a necklace – then taped her mouth shut, tied her right hand to a chopping block and cut of all her fingers with a meat cleaver. What kind of insanity is that? Oh, his name is Rafiqul Islam.

Hawa Akther Jui enrolled in college without her husband's permission

A Montreal man is accused of murdering his 3 daughters, Zainab, 19, Sahar, 17, and Geeti, 13, and his first wife, Rona Amir, 41, because his oldest daughter was dating a boy he didn’t approve of. Somehow, the woman and three girls ended up in a car at the bottom of a canal in Kingston, Ontario. It’s called an honour killing, as though murdering half your family can restore honour. What kind of insanity is that? Oh, his name is Mohammad Shafia; he is from Afganistan.

Shafia girls and Mohammad's 1st wife - murdered

Shafia, his 2nd wife, and son - murderers all

In the US, Amina and Sarah Said were murdered by their father in Texas in an honour killing for having boyfriends. He shot them both in the back of his cab. The father was a Muslim from Egypt.

Palestina Isa, a 16 year old was murdered by both her parents in St Louis for dating a black man and taking a part-time job. Her mother held her down while her father repeatedly stabbed her. They were Muslims from Palestine.

Three girls, aged 15, 17 and 18 were allegedly assaulted by Gaddafi’s soldiers at a school near the Libyan city of Misrata, during a two-month siege. When they returned home, their father slit their throats in a so-called honour killing, according to Physicians for Human Rights. What kind of insanity is that?

Every year in the United Kingdom (UK), officials estimate that at least a dozen women are victims of honor killings, almost exclusively within Asian and Middle Eastern families – according to Wikipedia.

Wikipedia reports that during the year 2002 in Pakistan, it is estimated that 245 women and 137 men were killed in honour-killings. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) estimates that perhaps as many as 5,000 women and girls a year are killed by members of their own families. Many women's groups in the Middle East and Southwest Asia suspect the number of victims is about four times greater.

In this blog you can read the unbelievably horrific story of Nurta Farah, a girl who was treated with incredible cruelty for converting to Christianity from Islam. 

After months of being shackled to a tree, locked in a closet, forced to take anti-psychotic drugs, and being beaten, Nurta managed to escape to an aunt’s home in another village. She was soon found by her family though and shot and killed, for the honour of the family.

Also in this blog, is the story of a 14 year old Christian girl in Pakistan who was raped by 5 Muslim men. One of the men said, “We attended an Islamic religious convention, and the speaker said if you marry a non-Muslim or rape a non-Muslim girl, you will get 70 virgins in heaven.” That occurred in 2010. What kind of insanity is that?

An expert interviewed in the Hawa Akther Jui case by the BBC suggests that less than 2% of spousal abuse ever gets reported.

Of course, spousal abuse and honour killings are not restricted to Islam. They continue in parts of India and other Asian countries and may occur in Sikh and Hindu, as well as other religions. However, just by reading the daily news it is obvious that the majority of mutilations (including female genital circumcision) and honor killings occur in Islam.

News reports don’t differentiate between Shia, Sunni, Sufi or other denominations but I think someone should be finding out if one or more denominations dominate this evil.

While many Muslims cry that this evil is not taught in the Quran, in fact, many are teaching that very thing even today. As my sample suggests, it is still being taught in many, many countries around the world. While murder is condemned in the Quran, it refers only to Islam (read Muslim men). Killing infidels (non-Muslims) and apostates (disobedient Muslims) is not even considered murder.

 Islam watch tells us that:

“A Muslim woman, who is therefore disobedient, oppositional; critical or rejecting of a Muslim man, may be by extension, considered to be an apostate and rejecting Islam, which is an act and a heresy for which the punishment is or may be, death by beheading, depending upon the momentary disposition of the males within her family.

What is not well understood by non-Muslim’s, is that within the category of an apostate, may readily fall those women who criticize, or are in any way oppositional, or rejecting of a Muslim man, and whose subsequent butchery is considered not only NOT murder, but an act of compassion and righteous redemption; hence the absence of outrage and the resounding silence within the Muslim community.”

There is much more insight on Islam Watch’s web page into the way the Muslim male mind may work. But the question now is, are we going to continue to ignore this evil? Can we continue to turn our backs on it, even when it is occurring in our own country? Unfortunately, most people won’t even read this or similar postings, and most of those who do will do nothing. They won’t even pass this website on to their friends because it might upset them. What kind of insanity is that?

I would like to suggest that, at the very least, we could be lobbying our governments for action during the immigration of Muslims, Sikhs, and Hindus whereby they are required to denounce verbally before an elder of their own faith & denomination, and in writing, such specific tenets of their faith that contradict the freedom and equality of western societies.

That would include recognizing the equality of women, the rights of all people to education, to change religions or abandon religion altogether, to associate with whomever they please. They would also need to denounce the right to kill or mutilate anyone except in the extreme event of self-defense. They would need to denounce any physically hostile act as a means of restoring family honour.

Governments need to be pushed because they are afraid of offending a rapidly growing demographic. “Those violent men are just a minority,” they say, and yet, with 1.5 billion Muslims in the world, a minority might still measure in the hundreds of millions.

Peaceful Muslims need to report when Immams or clerics are teaching that which is contrary to the laws of the country, and the government needs to deport such people.

Can we continue to ignore the suffering of women, who are considered only slightly better than dogs, by Islamic men? I tell you, we do so at the peril of our own souls.