Islamist abuse of women

Washington Times:

Four gunshots through the kitchen window. Two to the leg, one to the stomach, one to the head. The woman, who will remain unnamed for her safety, survived the attack, but she is still in hiding.

"For seven years, it was a secret place for housing women," said Kazhal Ali, the administrator of Asuda, a nongovernmental organization (NGO) in northeastern Iraq that runs shelters for abused women, including the one who was attacked.

"Now it is discovered," Ms. Ali said, "and we changed the shelter to another place."

The wounded woman's brother, husband and two brothers-in-law have since been arrested - by police officers who only recently began investigating and charging those accused of attacking women.

The Kurdistan Regional Government's Interior Ministry has given officials the authority to ensure that cases of violence against women are processed.

But the male-dominant culture remains in Iraq, even in the semiautonomous northern Kurdish region and even though Iraqis no longer face the brutality of Saddam Hussein's government.

Life after Saddam has proved a mixed blessing for many women, who face religious extremism in a nation once considered among the Middle East's most progressive for women's rights.

"Throughout the country, women reported increasing pressure to wear veils, including within government ministries," according to the U.S. State Department's latest report on human rights in Iraq.

"Women were targeted for undertaking normal activities, such as driving a car, and wearing trousers, in an effort to force them to remain at home, wear veils and adhere to a conservative interpretation of Islam," the report says.

...

The problem in Iraq and elsewhere in the Muslim world is the interpretations of Shari'a law a barbaric code from the Middle Ages. It is being interpreted as sanctioning the abuse of women by many Islamist. The abuse of women in the Muslim culture is something it is going to have to face up to and overcome if it is to progress. Abusing and keeping ignorant half the population is no way to get ahead.