WHERE IS EMAN AL-OBEIDI?

While it is good to see Arab women protesting alongside male demonstrators in the Arab uprisings, it is appalling to learn how at the first opportunity, many men turn to rape.

The shocking attack on the CBS journalist in Cairo, and now this terrible video of the poor Libyan woman crying out for help to the international media, is a violent and graphic reminder that women face specific and harrowing abuse in times of war and conflict.

Someone has left a post on Twitter re Eman al-Obeidi, the woman beaten and raped by Gaddafi lackeys in Libya ---- what can we do, we must do something, she tweets. The terrible thing is we can’t. And as I write this blog, she is incarcerated, somewhere unknown, certainly being tortured, even being raped again, for boldly, desperately, speaking out.

On the outside, looking in, we can only pass on the message and support by whatever means, the brave women who dare to speak up. Women like Marvi Sirmed in Lahore, ‘Zeinobia’ in Cairo and Emma Al Nafjan in Riyadh, to name just three of many courageous female bloggers putting their freedom at risk for daring to write of unacceptable situations in their respective countries. .

And neither let us forget the thousands of African women in Rwanda, Congo and Darfur who have been gang-raped by soldiers. Pray for women at risk everywhere in this violent world and wish the bastards who commit such atrocities may rot in hell.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26vYN_kxK3Y&feature=share

http://feb17.info/general/video-eman-el-obeidis-cousin-speaks-out-translated/

OFF WITH HIS NOSE !

It does not improve Pakistan`s reputation for a judge in the historic city of Lahore to order the nose and ears chopped of two men who committed the same act on a woman who refused to marry one of them. But I have to say bravo!

The status of rural women remains low throughout Pakistan, emphatically in the North West Frontier Province, but also in Baluchistan and Sindh. And the saying ` a woman`s place belongs in the home` might even have been invented on the Frontier, the tribal homeland of some 10 million Pathans.

The 17th century Pathan warrior poet, Kushal Khan Khattak, summarises the local male attitude in the following lines:

`…Soft and beautiful on the outside

They are venomous serpents within.

Speak of them no more Kushal Khan;

It would be better if they had never been.`

The treatment of women in the NWFP and in the lawless Tribal Areas, is personified by the pseudo-religious concept of the burqa, the all-concealing garment women are forced to wear.

Here a woman is simply a possession like a table or a truck. She is totally controlled by her husband, and if he forbids her to go outside the family compound, that is her lot. A woman aged 42, whom I met in Chitral District, told me she had never been outside her garden.

Honour killings remain common in the NWFP and there was the recent horrific tribal punishment of gang raping for a woman accused of committing adultery. Less well known is the traffic in Sindhi girls, kidnapped and sent to a life of sexual slavery and domestic drudgery in villages, never to be heard of again.

Misogyny exists in most Muslim countries, but nowhere more so than in Pakistan and if the courts order a few more noses and ears to be chopped off male criminals, then so be it.

c.Christine Osborne

Images: Tim Gurney

Source: www.copix.co.uk

THOUGHTS ON FRANKINCENSE TRAILS 2

' I entered a world unchanged since the frankincense trade,' said Kate Humble, the engaging presenter, of the desert kingdom of Saudi Arabia. To wit, the iconic tower in Riyadh owned by Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal who made million dollar deals, on his mobile, while chatting to her..

The appellation 'His Royal Highness' has long annoyed me for addressing eminent sheikhs. Can someone put me right with the Arabic equivalent?

I would dispute the veracity of a script claiming that incense caravans took only two weeks to cross the 'Empty Quarter' a 225,000 square mile sand sea occupying central Arabia.

Miss Humble cried in the first programme, when she put on a niqab in Sana'a. In last evening's programme, her tears were flowing on hearing the prayer-call in Jeddah. Does she cry at the sound of church bells, I had to wonder?

At one point she told us 'you must advance certain causes that you believe in.' but we were never told what they were.

Behind the glamour of Frankincense Trails 2, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia remains, the most misogynist regime in the Middle East.

Miss Humble had the opportunity to rant about inequality, but the remark by her humourless guide, 'I don`t believe in women playing sport` (of women playing netball) said it all.

But it was an attractive film and no doubt divers will eat their heart out for the pristine wreck of a ship carrying frankincense, embedded on a Red Sea reef.

C.Christine Osborne

Images: www.copix.co.uk

PROSTATE CANCER IS NO EXCUSE!

I`m sick of lawyers attributing prostate cancer by way of explanation for anti-social behaviour.

We have the widely publicised case of Megrahi, the `Libyan bomber` released because he is suffering from prostate cancer, in a deal involving the British government and Libya, in compliance with a `compassionate` but foolish, Scottish judiciary.

And now I read of a carer employed in a home for the intellectually impaired near Wollongong in NSW, who is reported to have unnaturally fondled female inmates.

Result: suspension on $52,000 full pay while the tribunal takes into account that he is suffering from prostate cancer and depression.

Whoa! Some 44,000 women are diagnosed annually with invasive breast cancer (UK figures) but do we ever hear of parallel misdemeanours?

Never! So let`s stop attributing unacceptable behaviour to prostate cancer and get on with a proper conviction.

The Australian case only involves the abuse of women in care, sadly unable to defend themselves, as opposed to the heinous bombing of Pan-Am Flight 103.

Megrahi, responsible for the deaths of 259 people and now free, after serving only seven years in detention, is nothing but a wicked Muslim.

I wonder is he fasting during Ramadan? Or is he exempt, because of failing health? He certainly didn`t look like a man with only ` 3 months to live` on his triumphant home-coming in Tripoli.

c.Christine Osborne

WHEN WILL IT STOP?

We have the trial coming up in September of the Sudanese woman journalist who committed the so-called crime of wearing trousers in a restaurant in Khartoum. Penalty, if convicted, 40 lashes.

And now, the equally conservative government of Malaysia, is to cane a young model because she drank two beers. (Not to mention the unfortunate African-Canadian woman imprisoned by Kenyan authorities, because her lips did not match her passport photo).

Curious how I`ve seen so many Muslims enjoying a drink on my travels, yet one never hears of a man being whipped.

By contrast to these rabid decisions, I see where the forward thinking government of Sultan Qaboos, is to relax restrictions on hotels serving alcohol to non-Muslims, during the holy month of Ramadan.

Oman is not a wealthy country by Gulf states standards and with tourism becoming a significant contributor to the GDP, the move is to be applauded.

c.Christine Osborne

Image: Scene in a cafe in Cairo

Source: www.copix.co.uk

BURQINI MAKES WAVES IN PARIS POOL

The Oz `burqini` creating controversy in Paris is only the latest ridiculous idea about how Muslim women should dress.

In the first century of Islam, Muslims were relaxed about what women wore.

The hijab is mentioned in the Qur`an only in the concept of a barrier - like a Victorian screen- to shield wives from male visitors to the house. Khadija, the wealthy, independent wife of the Prophet, did not herself veil.

Unfortunately over the years, a pseudo-religious concept of the burqa arose in some Muslim countries, requiring women cover themselves from view.

But in western societies, the burqa and the downright anti-social niqab, is merely power play by women of whom many are Muslim converts. That they adopt this attire does no favours to women FORCED to wear purdah by dominant men, emphatically in the Pathan tribal areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. And also in Saudi Arabia.

I agree that this `Carole` (now petulantly threatening to leave France) should not be allowed to wear the `burqini` in a public pool. And comments by many Muslims indicate their agreement.

The Lebanese-Australian who designed the `burqini` for Sydney`s beaches claims it fosters integration, but it does the opposite because the wearer stands out as being Muslim.

Better to build a `women only` swimming pool, or to allocate a beach (not only for Muslims, but for all modest women) like those which exist in Alexandria and on the Caspian Sea in Iran.

Women only bathing beaches would also be a good idea in the GCC states where Arab women swim in their black abayas which float around them like an oil slick.

c.Christine Osborne.

Image: Pathan women on a carriage outing in N.W.Pakistan.

Source: www.copix.co.uk