Jihad Watch director Robert Spencer takes issue with yet another piece by the New York Times' Nicholas Kristof this morning at FrontPage:
“My father said, ‘O.K., beat her.’ I’d never been beaten like that in all my life. My uncle and cousins were all beating me. ... They broke my head, and I was bleeding.”These are the words of Ellaha, a 19-year-old Afghan girl whom the intrepid New York Times pundit Nicholas Kristof encountered in a detention center for women in Kabul. Her crime was trying to flee Afghanistan rather than accept an arranged marriage to her cousin.
In Kristof’s narrow and inextricably partisan little world, this, like everything else, is George W. Bush’s fault: “The entire jail” where Ellaha is incarcerated, he notes, “is a kaleidoscope of woe. It’s been two years since President Bush declared that in Afghanistan, ‘Today, women are free.’ But that’s news to the inmates.”
Women do have a decidedly better situation in the new Afghanistan than they did under the radical Muslim Taliban regime: many have resumed their educations, and even some employment opportunities have opened up for them. But evidently Kristof and the Times expected Bush to wave his wand and remake Kabul into Manhattan, with burqas magically transformed into mini skirts and tongue piercings.
But it’s likely that this latest round of Bush-bashing from Kristof, as ludicrous as it is, stems as much from an inability to look at the real source of Ellaha’s woes than from blind hatred for the incumbent. In his entire meditation on the beating and mistreatment of women in Afghanistan, the egregious Kristof of course never once mentions the Qur’an, with which Ellaha’s father, uncle, and cousins are doubtless deeply familiar. It stipulates: “Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the support of women). So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah hath guarded. As for those from whom ye fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them” (Sura 4:34). If, therefore, Ellaha’s male kin had reason to “fear rebellion” from her, they considered themselves completely within their rights to “scourge” her.
This verse is not are not a thing of the past. In 2000 a retired Turkish Muslim cleric, Kemal Guran, sparked a controversy in that secularized Muslim nation with a passage in his booklet, The Muslim’s Handbook. According to the BBC, “the booklet, published by the Pious Foundation, which is part of the government’s Religious Affairs Directorate, says men can beat their wives as long as they do not strike the face and only beat them moderately.” Even a relatively moderate Muslim, Dr. Jamal Badawi, acknowledges that husbands have the right to beat their wives. Quoting Sura 4:34, Dr. Badawi doesn’t deny the prerogative, but he’s clearly embarrassed by it, and tries to explain it away: “Such a measure is more accurately described as a gentle tap on the body, but NEVER ON THE FACE, making it more of a symbolic measure then a punitive one.” (Emphasis in the original.)
The problem with this “moderate” view, of course, is that the dividing line between “symbolic” and “punitive” can be exceedingly fine, and hard to find in the heat of the moment. Thus although you’d never learn it from Kristof, the divine sanction that the Qur’an and Islamic tradition give to violence against women is the core reason why domestic violence is epidemic in some parts of the Islamic world. The Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences has determined that over nine out of ten Pakistani wives have been struck, beaten, or abused sexually — for offenses on the order of cooking an unsatisfactory meal. Others were punished for failing to give birth to a male child.
Why didn’t Kristof say anything about this? Because it’s a lot easier to snipe at George Bush than to address deep societal dysfunction — but until these problems are faced and the Qur’anic sanctioning of woman-beating definitively rejected by significant elements of the Islamic community, Kristof will have material abundant enough to enable him to tweak Bush over jailed Afghan women for years to come. The plight of women like Ellaha won’t improve in a Kerry administration — even as, at least according to John Edwards, the blind will see, the deaf hear, and the lame walk. The superficiality of the liberal intelligentsia’s analysis, as represented by Kristof’s column, illustrates once again the bankruptcy of the entire multiculturalist enterprise — and underscores the West’s imperative to marshal its own spiritual resources, for the sake of women like Ellaha.
And if Gore had become president?
Those inmates would never have gotten Any news, and would likely have joined many others in mass graves by now. A-la Kerry, if he gets elected. Ignore the problem, reduce it to a 'nuisance,' as I am sure people like Kofi Annan and Chirac also see it.
This is a very interesting article, and one of especial interest to women. Many years ago I think I remember reading that Benazir Bhutto, the then leader of Pakistan (?I think, my memory is a little fuzzy) was slapped by her husband in public getting off of an airplane. It made me really wonder at the time, what she had to suffer in private.
It's really frustrating the level of ignorance in the U.S. about Islam. On the radio the other day, a caller mentioned that Islam is also a political system and many American Muslims want Islamic law in the U.S. Almost immediately someone called in to respond that Islamic law was better for women than Christian law in the 1800s. (They could divorce, keep the children, own property, etc.)
Aren't most laws in the U.S. already based on Christian law? Did my fellow American think that current law appeared in a flash of lightning? An also, does she really want to live like the women in the Middle East in the 1800s?
The point is, no honest debate is ever held. It is all just superficial crap like: diversity is good, Islam is peace, stop being so ethnocentric and racist. God help us.
I have personally stepped between Muslim males and their wife two different times, and had to manhandle him so he wouldn't manhandle his spouse.
I encourage anyone, if you see this type of behavior in public from Muslim males, feel free to step on their nads.......then call the Police.
See, when one answers only to Allah, they run the risk of being thumped onto the sidewalk, then put in a cage. Allah and Mohammed are a bad influence....Shame be upon them
Gary and former liberal WF
You both are so right...
The level of stupidity in America is just amazing!!
There is no shame in being stupid. Thank you Slick Willy.
Why would anyone in there right mind argue something they really don’t understand?
This is the age of misinformation.
Al Gore invented it and Slick Willy perfected it.
I have had a few debates with these types that just spew whatever they where told by some liberal, Christian hating professor. So they compare their false view of Christian history long ago with Islam today!! And say look they are one and the same. Then I look and say, I am so glad I didn’t go to collage.
I have realized common sense is not found in most American schools!!
No Islam, Know Peace
These Liberals decry Christianity which has reformed itself while praising Islam which never has in 1,400 yrs! Their blindness [you just have to look at the status of women in any Muslim country] and assumption that same Muslims would allow them [Liberals] free speech and democracy is patently absurd. Liberals are willing tools and posters for Islamic fanatics everywhere. They are a curse and even more dangerous than Terrorists to the very society that nurtured them.
Time to bring back old Patriot Laws, I think.
So Christians pat themselves on the back because they don't beat women.
Misogyny comes in many forms, and in varying degrees.
A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. But women will be saved through childbearing — if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.
— 1 Timothy 2:11-15 NIV
Just one of many similar, and the OT is even worse.
Islam has earned it's bad rep, and well deserved that reputation is, but take the beam out of your own eye.
Mat 7:3 And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
Mat 7:4 Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam [is] in thine own eye?
Mat 7:5 Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.
Luk 6:41 And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in thine own eye?
Luk 6:42 Either how canst thou say to thy brother, Brother, let me pull out the mote that is in thine eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, cast out first the beam out of thine own eye, and then shalt thou see clearly to pull out the mote that is in thy brother's eye. "
Yes Islam is a horrific, life hating, stultifying Ideology, but in truth it differs only from Christianity and Judaism by it's extremism, and resistance to change and moderation.
The misogyny of Islam is a given, at least on these pages, though the Islamosaurs argue differently, they claim that their god only defines the natural order of things. Which is more or less what Christians claim, quoting sources such as above from Timothy, Acts, Chronicles, Romans, Genesis, Leviticus, Deuteronomy et al.
Misogyny is misogyny no matter how one tries to spin it, or engage in damage limitation.
By the way both Islam and Christianity (and of course Judaism) squelch female sexuality, in fact they squelch sexuality period, both blame women for the problems and "sins" of the world, attributing these "temptations" (fitnah in Islam) to the sexuality of females, which must be contained, squelched and controlled by men.
In Judeo Christianity it all starts with Eve in the Garden.
Thank you again Robert.
Giaour;
Your nitpicking at the little known faults of Christianity in order to "put into perspective" the huge injustices that characterize Islamic society is just plain silly.
Ever since the reformation, the right of Christians to discuss the Bible and question some of its teachings has become a hallmark of Western civilization. In effect, with the exception of fundamentalists, Christians do not treat the Bible as the DIRECT word of God. The history of how it was put together (and how many parts were rejected) in the 3rd century is openly discussed without fear of excommunication.
There is a world of difference between a book written by people who were presumably INSPIRED by God, versus a book that was presumably DICTATED by God's most important angel.
If the misogyny of the Bible is so significant, are you ready to demonstrate a significant correllation between the degree of religious belief and spouse abuse among Christians?
I may be an agnostic, but I much prefer the solid morality of Christians who call evil by its proper name than the moral confusion of secularists like Kristof, who equate Christians who believe in "The Rapture" with the Islam-bots of Al Qaeda.
I'm always amazed at how the proponents for Islam defend it by boasting how it has slaughtered or oppressed less people than other faiths.
What's wrong with being against all violence towards fellow humans,we're all related through God and even the Jihadists beheading civilians
are God's children that need the Love and Forgiveness Jesus promised as a gift from God.
If you ascribe to the view that your ancestors
were apes then that's OK with me,but you still have to believe that something created the Universe to allow the evolution theory to be
accepted by non-faith intellectuals.
Giaour, when I consider the Aimee Semple McPhersons on the sawdust trail of yesteryear and the Karen Armstrongs teaching religious studies in prestigious institutions, I thank God we Christians still have the apostle Paul to remind us of what's what. Interesting how when you quote Scripture, you also lay your finger on Gospel texts that have taught a self-critical spirit in my religion for the past two millennia, too.
Rublev, as a Protestant, even I recognize that the medieval world had its porponents of rule of law, limited government, and checks and balances (the Conciliar movement was one such movement--as was Jan Hus, whom it put to death). By the way, if I admit fault in my tradition, it's only because the tradition itself teaches me to do so.
When will you secularists stop and admit your responsibility for the 20th century's horrors?
good points made by robert. i might point out that some left-wing "intellectuals" have taken to the mantra that women were better off in afghanistan and iraq before american intervention