UK: Muslim gang "groomed young girls for sex, drove terrified victim, 14, to the woods at night and threatened to cut her head off"

The Qur'an allows for the owning of sex slaves:

If you fear that you will not act justly towards the orphans, marry such women as seem good to you, two, three, four; but if you fear you will not be equitable, then only one, or what your right hands own; so it is likelier you will not be partial. (Qur'an 4:3)

This verse is the basis for Islamic polygamy, allowing a man to take as many as four wives, as long as he believes he is able to “deal justly” with all of them. But justice in these circumstances is in the eye of the beholder. Ibn Kathir says this the requirement to deal justly with one’s wives is no big deal, since treating them justly isn’t the same as treating them equally: “it is not obligatory to treat them equally, rather it is recommended. So if one does so, that is good, and if not, there is no harm on him.”

The verse goes on to say that if a man cannot deal justly with multiple wives, then he should marry only one, or resort to “what your right hands own” – that is, slave girls.

Slave girls? Maulana Bulandshahri explains the wisdom of this practice, and longs for the good old days:

During Jihad (religion war), many men and women become war captives. The Amirul Mu’minin [leader of the believers, or caliph – an office now vacant] has the choice of distributing them amongst the Mujahidin [warriors of jihad], in which event they will become the property of these Mujahidin. This enslavement is the penalty for disbelief (kufr).

He goes on to explain that this is not ancient history:

None of the injunctions pertaining to slavery have been abrogated in the Shari’ah. The reason that the Muslims of today do not have slaves is because they do not engage in Jihad (religion war). Their wars are fought by the instruction of the disbelievers (kuffar) and are halted by the same felons. The Muslim [sic] have been shackled by such treaties of the disbelievers (kuffar) whereby they cannot enslave anyone in the event of a war. Muslims have been denied a great boon whereby every home could have had a slave. May Allah grant the Muslims the ability to escape the tentacles of the enemy, remain steadfast upon the Din (religion) and engage in Jihad (religion war) according to the injunctions of Shari’ah. Amen!

This is by no means an eccentric or unorthodox view in Islam. The Egyptian Sheikh Abu-Ishaq al-Huwayni declared in May 2011 that “we are in the era of jihad,” and that as they waged jihad warfare against infidels, Muslims would take slaves. He clarified what he meant in a subsequent interview:

...Jihad is only between Muslims and infidels….Spoils, slaves, and prisoners are only to be taken in war between Muslims and infidels. Muslims in the past conquered, invaded, and took over countries. This is agreed to by all scholars--there is no disagreement on this from any of them, from the smallest to the largest, on the issue of taking spoils and prisoners. The prisoners and spoils are distributed among the fighters, which includes men, women, children, wealth, and so on.

When a slave market is erected, which is a market in which are sold slaves and sex-slaves, which are called in the Qur’an by the name milk al-yamin, “that which your right hands possess” [Qur’an 4:24]. This is a verse from the Qur’an which is still in force, and has not been abrogated. The milk al-yamin are the sex-slaves. You go to the market, look at the sex-slave, and buy her. She becomes like your wife, (but) she doesn’t need a (marriage) contract or a divorce like a free woman, nor does she need a wali. All scholars agree on this point--there is no disagreement from any of them. [...] When I want a sex slave, I just go to the market and choose the woman I like and purchase her.

Right around the same time, on May 25, 2011, a female Kuwaiti activist and politician, Salwa al-Mutairi, also spoke out in favor of the Islamic practice of sexual slavery of non-Muslim women, emphasizing that the practice accorded with Islamic law and the parameters of Islamic morality.

...A merchant told me that he would like to have a sex slave. He said he would not be negligent with her, and that Islam permitted this sort of thing. He was speaking the truth….I brought up (this man’s) situation to the muftis in Mecca. I told them that I had a question, since they were men who specialized in what was halal, and what was good, and who loved women. I said, “What is the law of sex slaves?” 

The mufti said, “With the law of sex slaves, there must be a Muslim nation at war with a Christian nation, or a nation which is not of the religion, not of the religion of Islam. And there must be prisoners of war.”

“Is this forbidden by Islam?,” I asked.

“Absolutely not. Sex slaves are not forbidden by Islam. On the contrary, sex slaves are under a different law than the free woman. The free woman must be completely covered except for her face and hands. But the sex slave can be naked from the waist up. She differs a lot from the free woman. While the free woman requires a marriage contract, the sex slave does not--she only needs to be purchased by her husband, and that’s it. Therefore the sex slave is different than the free woman.”

While the savage exploitation of girls and young women is an unfortunately cross-cultural phenomenon, only in Islamic law does it carry anything approaching divine sanction. Here is yet another human rights scandal occasioned by Islamic law that the international human rights community cravenly ignores.

"Gang of men 'who groomed young girls for sex drove terrified victim, 14, to the woods at night and threatened to cut her head off,'" by Arthur Martin and Keith Gladdis for the Daily Mail, January 15 (thanks to all who sent this in):

Girls as young as 11 were groomed and raped by a child sex ring before being sold to abusers across Britain, a court heard yesterday.

Nine men, mostly of Asian heritage, befriended vulnerable girls with gifts of perfume, alcohol and drugs before subjecting them to a 'living hell' for eight years.

The six girls were subjected to 'extreme physical and sexual violence' while they were repeatedly raped by numerous abusers.

The gang, from the Oxford area, 'actively targeted' girls from 'troubled upbringings' and those who lived in care homes, the Old Bailey heard.

One victim became pregnant by one of her attackers when she was 11 or 12.

When gang member Mohammed Karrar discovered she was pregnant he used an instrument to perform an abortion on her, it was alleged.

The attackers used knives, meat cleavers and baseball bats to inflict severe pain on the girls for their twisted pleasure.

On other occasions the girls were bitten, scratched, suffocated, tied up, beaten and burnt with cigarettes.

The men are said to have fed the girls copious amounts of drugs so that they became more complicit to their depraved demands.

At times the girls were so 'wasted' they 'were barely aware of what was going on' during the abuse.

Men would travel to Oxford 'often by appointment' from as far afield as Bradford, Leeds, London and Slough 'specifically to abuse young girls' in hotels and private houses. Sometimes the girls were taken to towns and cities such as London and Bournemouth where they were sold for sex.

These men also subjected them to 'humiliating and degrading' levels of abuse, leaving the girls with severe internal injuries.

The gang often stood guard outside a room while girls were being abused and threatened to kill them and their families if they tried to escape, the court heard.

One girl, who was just 12 when she was groomed, became so enslaved to the gang that she even forgot it was her 15th birthday when she was with the men.

Later she started to self-harm to 'take away the hurt' and told her mother: 'I may as well be dead.'

Opening the case yesterday Noel Lucas, QC, prosecuting, said: 'Much of what the girls were forced to endure was perverted in the extreme.

'These defendants, and the others with whom they operated, showed the complainants little or no human decency or consideration.

'Their conduct towards these very young and vulnerable girls was with total disregard to any moral inhibitions as to their own conduct. The depravity of what the girls were forced to endure was extreme.'

The men did this 'for their own sexual gratification and for the sexual gratification of other men,' he added.

Kamar Jamil, 27, Akhtar Dogar, 32, Anjum Dogar, 30, Assad Hussain, 32, Mohammed Karrar, 38, Bassam Karrar, 26, Mohammed Hussain, 24, Zeeshan Ahmed, 27, and Bilal Ahmed, 26, face a total of 79 charges against them.

These include allegations of child rape, trafficking for sexual exploitation, arranging or facilitating child prostitution and using an instrument with intent to procure a miscarriage.

It took almost half an hour for all the charges to be read to the jury. The trial heard how there were many more alleged abusers in addition to those in the dock.

Mr Lucas told the jury of seven men and five women to 'steel yourself' for the 'highly unpleasant and distressing' nature of the evidence they were to hear. He added: 'The evidence will show that these girls were targeted precisely because they were young.

'The girls who were chosen generally had troubled upbringings and unsettled home lives. The combination made it less likely that anyone would be exercising any normal parental control over them or indeed keep a careful eye out for them.'

Mr Lucas said the girls were 'unlikely to be ever able to extract themselves from [the abuse], let alone complain about it'.

And if they did complain it was unlikely they would be believed 'in view of what others would perceive as their delinquent conduct'....