Here we go again. I have posted this information many times before and will keep on posting it every time there is another honor killing, if only to leave a record, for as long as this site remains up, of the cravenness of the mainstream media in never reporting on the Islamic justification for honor killings accurately, and thereby enabling the practice to continue.
This is an Islamic phenomenon, and can only be stopped if it is confronted as such. Muslims commit 91 percent of honor killings worldwide. A manual of Islamic law certified as a reliable guide to Sunni orthodoxy by Al-Azhar University, the most respected authority in Sunni Islam, says that “retaliation is obligatory against anyone who kills a human being purely intentionally and without right.” However, “not subject to retaliation” is “a father or mother (or their fathers or mothers) for killing their offspring, or offspring’s offspring.” (‘Umdat al-Salik o1.1-2). In other words, someone who kills his child incurs no legal penalty under Islamic law.
The Palestinian Authority gives pardons or suspended sentences for honor murders. Iraqi women have asked for tougher sentences for Islamic honor murderers, who get off lightly now. Syria in 2009 scrapped a law limiting the length of sentences for honor killings, but “the new law says a man can still benefit from extenuating circumstances in crimes of passion or honour ‘provided he serves a prison term of no less than two years in the case of killing.’” And in 2003 the Jordanian Parliament voted down on Islamic grounds a provision designed to stiffen penalties for honor killings. Al-Jazeera reported that “Islamists and conservatives said the laws violated religious traditions and would destroy families and values.”
“Shooting at İstanbul court leaves woman, police officer dead,” from Today’s Zaman, March 11 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):
A man fatally shot a woman and the police officer assigned to protect her at İstanbul’s Çağlayan Courthouse on Tuesday morning.
Hanime Aslan, who had gone to the court for a divorce proceeding, died at the scene of the crime.
Police officers immediately detained the shooter, who Turkish media have reported was the woman’s son, Dursun Zeyir. The wounded policeman died after he was taken to a nearby hospital.
Aslan divorced her husband Hızır Zeyir on March 7, 2011 because of domestic violence. She came to court on Tuesday for divorce proceedings and to renew state-provided protection.
News outlets have reported that 20-year-old Dursun Zeyir shot his mother five times at the building’s security checkpoint. Turkish media have claimed that Zeyir had been trying to reconcile his parents.
The wounded police officer, Emrah Taşdemir, survived until he was taken to a nearby hospital. While receiving medical treatment, his heart stopped. He died soon after a call for blood donations was issued. İstanbul Police Chief Selami Altınok announced Taşdemir’s death.
According to media reports, Aslan’s 14-year-old son and her ex-husband were also present at the entrance to the Çağlayan Courthouse. Turkish media reported that Aslan’s youngest son, in tears, desperately tried to reach his mother, while Hızır Zeyir asked nearby officials what was going on.
Female homicides are a common and rising phenomenon in Turkey, which has been losing its battle to protect women from domestic violence. The Ministry of Family and Social Policy, established in 2011, has made preventing violence against women a top priority and opened shelters for female victims of domestic violence. Despite these measures, the Interior Ministry’s latest statistics show that the number of cases of femicides and other forms of violence against women in the country is still alarming, and activists say increased awareness and a change in mentality are required to prevent more women from becoming victims of domestic violence.
NGOs working on women’s rights issues have said that despite the adoption of a law on the protection of the family and the prevention of violence against women in 2012, 174 women have since been killed by their husbands or partners in Turkey. According to a report released by the National Police Department’s (EGM) Public Order Department, 153,000 women have been exposed to violence since the law came into effect in Turkey. The report stated that 171 women in 2009, 274 in 2010 and 161 in 2011 were murdered in incidents of domestic violence. In an interview with Today’s Zaman in January, Compassion Association (Şefkat-Der) President Hayrettin Bulan said that most of the murdered women were killed while under police protection.
That was the case with Aslan’s shooting on Tuesday.