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UK: Muslim doctor struck off medical register for helping arrange FGM

May 31, 2014 2:50 pm By Robert Spencer

Ali Mao-AweysThe British authorities are caught in an insuperable contradiction. They strike Dr. Ali Mao-Aweys from the medical register, while pretending that he is a singular case, and that the vast majority of Muslims in the U.K. reject this barbaric practice. That may be, but it is without any doubt much more widespread than they think, or would like to admit, because of its justification in Islamic law. And so they welcome Muslims into the country in large numbers, try to position London as a global capital of Islamic finance, and ban opponents of jihad terror like Pamela Geller and me from the country, without realizing that all this encouragement of the growth of Islam in Britain is without any doubt going to result also in the growth of female genital mutilation in the country.

Muhammad is said to have justified the cutting of women’s genitals: “A woman used to perform circumcision in Medina. The Prophet (peace_be_upon_him) said to her: Do not cut severely as that is better for a woman and more desirable for a husband.” (Sunan Abu Dawud 41.5251)

The problem with this is that the distinction between cutting and cutting severely is subjective. Also, some Islamic authorities say that this is a weak hadith. That’s wonderful. I hope they manage to convince every Muslim authority in the world that this is the case. Unfortunately, many remain misunderstanders of Islam. A few examples:

Gambia: “Alhaji Abdoulie Fatty, the Imam of State House Mosque has rebuted [sic] claims published on 1st June edition of the Daily observer, entitled ‘Female Genital Cutting Unislamic’ as utter rubbish.” — Gambia’s Daily Observer, June 6, 2007

Egypt: “Omayma Idris, a Cairo-based gynaecologist, says that more than 90 percent of all married Egyptians today are thought to have undergone mutilation. After the prohibition, she says, one could see a decline, ‘but since the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamists are in power in Egypt, the numbers are on the rise again; they encourage families to do it again.’…Salafists and representatives of the Muslim Brotherhood – the political home of Egypt’s President Mohamed Mursi – want to see female genital mutilation legalized again.” — Deutsche Welle, November 23, 2012

The late Sheikh Muhammad Sayyed Tantawi of Egypt’s venerable Al-Azhar University once called circumcision “a laudable practice that did honor to women.”

Indonesia: “The the Muslim intellectual Sumanto Al Qurtuby says the faction that supports tetesan [female genital mutilation] is linked to the Salafi and Wahhabi community, which together with other fundamentalist groups are concentrated in Bandung and Aceh. They believe that circumcision is ‘morally’ encouraged by Sharia, or Islamic law, and reiterated in the hadith, in anecdotes related to the life of the Prophet Muhammad.” — Asia News, December 7, 2012

Australia: “Islamic law permits by definition, by prophetic statement and by practice female circumcision” — Australian Imam Afroz Ali, The Australian, December 24, 2012

There is also justification for the practice in Islamic law:

“Circumcision is obligatory (for every male and female) (by cutting off the piece of skin on the glans of the penis of the male, but circumcision of the female is by cutting out the bazr ‘clitoris’ [this is called khufaadh ‘female circumcision’]).” — ‘Umdat al-Salik e4.3, translated by Mark Durie, The Third Choice, p. 64

“Birmingham doctor struck off for helping to arrange FGM,” ITV.com, May 30, 2014:

A doctor with a practice in Birmingham has been struck off the medical register after he was found by a medical malpractice tribunal to have told an undercover reporter how to arrange female genital mutilation abroad for her two nieces.

FGM involves the partial removal of a girl’s genitals for non-medical reasons and is illegal in this country. It is also illegal to carry it out on a British citizen abroad.

The tribunal said Dr Ali Mao-Aweys’ misconduct was “at the extreme end of the spectrum of serious misconduct and was damaging to the public’s trust and confidence in the profession.”

It said he will be struck off the medical register with immediate effect. He has 28 days to appeal the decision.

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Filed Under: female genital mutilation, United Kingdom Tagged With: featured


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Comments

  1. Fitz says

    May 31, 2014 at 3:18 pm

    Living in the UK as I do, here is a little true story for you. The UK government launched a helpline for victims of FGM and a Muslim father rang it expecting to receive advice on where he could get the procedure performed on his daughter! If anyone in authority had any sense they should have invited this gentleman in for a ‘consultation’ and then arrest and charge him on the spot, and anyone else who made the same mistake. Unfortunately the authorities have no sense in this country.

    • bill says

      Jun 1, 2014 at 1:24 pm

      Action was taken in this case, I cannot rmember what but it was followed up.

  2. Fitz says

    May 31, 2014 at 3:29 pm

    Just to add, the charge, of course, would be conspiracy to commit child abuse.

  3. lebel says

    May 31, 2014 at 3:33 pm

    Let us be fair, Mr. Spencer, and also aknowledge this (from Mauritania no less):

    This week, 34 well-regarded Mauritanian religious and national leaders signed a fatwa, or Islamic law, banning female genital mutilation (FGM). The fatwa is considered a huge stride toward women’s rights in the Islam world.
    Female genital mutilation, or genital cutting, is a form of female circumcision. It entails removing all or part of the external female genitalia, including the clitoris and labia.
    It is often practiced on girls between the time they’re born and their early teen years. After the circumcision is complete, many experience severe bleeding, difficulty urinating, childbirth complications and, in some cases, death.
    According to the World Health Organization, the procedure has no medical benefits.
    Female circumcision is not a religion practice. However, it has become a “law by custom,” says Jacqueline Castledine in an article posted on theMount Holyoke College website.
    She states, “The practice has become important to Islam because it is associated with female sexual purity. FGM is intended by its practitioners to both control women’s sexual drives and also to cleanse women’s genitalia by removing the clitoris, which is seen as masculine, a female penis.”
    The law was passed on Jan. 15, 2011, by 34 Mauritanian religious and national figures. It prohibits the practice of FGM within the country.
    According to Magharebia.com, “The authors cited the work of Islamic legal expert Ibn al-Hajj as support for their assertion that [s]uch practices were not present in the Maghreb countries over the past centuries.”
    This new law will certainly curb the practice of female genital mutilation in Mauratania.
    “It removes the religious mask such practices were hiding behind,” says Dr. Sheikh Ould Zein Ould Imam, professor of jurisprudence at the University of Nouakchott in aMagharebia.com article. “We do need, however, a media campaign to highlight the fatwa, explain it and expound upon its religious and social significance.”
    Many men and women — both Islamic and not — declared this a victory for female rights, saying the fatwa was long overdue.
    “Where were those imams for the past decades, when [FGM] killed dozens of girls each year? Were the imams and circumcision victims on two different planets? Personally speaking, I find no answer to those questions. All I am trying to say is that we needed that circumcision-prohibiting fatwa a long time ago. I was victimized by that brutal custom when I was seven, and it left an indelible psychological scar,” said Miriam, a 30-year-old housewife circumcised as a young girl.

    Female Genital Mutilation Banned by Islamic Leaders in Mauritania – Yahoo! News

    • gravenimage says

      May 31, 2014 at 4:34 pm

      Muslim apologist lebel wrote:

      Let us be fair, Mr. Spencer, and also aknowledge this (from Mauritania no less):

      This week, 34 well-regarded Mauritanian religious and national leaders signed a fatwa, or Islamic law, banning female genital mutilation (FGM). The fatwa is considered a huge stride toward women’s rights in the Islam world.
      ………………………………………..

      This story is actually several years old.

      lebel uncritically quotes this article, which characterizes a Fatwa as “Islamic law”—it *is not*. A Fatwa is a formal *opinion* on Islamic law from one or more clerics. Some Fatwas are very influential; many less so.

      FGM has been technically illegal in Mauritania for almost ten years. Yet a Health Ministry study from 2007 showed that the percentage of women who had suffered FGM there was 72%—the same it had been in 2001.

      “MAURITANIA: Fatwa alone will not stop FGM/C”

      http://www.irinnews.org/report/87928/mauritania-fatwa-alone-will-not-stop-fgm-c

      And the fact is that three out of four of the traditional schools of Islam consider FGM obligatory—and the fourth considers it “honorable” and a “courtesy to the husband”.

      The reality is that most Muslim clerics do condone FGM—including those in the West.

      More from the article:

      According to Magharebia.com, “The authors cited the work of Islamic legal expert Ibn al-Hajj as support for their assertion that [s]uch practices were not present in the Maghreb countries over the past centuries.”
      ………………………………………..

      Well, that’s grimly hilarious, given that almost three-quarters of Mauritanian woman have suffered mutilation—in Egypt, the figure is closer to 95%. Claiming that FGM is not a common practice in the Mahgreb is fanciful at best.

      • Guest says

        May 31, 2014 at 8:08 pm

        “A courtesy to the husband”

        What is WRONG with these men? Why on earth would they want a wife who can’t even enjoy sex???

        • dumbledoresarmy says

          Jun 1, 2014 at 7:02 am

          It might be that they’re scared of being cuckolded.

          They think they can head off that possibility by making a woman “dead in bed” – mutilated in such a manner that sex for her is either without sensation or else (more often, given the mess that FGM usually creates) agonisingly painful.

          The other possibility is that for these spiritually-screwed-up Mohammedan males, the very idea that the *woman* might receive pleasure is anathema.

          It’s the “unless you LOSE, unless you’re *humiliated*, I ‘m not winning” mentality. They’re getting off on the very fact that the woman is either feeling NOTHING or else is enduring terrible pain.

      • Semeru says

        Jun 2, 2014 at 11:19 am

        According to Magharebia.com, “The authors cited the work of Islamic legal expert Ibn al-Hajj as support for their assertion that [s]uch practices were not present in the Maghreb countries over the past centuries.”

        And Graven Comments

        Well, that’s grimly hilarious, given that almost three-quarters of Mauritanian woman have suffered mutilation—in Egypt, the figure is closer to 95%. Claiming that FGM is not a common practice in the Mahgreb is fanciful at best.

        What is even more hilarious is that Graven doesn’t know that the lands of the Maghreb are generally considered to be the coastal plains of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and western Libya.

        Egypt has never been part of the Maghreb, the same for Mauritania, which became part of the Arab Maghreb Union, by the inclusion of Mauritania, in 1998.

        http://3.bp.blogspot.com/__hkdofSQH18/TBsaL98aJ8I/AAAAAAAAADM/zVAmOdGwp3A/s1600/FGM.bmp

        In another comment from Graven she blatantly tells porkies

        And the fact is that three out of four of the traditional schools of Islam consider FGM obligatory—and the fourth considers it “honorable” and a “courtesy to the husband”.

        No the fact is that three out of four of the traditional schools of Islam consider FGM sunnah—and the fourth considers it wajib

        For those that do not know Wajib/Fard = obligatory

        Sunnah

        Also graven does not mention which schools

        So here we go

        The Shafi’i school of Islamic jurisprudence considers female circumcision to be wajib (obligatory).

        The Hanbali school of Islamic jurisprudence considers female circumcision to be makrumah (honorable) and strongly encouraged, to obligatory.

        The Maliki school of Islamic jurisprudence considers female circumcision to be sunnah (optional) and preferred.

        The Hanafi school of Islamic jurisprudence considers female circumcision to be sunnah (preferred)

  4. wmeenaboggs@hotmail.com says

    May 31, 2014 at 3:42 pm

    This doctor & all who are in favor of genital mutilation should be deported.

  5. gravenimage says

    May 31, 2014 at 3:54 pm

    UK: Muslim doctor struck off medical register for helping arrange FGM
    ………………………….

    How many more Muslim doctors like Dr. Ali Mao-Aweys are there in the West? I’m sure this is rife—many Muslim “leaders”, including clerics, have openly condoned FGM.

    Sometimes the victims are shipped overseas for the mutilation, but I imagine increasingly it is done right here in the West, sometimes just with a rusty knife on the kitchen table. This can cause problems with the Western authorities if something goes wrong, though—so much better to get a Muslim doctor to perform the mutilation.

    I’m just glad the UK is actually barring Dr. Ali Mao-Aweys from practicing medicine. I hope they legally prosecute him, as well—and deport him if he is not a citizen.

    • Fitz says

      May 31, 2014 at 4:00 pm

      Don’t hold your breath. The UK is hamstrung by the ECHR – European Convention on Human Rights – which miscreants like our doctor here abuse in order to prevent deportation, for instance under the provision of ‘right to a family life’.

      • gravenimage says

        May 31, 2014 at 5:07 pm

        Oh, I know this all too well, Fitz—I’m just glad to see the UK taking *any* action.

        And thanks for that grim story about the Muslim father calling the FGM help line *for a referral*. I’d heard this before—but it clearly indicates the depth of the problem.

        Apparently the practice is so openly widespread in London that Muslims from Europe are bringing their daughters there to have them mutilated.

        Shockingly, there had not been a *single* conviction in Britain of an FGM case—even though the law was passed in *1985*.

        Here’s more from The Guardian:

        “FGM is banned but very much alive in the UK”

        http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/feb/06/female-genital-mutilation-foreign-crime-common-uk

  6. citycat says

    Jun 1, 2014 at 12:43 am

    Mother mature has not made a mistake that needs correcting by misogynistic dogs

  7. mortimer says

    Jun 1, 2014 at 7:26 am

    Normative Islam, rather than an aberration.

  8. Pradman says

    Jun 1, 2014 at 10:17 am

    There should be no avenue for appeal.

  9. logdon says

    Jun 1, 2014 at 2:11 pm

    “Women are for children, boys are for pleasure” explains it.

  10. Carol says

    Jun 1, 2014 at 3:41 pm

    In Islam, as told to me by ladies in Saudi Arabia, the ‘Muslim’ is so perfect that women or men may not pluck their eyebrows or dye their hair!!! So by circumcision and FMG they are saying that Allah did NOT produce the Perfect person the ‘Muslim’ so they must improve the body given to them. Can’t have it both way folks!!!

  11. dumbledoresarmy says

    Jun 4, 2014 at 3:27 am

    Above, one of our resident and slier Defenders of Islam, one ‘Semeru’, accuses regular commenter Gravenimage of being a deliberate and brazen liar – “telling porkies” – because of a comment above in which she wrote that “three out of four of the traditional schools of Islam consider FGM obligatory—and the fourth considers it “honorable” and a “courtesy to the husband”.”

    *I* – because I know Gravenimage very well, and I know that she *is* generally careful about her facts – assumed it to be a simple and honest mistake (she did in fact get this not quite right).

    “Semeru”, on the other hand, never misses an opportunity to assume the worst, and to attack and accuse any regular commenter here.

    His tone is not that of someone offering a friendly correction to a usually-reliable commenter.

    it is, rather, one of accusation, intended to suggest that she is a noted liar and deliberate deceiver.

    The fundamental point of all this, however, whether of GI’s comment or of his correction (which is “framed” by a comment intended to damage GI’s credibility with new readers), is exactly the same. For even though GI slipped up on the exact *terminology*, the thing that matters is *this*: that *not one* of the four Sunni schools of sharia ‘Law’ *condemns*, or *forbids*, FGM.

    Whether they consider it Sunnah or obligatory is to some extent irrelevant: what matters is that they *do not condemn or forbid it* and, though varying somewhat in the degree of emphasis, *approve of it*.

    • Mirren10 says

      Jun 4, 2014 at 7:58 am

      ”Whether they consider it Sunnah or obligatory is to some extent irrelevant: what matters is that they *do not condemn or forbid it* and, though varying somewhat in the degree of emphasis, *approve of it*.”

      Exactly.

      I, for one, am sick to the back teeth of stinking ‘semeru’ and his nasty, spiteful, little ‘gotcha’ games.

      He contributes absolutely **nothing** to the counter-jihad, indeed, as you say, he deliberately seeks to discredit decent posters, such as graven, in the hopes that new readers, posters, will extrapolate such *occasional* mistakes into doubting that the tenets of islam say precisely what they say, and that therefore there actually is no jihad of mohammedans against the rest of us.

      I wish marc, or Robert, would just ban the little creep.

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