Friday Links — March 13, 2009

• A prominent Tunisian academic, Amel Grami, calls for ijtihad.

• Rafia Zakaria writes for Pakistan’s Daily Times about the Pakistani Taleban’s increasing violence against women in Swat and elsewhere, despite Zardari’s pledges for women’s rights. IPS jumps in about what Pakistani women are doing to resist the violence.

• Dubai’s mufti declares that women can issue fatwas if they have attained sufficient knowledge of Islamic teachings.

• New York domestic violence organizations object to NOW’s Marcia Pappas’ statements on Aasiya Hassan’s death.

• Yemen won’t allow Nujood to travel to Austria to receive an award. More here.

• A group of women in Bangalore, India, plan on marching against men who harass and attack women in the name of “morality.”

• On the dire lack of medical resources for Palestinian women and children.

• ReligionDispatches profiles the Musawah campaign, as does The New York Times.

• A Tunisian woman kicks ass and takes names by founding Tunisia’s first women’s bikers association.

• Money worries are a large factor in many Indonesian domestic violence cases.

• The Iranian government is implementing controversial legislation that allows women to inherit all forms of their husband’s property.

• The LA Times reviews The Hijabi Monologues.

• PM’S World writes a detailed scholastic rebuttal to the hadith claiming that women shouldn’t hold positions of power.

• MR Zine examines the women’s rights movement in Iran.

• The head of a police department in Java, Indonesia, has asked that all female Muslim officers wear a headscarf.

• Women in creative fields in the U.A.E. have no support system.

• Chechnya’s president is carrying out a campaign to impose strict Islamic law on the territory, with Russia’s backing.

• The National profiles two up-and-coming designers, whose bedrooms also serve as their ateliers.

• The Times of India explores women in Islamic clergy.

• Female journalists in Yemen are often targeted for smear campaigns or censorship.

• Menassat reports that abused domestic workers in Lebanon are organizing themselves in an effort to redress their grievances and get justice.

• Wajahat Ali’s “The Contemporary Muslim Women” series has more entries by Nausheen Ali, Kannaporn Amoraseth Akarapisan, Rabea Chaudhry, Noura Erakat, Zeba Iqbal, and Mona Sheikh.

• Feminist group Kayan aims to improve the status of Arab women in Israel.

• The debate about headscarves in Norway is harming women and children.

• Female policewomen in Abu Dhabi are celebrated alongside their male counterparts for the first time.

• Jamerican Muslimah discusses Muslimah sexiness in two parts.

• On Afghan women: one step forward, two steps back.

• Nuseiba draws parallels between Barbie and women who dye their hair, while Porochista Khakpour writes about what Barbie meant to her as she and her family escaped Iran during the Iran-Iraq war.

• The National reviews Amours Voilees.

• The effects of war on Iraqi women are manifesting themselves in studies.

• Female Iranian artists display their work in London.

• The BBC investigates women’s place in the mosque in Cairo.

• Only women are to be employed in women’s clothing shops in Iran, say Iranian police. Are you listening, Saudi Arabia?

• Several thousand women have joined Yemeni security forces.

• How one woman taking a job over twenty years ago changed the U.A.E. forever.

• Al Jazeera interviews Hibaaq Osman, chair and founder of Karama, a regional movement to end violence against women in North Africa and the Middle East.

• Racialicious founder Carmen van Kerckhove interviews Saleha Jalil Khan from Ontario Police College.

• Saudi officials disastrously mess up yet again when it comes to doling out punishment, sentencing a 76-year-old woman to lashes for having “non-mahram men enter her house” to deliver bread. Really?! The men will also receive the same number of lashes. Via PM’S World.

• A British woman plans to launch a line of clothing for Muslim women, Elenany.

• The recent attacks on two Muslim women in Mangalore, India, have galvanized locals to protest.

• Hajiya Bilkisu writes about her experience at the Musawah initative meeting in Malaysia.

• The British Government plans to train Muslim women for public office in a bid to involve them in national politics.

• Yemeni photographer Amira Al-Sherif is profiled in the Yemen Times.

• Selma Atabek works to educate people about the widespread domestic violence in Turkey.

• The Indonesian Religious Affairs Ministry is aiming to ban secret marriages.

• Iraq’s women’s minister withdraws her resignation, which she gave just last month, after a huge outpouring of international support for her work. More here.

• Zeba Iqbal writes about the response of Muslim Americans to domestic violence.

• The Nation profiles some Muslim women in Thailand who are working to better their communities.

• Kyrgyzstan banned the headscarf a la France. After protests, the ban was rescinded. More here.

• On the creation and steady growth of a Muslim women’s organization in Ahmedabad, India.

• The Huffington Post gives props to Sheikha Lubna al-Qasimi.

• IPS interviews Fatima Nazari, an Afghan Parliament member, on the challenges that women lawmakers face in the country. More here.

• Radio Free Europe reports that female genital cutting is widespread among Kurdish regions.

• A woman at a Maryland credit union was denied service twice because of her headscarf. More here and here.

• A look at pioneering Turkish women in history.

• Muslim women will preach against harmful influences in the Russian city of Kazan, preaching only in Tatar.

• A Jordanian court has convicted a Syrian man of killing his sister.

• Global Voices Online examines International Women’s Day for Middle Eastern women bloggers. More here.

• IslamOnline profiles several single mothers.

• Afghan women want to be included in talks with the Taleban because they’re skeptical about the latter’s intentions.

• Some recent statistics on Palestinian women.

• The Des Moines Register profiles Mira Yusef, an activist fighting against domestic violence.

• The Feminist School teaches us the history of International Women’s Day in Iran.

• Wedad Lootah, the author of the book on sex and marriage that has caused so much stir in the U.A.E., speaks out.

• The Jordan Times reports that Princess Basma speaks out on Jordan’s rejecting all forms of violence against women.

• Lebanon starts a Taxis for Women initiative, and gets a sexist title from AFP.

• Yemen launched its first Women’s Sports Festival last week.

• Abu Dhabi is launching a campaign to education Emiratis about the importance of family.

• On the difficulty that Jordanian women and children have when a mother cannot pass on her citizenship.

• The U.S. Department of State honors a 10-year-old Yemeni divorcee. No, not Nujood. A different one. Related: Asharq Alawsat writes about the increase of marriage age in Yemen.

• Women in a conservative Turkish city are gaining influence in business and politics.

• Two differing stories about Kuwaiti women on International Women’s Day.

• Men pledge to help stop domestic violence.

• London holds an Afghan Women’s Film Festival.

• The U.A.E.’s first midwifery program sees 24 women enroll.

• Turkish courts are one area where women have broken up the boy’s club.

• A Canadian program aims to give Afghan women vocational skills so they can earn better incomes and improve the lives of their families.

• Women in Bamyan, Iran, take matters into their own hands. Literally.

• A Kashmiri woman tells her story.

• Women in Indonesia are seeking better representation.

• The prison sentence  for an Afghan man who printed out an article about the role of women in Islam has been upheld: it’s 20 years, negotiated from death.

• The U.A.E. has launched a campaign against “masculine women”.

• I write about the best strategy for breaking “glass minarets” on ReligionDispatches.

• G. Willow Wilson talks with KUOW radio about her newest comic Air. Listen here:

[audio http://www.zshare.net/download/5696270155bcf113/]

Tags: Muslim women, News

Friday Links