Amy Smithers and Katie Rook update the death of Aqsa Parvez:
The 16-year-old Mississauga girl who was allegedly strangled by her father in a dispute over her refusal to wear the hijab has died.
Aqsa Parvez, a Grade 11 student at Applewood Heights, succumbed to her injuries late last night, Peel Regional Police said today.
The girl’s 57-year-old father, Muhammad Parvez, has been charged with muder. Aqsa’s 26-year-old brother, Waqas Parvez, has been charged with obstructing police.
Friends believe Aqsa (seen above in a personal photo) was the victim of a dispute over the teenager's desire to be more western.
“She wanted to live her life the way she wanted to, not the way her parents wanted her to,” classmate Krista Garbhet told the Post this morning.
“She just wanted to be herself, honestly she just wanted to show her beauty, and not be pushed around by her parents telling her what she has to be like, what she has to do. Nobody would want to do that.”
An announcement broadcast at the school, near Bloor Street and Cawthra Road this morning, confirmed Aqsa’s death.
School officials described her as an energetic, well-liked student.
“Peel Police are investigating Aqsa’s death. It’s natural to want answers about why this tragedy occurred, but we really don’t have any of those answers yet. So it’s important to avoid speculation or rumours. If you do have first-hand information that you think is relevant to this case, you can speak with one of the teachers or counsellors, or with office staff,” one school official told students.
A memorial with a photograph of Aqsa and book of dedication was set up in the school’s main foyer.
Grief counsellors are available to support shocked classmates. A flag outside the school has been lowered in memory of the girl.
The National Post editorial board discusses this case in their podcast here.
---------------
Hijab dispute behind teen's death, friends say
Updated Tue. Dec. 11 2007 7:06
The students said Parvez no longer wanted to wear a hijab, a shoulder-length head scarf worn by some Muslim women. They also said Parvez would often change her clothing once she got to school and then would change back before going home.
"People said her brothers and sisters followed her to see if she was wearing her headscarf or not," one student said.
Parvez had recently been staying with a friend because of tension at home, classmates said.
"Her dad was threatening her and she was getting scared and she just didn't want to live there anymore," another student said.
The victim's father has been charged with murder, while the girl's brother has been charged with obstructing police.
Police have not commented on a possible motive and are keeping tight-lipped as to how the teen was attacked.
Students, staff remember slain teen
A spokesperson for the Peel District School Board said officials will look into the situation to see if there's something they can learn to help ease cultural transitions for students in the future.
"We will want to see what we can learn from this," Sylvia Link, the board's manager of communications told CTV.ca. "If there is anything that we can learn from this incident that will prevent it from happening in the future, we'll do what we can to keep our students safe."
Link said the board already helps students learn about other cultures by organizing events such as Black History Month.
In fact, Parvez helped organize the school's last Black History Month event.
"She had friends from all kinds of different backgrounds," Link said.
Aside from describing her as popular and vivacious, Link said Parvez showed great interest in the arts, particularly fashion. She was enrolled in a photography and fashion course at the school.
Counsellors were at the school Tuesday to help students and staff deal with the grief, Link said.
A memorial table was also set up at the front of the school where friends of the slain teen could write their memories, put up pictures, leave flowers and mementos.
"Aqsa was honestly the brightest girl around," wrote one student inside a memory book. "She had the biggest smile and was the happiest person in school. She loved to dance and take pictures."
"No matter what, there was always happiness inside you," wrote another student. "You always knew how to make people smile even when you weren't yourself."
Link said staff at the school were shocked when they heard the news.
"There is no way to describe the shock and grief a school experiences when it loses a student to a tragedy like this," she said. "Our focus today is helping support staff and students."
An announcement was made early in the morning and two letters, one for students and another for their parents is expected to go home with the kids at the end of the day.
Muhammad Parvez, 57, appeared in a Brampton court on Tuesday charged with murder.
Waqas Parvez, 26, is also charged in the investigation with obstructing police.
With a report from CTV's John Musselman
-----------
Teen tried to leave strict family
16-year-old's love of dancing, fashion and photography brought her into conflict; father now faces murder charge
OMAR EL AKKAD AND KENYON WALLACE
From Wednesday's Globe and Mail
December 12, 2007 at 3:25 AM EST
Aqsa Parvez was largely estranged from her family and sleeping away from home in recent days. The 16-year-old's friends said she returned to her home in Mississauga on Monday only to collect her belongings.
Shortly afterward, she was taken to hospital, where she died early Tuesday morning – leaving friends grief-stricken and igniting a public debate on religious extremism in Canada.
Her father, 57-year-old taxi driver Muhammad Parvez, is charged with murder. Her brother, 26-year-old Waqas Parvez, is charged with obstructing police.
Ms. Parvez's friends described the Grade 11 student at Applewood Heights Secondary School as someone who was drawn to Western culture even as her family adhered to a devout form of Islam. Friends paint a picture of a hardworking and cheerful girl who loved dancing, fashion and photography – interests that often clashed with her strict home environment.
Sixteen-year-old Aqsa Parvez died Tuesday after she returned to her family home in Mississauga on Monday to collect her belongings.
“Aqsa was always trying to get us to go shopping with her,” schoolmate Dominiquia Holmes-Thompson said. “We were supposed to go to the mall together today.”
Last week, Ms. Parvez temporarily moved in with a friend from school.
“She said she wasn't getting along well with her family and that things weren't right,” said Trudy Looby, the mother of one of Ms. Parvez's friends, Alisha. “When she was here, she was very happy.”
Ms. Looby said she told Ms. Parvez to inform her parents about where she was staying. “She notified me that the school was aware of where she was staying and that that was okay,” the mother said.
During her stay, Ms. Looby said, Ms. Parvez didn't wear the hijab, a head scarf that friends said was a hot topic within her family.
Krista Garbutt remembers walking down the street with Ms. Parvez earlier this year, when the two of them spotted Ms. Parvez's brother walking toward them. Panicking, the teenager quickly fumbled for her head scarf, trying to put it on. “There were times when we'd be walking down the street and she'd see her brother and she wouldn't be wearing her hijab and she'd have to put it on,” Ms. Garbutt said. “She said, ‘He'll kill me, he'll kill me.' I said, ‘He's not going to kill you,' but she said, ‘Yeah, he will.' And nobody believed it.”
On Monday morning, Peel Regional Police responded to a 911 call from a man who said he had just killed his daughter. When officers arrived at a single-family detached home on Longhorn Trail, they found Ms. Parvez suffering from life-threatening injuries. She was taken immediately to Credit Valley Hospital and later transferred in critical condition to the Hospital for Sick Children, where she died.
Peel police said the Crown is waiting to decide whether Mr. Parvez should be charged with first- or second-degree murder, pending a police investigation. Although police would not elaborate on the ongoing homicide investigation, the difference between laying a first- or second-degree murder charge often rests on proving that the killing was premeditated.
Ms. Garbutt said the teenager went home on Monday to collect her belongings, at which point her father “basically went ballistic.”
For weeks before, Ms. Parvez had been living something of a double life, friends said.
“She wanted peace with her family,” Alisha Looby said. “She wanted to make them happy but she wanted to be herself at the same time, and there's nothing wrong with that.”
A makeshift memorial is already in place at Applewood Heights, full of mementoes and messages left by grieving students.
“Aqsa was honestly the brightest girl around. She had the biggest smile and was the happiest person in school. She loved to dance and take pictures,” one student wrote.
Across Canada, the killing has taken on larger proportions. On call-in shows and websites, many have used the incident as part of a wider indictment of fundamentalist Islam. One Canadian conservative blogger suggested Canadians boycott taxicabs driven by Muslims.
In a statement Tuesday, the Canadian Council on American-Islamic Relations called on Canadians of all faiths to address issues of domestic abuse, and called for “the strongest possible prosecution” of those responsible for Ms. Parvez's killing.
Trudy Looby, who let Ms. Parvez stay at her home last week, said she now wishes the teen had not left.
“I was feeling that whatever it was she was dealing with at home was a bit too personal to involve me in,” Ms. Looby said. “I wish she would have stayed longer, that's all. It's a sad waste of life.”
-----------------------
The night before Aqsa Parvez died, she danced to Indian music under the loving gaze of a Muslim family she had adopted as her own.
The rebellious teenager did not see eye to eye with her parents, so she moved in with a Mississauga family, and last Sunday happily took part in a birthday celebration for the youngest of six Tahir daughters. Everyone complimented Aqsa on her outfit --a pink skirt she had borrowed from one of the sisters, Amal Tahir, and her own matching pink top. "Tell Amal to teach me a couple of steps," the mother, Lubna, recalled Aqsa asking.
"What I saw in that kid was that she was just asking for acceptance," Lubna Tahir said. "She wanted to be like a young celebrity. Want to do everything, be in everyone's eye. Want to be popular. Want to be loved one."
Police say that the next morning, on a visit back to her family's Mississauga home to pick up clothes, 16-year-old Aqsa was strangled to death by her father, 57. She will be buried today.
Friends from Aqsa's high school said the girl had been fighting with her family about her refusal to wear a hijab and other traditional Islamic clothes. They say she "wanted to dress normally," so she would take off the head scarf at school and make sure to put it back on before she went home.
The suggestion that her death was the tragic end to repeated culture clashes between a traditional Muslim family and their rebellious Westernized daughter has generated a fierce debate.
Canadian Imams have denounced the murder as un-Islamic, but underscored the importance of a hijab by saying that children who shunned it could make some parents feel like failures. Other observers say the discussion should centre around domestic violence, which affects all communities.
Muhammad Parvez, a taxi driver who immigrated from Rawalpindi, Pakistan, prior to his family making the move about seven years ago, remains in jail on a charge of murder. Police said a man called 911 on Monday morning to say he had killed his daughter.
Aqsa died in hospital several hours later. Waqas Parvez, who picked his sister up at a bus stop that morning and took her home, is charged with obstructing police. He was released on $10,000 bail yesterday.
Mr. Parvez was licensed as a sole taxi operator, which meant he owned his own cab but paid dues to a dispatch brokerage.
He worked for a short period of time for Golden Taxi, before moving to rival Blue & White Taxi. As an independent operator, there was little contact between Mr. Parvez and other cab drivers or dispatch company officials. Several fellow cab drivers and officials at both companies say they know next to nothing about the man or his family.
The Tahirs describe Aqsa as a girl who embraced her faith by praying five times a day, like a good Muslim, while also trying to emulate the "gangsta" style she admired in rap videos. She knew who she wanted to be one day -- a famous fashion designer -- but struggled, like most teens, to fit in. Aqsa's three brothers and four older sisters were more reserved than she, which made her sometimes feel misunderstood.
The Tahirs say that days after she moved in with them, Mr. and Ms. Parvez came over, and both families had a two hour meeting with Aqsa.
Her mother cried. Mr. Parvez calmly implored his daughter in Punjabi to tell him why she left and what he could do to bring her home. Aqsa barely spoke, except to say that she "just wanted change," according to Ms. Tahir. Privately Aqsa told her that she wanted "to get more out of life".
Mr. Parvez appeared to be relieved that his daughter was safe, said Ms. Tahir, and not alone on the street. He was content to see Aqsa living in a household that resembled his own, said Ms. Tahir, and told her to stay as long as she needed to. Aqsa asked if she could bring items from her house back, and he said they would arrange that "together."
"That's how he left," said Ms. Tahir, an immigration and paralegal consultant who immigrated from Pakistan 10 years ago.
But Aqsa, it seemed, was still searching for independence.
A few days after that first meeting, over coffee in Tim Hortons, Aqsa told her father that she wanted to live on her own, she wanted to go to school in the mornings and work in the evenings. Mr. Parvez offered to let her take over the basement. Aqsa said she would think about it.
"She was satisfied, she was relaxed that somehow her parents understood that this is what she wanted to do, and they didn't push her to come home," said Ms. Tahir, who wanted to be an impartial third party to broker peace.
She pressed Aqsa many times to tell her why she had run away. The girl claimed repeatedly that she had never been abused. When one Imam suggested at a press conference this week that boy issues may have been behind Aqsa's family troubles, the Tahir women, who were in the audience, raised their voices in protest.
Aqsa did not have a boyfriend, said Ms. Tahir, who expressed dismay at the "rumours" in the press, including speculation that it was conflict over wearing the hijab that triggered the alleged murder.
The Tahirs did not know of any dispute over Aqsa wearing a hijab and said that the older Parvez sisters did not always wear the head scarf.
Aqsa's Applewood Heights Secondary School friends said she started removing her hijab in September, which was also when she ran away from home the first time and to a women's shelter.
Amal Tahir said Aqsa still periodically wore the hijab, and sometimes other students picked on her.
"They didn't accept her as easily as they did when she changed her appearance. I told her, if someone doesn't like you for the way you are inside, the way you dress won't influence them," said Amal, who knew Aqsa through her older sister, Irim.
Aqsa sparred with her father about skipping classes, admitted Amal, but she never thought the girl feared Mr. Parvez.
In the two weeks they lived in the same house, Amal and Aqsa bonded -- and the older girl learned that Aqsa liked to call the shots.
"She was a dominant personality," Amal said. She wanted to be the centre of attention, loved posing for pictures, gossiping about boys and experimenting with her appearance. "Typical teen stuff," Ms. Tahir said.
Privately, Aqsa appeared to be lonely. She was her own best friend, and Amal overheard her talking to herself often. "I talked with her a lot during these two weeks because I completely felt this is my responsibility," Ms. Tahir said. "And I felt so bad when things had happened this way. I kind of felt guilty, maybe I could have done something different. And then I felt peace. She must be more happy with God, but this is not the way it should be."
---------------
POSTCARD USA: Who will mourn Aqsa Parvez? — Khalid Hasan
Manto wrote that outward symbols, be they beards or metal wristbands or sacred threads across the bare chest, are external manifestations of a sprit that is no longer alive. The hijab, which has been gaining ground among Muslim women since the Iranian “revolution”, falls in the same category
Aqsa Parvez was only sixteen when her father strangled her because she no longer wanted to wear the hijab. What he erroneously believed was an Islamic injunction was more important to him than his schoolgirl daughter’s life. This happened in the Toronto suburb of Mississauga on December 10, ironically at a time of year which is celebrated as the season of goodwill, good cheer, family togetherness and peace on earth. But for Aqsa Parvez, it proved to be her year of death. She was deprived of life, love and fulfilment by her own father who believed he was doing God’s will. Muhammed Parvez, her killer, is a 57 year old cabdriver who would take three to four breaks during his working day to say his prayers. One can only wonder if he was praying to the same God of compassion that the Quran gives tidings of.
Natasha Fatah, speaking on Canadian national radio, said some Muslims had turned the wearing of hijab into the sixth pillar of Islam. They had brought into Canadian homes the radical tribal notion that a man’s honour is encompassed in the sexual and physical body of the women in his family, which is why they must be covered up and kept inside. They had made a woman’s body the fighting ground for their religious wars, and before their congregations, deluded imams kept exhorting men to control their daughters, wives and sisters.
The most shameful part of the Aqsa tragedy lies in the online and offline rumours that those who consider themselves “rightly guided” have been circulating. Some suggested that she had a black boyfriend (note the racism), others that she was sexually promiscuous, and some even called her a drug pusher. In other words, her father had every moral right to kill her, is the message. The Canadian imams, many of them in their self-styled attires and operatic headgear came out with other justifications. Sheikh Alaa El-Sayyed, imam of a Toronto mosque, said, “Women who wear hijabs occupy higher positions in Islam, according to religious teachings.” Where did the imam get that because nowhere does Islam lay that out? He also said, “We cannot let culture supersede religion. If we stay away from the teachings of Islam, we will pay for it.” Translated into straight language, it means that since Aqsa stayed away from the teachings of Islam, she had to “pay for it”. Imam Iqbal Nadvi of Oakville’s Al-Falah Islamic Centre mosque said, “Parents fail and bring shame upon themselves if a child chooses to abandon holy writings and not wear the hijab. It is their duty to convince their kids that this is part of their culture.” In other words, Aqsa’s father was justified in killing her because she would not wear the hijab. He also said that Aqsa was “going in the wrong direction, going with some other boy or some other thing.” That being so, she got what was coming to her and good riddance that was.
Now let me quickly examine what precisely the Quran says on the subject, because that alone should be a believing Muslim’s supreme and only guide. Dr Fazlur Rahman’s wrote that all Quranic passages, revealed as they were at a specific time in history and within certain general and particular circumstances, should be given expression relative to those circumstances. Another Muslim scholar, Dr Ibrahim Syed, says that those who claim that the Quranic verses are explicit about hijab base that position on Sura Al-Ahzab (33:59). The operative words in Arabic on which this interpretation is based mean (that women should) “lower their garments” or “draw their garments closer to their bodies”.
Nowhere does the verse say that the face should be covered. In fact, the verse is devoid of the word ‘face’. The advocates of hijab also quote in support of their position Sura Al-Nur (24:31). Dr Syed writes: “In the pre-Islamic period, women used to wear a cloth called khimar on their necks that was normally thrown towards the back leaving the head and the chest exposed. The reference in Al-Nur apparently instructs that this piece of cloth, normally worn on the head and neck, should be made to cover the bosom.” The khimar was akin to a scarf or the Pakistani dupatta He writes: “So it is erroneous to conclude that the Quran demands (of) Muslim women to cover their heads.”
According to Dr Abou el Fadl, “From the gross liberties taken in translating the (Quranic) text, apparently the translators believe that God wishes women to be like house-broken dogs — loyal, sweet and obedient. One can only ponder what type of rotted and foul soul imagines that God wishes to imprison women in a sewer of squalid male egos, and suffer because men cannot control their libidos. What an ugly picture they have created of God’s compassion and mercy!”
A Western scholar of Islam, Daphne Grace, in a 2004 work wrote, “Contrary to popular belief, the veiling of women is nowhere explicitly prescribed in the Quran. It is claimed that the custom of veiling arises from the verse in the Quran telling believers to ‘cast down their eyes ... and reveal not their adornment save such as is outward; and let them cast their veils over their bosoms.’” She quotes the scholar Fadwa El Guindi, who elaborated the translation of this passage to reveal that the original meaning was to “cover the cleavage of the breasts”. Grace writes: “The passage has been interpreted by men in some countries to indicate the requirement of the full veil . . . while in other countries (such as Egypt), a fashionable headscarf suffices. It is worth noting that the cover outlined in the Quran was intended to prevent the public flaunting of sexuality, and a parallel verse prescribed an equivalent modest dress code for men.”
But I will let Saadat Hasan Manto have the last word. He wrote that outward symbols, be they beards or metal wristbands or sacred threads across the bare chest, are external manifestations of a sprit that is no longer alive. The hijab, which has been gaining ground among Muslim women since the Iranian “revolution”, falls in the same category. Those who wear it believe that they are fulfilling the Quranic injunction and thus earning merit in the eyes of God. Their reading of the holy book is faulty and it only bears witness to their ignorance and narrow-mindedness. Aqsa Parvez lost her young life at the alter of ignorance. She will surely end up in heaven.
Khalid Hasan is Daily Times’ US-based correspondent. His e-mail is khasan2@cox.net
-------
Martyr of the Hijab: Marwa Sherbini, a Walking Veil?
By Shabana Mir
July 7, 2009
Why did coverage of the murder of a pregnant Muslim woman merely record the outrage “in the Muslim world”?
Marwa Sherbini was assaulted and murdered—not just assaulted and murdered but murdered in plain daylight—not just daylight but in a courtroom in the democratic, egalitarian Western nation of Germany. This was not a remote village in Somalia, or a Taliban-controlled village in Pakistan, or any random militia-ruled town without paved roads, police, emergency hotlines, elevators and cell-phones. It was a courtroom in Dresden. It was within the very space where justice is delivered.
Alex W. saw her as a walking veil which reduced her to a terrorist in his eyes. She was not a walking veil, nor should her supporters reduce her to one. She was a human being. Alex insulted her for her headscarf and her religion. She and her husband, trusting in the justice system, sought state protection from such attacks.
Well, Alex W. showed Marwa. He showed her and immigrants all over the world, to keep their mouths shut, to suck it up, and to deal with verbal insults or even physical ones—but to withdraw to their holes and preserve their own and their children’s lives. To protest, to defend yourselves to speak out, is dangerous, and could mean death.
Marwa was a person. She was a former handball champion. She loved her child and her eyes brightened when she saw him smile. Her husband would lay down his life for her. She may have enjoyed soccer, preferred Coke over Pepsi, struggled with Windows Vista, hated acrylic sweaters, loved the smell of rain, missed her family in Egypt and cried when they called her, and suffered from dust allergies. She was a living human being—at least until the hatred channeled through Alex W. struck her down.
Shot her? No. Not so easy. Stabbed her. In a courtroom. Once? Twice? No, 18 times.
She was a wife, whose husband is in critical condition after trying to save her life. His misfortune deserves mention: it seems he was injured both by Alex W. and by a policeman’s shots.
She was a mother. Her three-year-old child, Mustafa, was in the courtroom when she was murdered. My own daughter is three. She is fully aware of any pain and any anxiety I experience. She won’t let a physician or a hair-dresser touch me without registering loud protest. I cannot imagine the trauma this child experienced when his mother was killed before his eyes. I don’t want to imagine what this will do to his sense of self and security.
She was the mother of a murdered child, too. The fetus in her womb was three months old. It may have been a girl. The little girl might have had curly black hair and dimples, an excellent singing voice, and an unfortunate love for the PowerPuff Girls. But she is far below dust now.
I cannot understand why the news article I read on this subject merely records how newspapers in the “Muslim world” have expressed outrage for the martyr of the hijab. I cannot understand why German and indeed European newspapers, politicians, feminists, mothers, husbands, citizens have not made themselves heard. Where are their voices? Where is their outrage? How come a BBC piece does not find their voices either audible or newsworthy? Muslims are justly asked why they don’t protest against extremism and sexism in their communities. Is it fair to ask for similar condemnation of violence and murder in plain sight of law enforcement and in the spaces of law and justice?
As a Pakistani in the US, I am shocked and terrified by the recent bomb blasts in Pakistani cities. I am shaken to the core by the seeming frailty of law enforcement before armed militants. I protest and register my shock. My sympathies lie with the German citizenry: this is after all an attack on their sense of security too. If one man full of hate can murder a woman in a courtroom, where one is supposedly safer than anywhere else, who is safe in Dresden? Who can plead for justice anymore, without fearing for their lives?
-------
Egypt mourns 'headscarf martyr'
Demonstration in Cairo proclaiming Marwa Sherbini the Hijab Martyr
Marwa Sherbini is being hailed as the shahida, or martyr, of the Hijab
The body of a Muslim woman, killed in a German courtroom by a man convicted of insulting her religion, has been taken back to her native Egypt for burial.
Marwa Sherbini, 31, was stabbed 18 times by Alex W, who is now under arrest in Dresden for suspected murder.
Husband Elwi Okaz is also in a critical condition in hospital, after being injured as he tried to save his wife.
Ms Sherbini had sued her killer after he called her a "terrorist" because of her headscarf.
The case has attracted much attention in Egypt and the Muslim world.
German prosecutors have said the 28-year-old attacker, identified only as Alex W, was driven by a deep hatred of foreigners and Muslims.
'Martyr'
Medics were unable to save Ms Sherbini who was three months pregnant with her second child. Her three-year-old son was with the family in court when she was killed.
Alex W and Ms Sherbini and family were in court for his appeal against a fine of 750 euros ($1,050) for insulting her in 2008, apparently because she was wearing the Muslim headscarf or Hijab.
Newspapers in Egypt have expressed outrage at the case, asking how it was allowed to happen and dubbing Ms Sherbini "the martyr of the Hijab".
Senior Egyptian officials and German diplomatic staff attended the funeral in Alexandria along with hundreds of mourners.
Media reports say Mr Okaz was injured both by the attacker and when a policeman opened fire in the courtroom.
-------
Decrease font Decrease font
(CNN) -- Hundreds of Egyptians took part Monday in the funeral of Marwa Sherbini, an Egyptian woman who was stabbed to death last week in the German city of Dresden in a crime believed to be racially motivated.
Egyptians take part in the funeral of Marwa Sherbini, who was murdered in Germany last week.
Sherbini, 33, was stabbed to death Wednesday in a courtroom as she prepared to give testimony against a German man of Russian descent whom she had sued for insult and abuse.
The man, identified in German media as Alex A., 28, was convicted of calling Sherbini, who wore a headscarf, "terrorist," "bitch" and "Islamist" when she asked him to leave a swing for her 3-year-old son Mustafa during an August 2008 visit to a children's park.
He was fined and appealed the ruling. The two were in court Wednesday for that appeal when Alex A. attacked, pulling out a knife and stabbing Sherbini 18 times. He also stabbed her husband three times and attacked another person.
According to Arab media, police officers tried to intervene to end the fight, and a number of shots were fired. One hit the husband, who fell unconscious and is currently in intensive care in the hospital of Dresden University.
Sherbini was three months pregnant at the time of her death.
Hundreds attended Sherbini's funeral in Alexandria, Egypt, her hometown, among them government officials, including Egyptian Manpower Minister Aisha Abdel Hadi and Telecommunications Minister Tariq Kamel, Egyptian media reported.
Many shouted hostile slogans against Germany and called for Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to take a firm stand on the incident. Egypt's grand mufti, Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi, demanded the severest punishment to be issued against Alex A.
Berlin witnessed angry protests on Saturday, when hundreds of Arabs and Muslims demonstrated after a funeral prayer that called her killing an outrageous racist murder against Muslims.
In a phone call with Al Arabiya, Marwa's brother, Tariq Sherbini, said, "Extremism has no religion. My sister was killed simply because she wore the veil. This incident clearly shows that extremism is not limited to one religion or another and it is not exclusively carried out by Muslims."
"We are only asking for a fair punishment," he said, adding that his sister was not a radical. "She was a religious woman who prayed and wore her headscarf, but she was killed because of her belief."
Anger about Sherbini's death smoldered online, as Twitterers and bloggers pushed the cause.
"She is a victim of hatred and racism," tweeted Ghada Essawy, among many other Arab twitters and bloggers. Essawy called Sherbini "the martyr of the veil."
Various videos circulated on YouTube calling on Egypt to take action and urging Germany to address what their makers saw as a new wave of hatred against Arabs and Muslims in its community.
One video showed various pictures of a young happy Marwa saying that "The woman stood up for her rights and she was killed. May God bless her." The English font in the video presentation asked "when will Egypt cares for its citizens' rights inside Egypt and abroad."
Sherbini and her husband moved to Dresden in 2003, after the husband received a grant to study genetic engineering in the renowned Max Planck Institute. He was scheduled to present his Ph.D. thesis in the coming days.
------
When a certain Neda was killed in Tehran, she became the face of the 'Feminine Green Tsunamic Iranian Resistance' with most news media showing it with lengthy comments. But not when Dr Marwa Al-Sherbini was killed inside a court in Germany by a thug stabbing her 17 times. The German police, instead of coming forward to protect her, they fired at her husband when he tried to do so.
In Germany most Germans didn't know it has happened and now there is a news black out until the investigation is over. Can any one imagine the reaction of the German and the world media if a German woman was killed in an Egyptian/Tehran court with that many stabs and the Egyptian police/Basij fired, not at the killer, but at those who came to protect her? With prostrated and defeated Arab leadership, no one pays attention or raise a finger if an Arab or a Muslim is klilled. Knowing this, the USraelis have been killing Arabs and Muslims with impunity. "If Muslims don't get peace no-one will", Bin Laden.
====
May 5, 2011, 12:35 pm
My First Afghan Burqa
By ALISSA J. RUBIN
Alissa J. Rubin is the bureau chief of The New York Times in Kabul.
Voices
GARDEZ, Afghanistan — For a recent story, I had to travel unembedded into an area largely controlled by the Taliban. The route passed through Logar Province, through the area where one of my colleagues had been kidnapped, and then deeper into Taliban territory. So I decided to do something I had never done here — wear a burqa. It was a window into the world as seen by most Afghan women.
Three Afghan women walked together in Kabul, Afghanistan's capital, with a little girl, who hid herself from rain under her mother's burka. Three Afghan women walked together in Kabul, Afghanistan’s capital, with a little girl, who hid herself from rain under her mother’s burqa.
LogarThe New York Times
The burqa here is a complicated item of clothing. Wearing one is seen by a number of women in Kabul — Afghan women as well as Westerners who live here — as a political statement: as acquiescence in or even endorsement of a hierarchy in which women have little power outside the home, and where their status is dependent on their being for all intents and purposes unseen. Some see it simply as a throwback to Taliban times, which they want to banish forever. When I told an Afghan friend here that I had worn a burqa for the trip, she shook her head and said, “Oh, no.” I could tell that she worried that next I might stop caring about women’s rights.
For the woman wearing the burqa, however, the experience can be quite a bit more routine. In many parts of Afghanistan, for a woman’s face and neck and arms to be seen is to be considered cheap. And to be cheap is to be at risk of death. A woman who is seen as a prostitute, or as someone with the intent of seducing men, is a candidate for an honor killing. Although it reflects the culture’s restrictive views about women, wearing one is a ticket to getting out of the house, to going to the market or to a friend’s house or to visit your mother or to work, because if you are wearing one you are unlikely to be accused of being a seductress.
I was busy and one of my Afghan male colleagues went to buy one for me — a mundane event because men often buy a veil or other item of modest clothing for a female member of the family. Although the most common burqas are the blue ones, they come in four colors: blue, white, yellow and black. The average burqa is a cheap item, costing about $13 to $14, which is pretty inexpensive for something you wear every day. My colleague, who was very pleased that I was buying one because he and his other Afghan drivers and journalists feel safer when they are with someone who looks Afghan rather than Western, brought back a standard blue one.
I tried it on, awkwardly. I had always thought of the women wearing them as blue ghosts or as invisible — because a woman without a face in a sense does not exist. You cannot see her approval or disapproval, her smiles or tears; even her laughter is muffled by the fabric. I put the thing over my head and for a panicky moment could not find the mesh that is supposed to go in front of your eyes so that you can see enough to walk on the street and do your chores. Then I found the cap part that keeps the whole contraption in place, but the cap was a bit small and kept riding up, depriving my eyes of the thin ribbon of semi-transparent fabric mesh that goes in front of them, this mesh being my only link to the outside world.
Contrary to my fears, my vision was only somewhat blurred by the mesh. It made me think of those purdah screens of intricately carved wood that women used to sit behind on balconies in conservative areas of India and the Arab world. The women could see out, but the men could not see in. Thus a woman’s curiosity about potential suitors could be satisfied without the suitors having the chance to tarnish them with lascivious looks. With the fabric draped around me I moved awkwardly because I couldn’t look down and see my feet, and I was worried about tripping.
One of the few practical features of the modern-day burqa is that it is considerably shorter in front than in back. The front hangs only to the waist or hip, so that your hands can get out easily to do things like choose onions and carrots in the market, or to hold a baby without having to make the baby sit on a clump of bunched-up fabric. I realized that I had never noticed what a woman did with her hands when she was walking — did she keep them under the burqa or could she stride along with them swinging by her sides? I asked my Afghan colleague. Of course, she kept them modestly beneath the cloth.
Women who regularly wear burqas have adapted them well beyond the shorter-in-front, longer-in-back design. If the cap part fits firmly, you can throw back the front part of the burqa that hangs over your face so that your face is open, and then when you see a situation coming (such as an unknown man approaching) you can pull it down, like a person drawing a shade. I had watched an Afghan woman do just that: as she entered our compound in the morning, she flipped up the fabric that hung over her face and as she left in the evening she flipped it down. When flipped up, the whole affair reminded me of wearing a bridal veil — except that if you are an Afghan woman, you wear it every day.
Having tried it on, I rapidly took it off, glad to delay wearing it until the day of our journey to Taliban territory.
The day of our departure, I put it on (flipped up, face open) for our departure from Kabul because no one was worried about people seeing my face in the city. There are many Westerners here, and usually I wear only a long scarf or a shawl draped over my hair, with blond wisps protruding. As we approached the gates of the city, where the checkpoints begin, my Afghan colleague gently suggested that I flip down the front piece of material so that I was fully covered. Then the Afghan police peering into our car would assume I was a wife or mother and just wave us through.
I felt rejected with my burqa down, as if I were not good enough to be seen in public. I leaned back in the seat and felt a wash of passivity come over me. Nothing was demanded of me except silence. I could sleep through life in this veiled state or, if I were someone who readily got angry, I would probably feel moved to tear it off. But I am not someone who readily gets angry, and I knew how much the trip depended on my being invisible until I absolutely had to show my face in order to do interviews.
The car windows were closed and soon, passive or not, I felt I was suffocating behind the fabric. Burqas are made of a cheap nylon and while light in weight, they do not breathe and in a matter of a few wearings come to carry the stale sweet-sour smell of sweat. I rolled down my window. The sense of quiet in my blue tent wasn’t bad when I was in a car and had a slight breeze blowing in. I looked out at the men in the small bazaars we passed through. I could see them and they couldn’t see me, and I felt a certain satisfaction — and dismay. They did not care about seeing me. I knew that many Muslims would say that when a man does not look a woman in the eye, it was a sign of respect, but for me it was also a sign of their not being interested in who I really was. I was simply “a woman,” and “a woman” deserves respect — not necessarily this particular woman.
We had left early and I hadn’t had any breakfast, so I took out a piece of Afghan naan bread and began to munch it under my burqa. I liked that no one could see me eating. I followed the bread with an apple and considered what life would be like lived in this cocoon. I took out a notebook and began to write on my lap. It was private and quiet. I remembered playing house with my sister when I was 8 and she was 5; we put a plastic opaque sheet with the outside of a house painted on it over a bridge table and sat under the table and felt invisible. Because we couldn’t see, our hearing became more acute and we would listen as different people walked down the hall that went past our room. The quick tapping steps were my mother. The slower, more ponderous steps were my father, and we could hear him pause, look into the room where we were hidden under the table and, not seeing us, continue down the hall to his bedroom. The rustling of shopping bags was my Great Aunt Rose, who always arrived with some present for us, and we would duck out of our pretend house and run to see what she had brought.
And that, of course, was the problem. I couldn’t choose when to duck out of my blue house. I needed permission.
I could see we were passing through empty country for a stretch, and I leaned forward and asked my colleague, “Can I pull up the burqa now?” “Sure, Alissa,” he said. I flipped it up, but then as we passed through a small bazaar, he looked back at me wordlessly. I flipped it down.
The words of St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians floated into my consciousness. They are about the longing to be seen fully for who one is:
“For now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face: now I know in part; then shall I know, even as also I am known.” [1 Corinthians 13:12]
The longing to know someone and be known by them — not just one person, but in all one’s daily dealings.
That is what feels missing in a veiled world, or at least for someone who comes to it unveiled.
No comments:
Post a Comment