US Supreme Court Eliminated the Constitutional Right to an Abortion: Muslim Women Say Overturning Of Decision Will Hurt Everyone
New Age Islam News Bureau
25 June 2022
• Iran Arrests 10 in Shiraz after Video Shows Teenage
Girls without Hijabs Mingling With Boys
• Her Highness Sheikha Fatima of UAE Honours
Outstanding Female Graduates of Higher Education Institutions
• Women Earthquake Victims Neglected For Lack Of
Female Physicians in Afghanistan
• Pakistan President for Undoing Obstacles to
Encourage Women Choose Diplomatic Career
• US Supreme Court Eliminated the Constitutional Right
to an Abortion: Muslim Women Say Overturning Of Decision Will Hurt Everyone
• UN Body to Hold Urgent Debate on Women, Girls’
Rights in Afghanistan
• Scholar Stresses Role of Women in Religious Research
Following Islamic Revolution
• Female Mountaineers Set Eyes on Becoming First
Pakistani Women to Summit K2
Compiled by New
Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/us-supreme-court-abortion-constitutional-right/d/127324
--------
US Supreme Court Eliminated the Constitutional Right
to an Abortion: Muslim Women Say Overturning Of Decision Will Hurt Everyone
Women stand together at an event at city hall in New
York City for World Hijab Day, on 1 February 2017 (AFP)
-----
By Zainab Iqbal
24 June 2022
Fatima* remembers every painstaking detail as if it
were yesterday.
Her parents had gone out for dinner and she stayed at
home with her uncle. She was wearing purple pyjamas under her Abaya. Her
T-shirt had a small hole near the collar.
She had never imagined that someone in her family
could betray her. In the few hours that her parents were gone, she was raped.
Fatima soon found out she was pregnant. Without the
support of her immediate family, she left home and eventually met a woman at a
mosque in Connecticut that offered to help. A week later, she had an abortion.
Speaking to Middle East Eye, she says she doesn't know
how she would have coped if she had been forced to keep the baby. But now,
women across the US might have to face that exact reality.
On Friday, the US Supreme Court eliminated the
constitutional right to an abortion. The Court overturned Roe v Wade, a 1973
landmark decision which ruled that the constitution protects a pregnant woman's
right to choose to have an abortion. Now, the question of abortion legality
will be decided by each state.
It's a decision that will have an impact on Americans
from all walks of life.
"I would consider myself a practising Muslim. I
try my best to abide by the Quran and the Sunnah [teachings of the Prophet
Muhammad]. Based on my faith, I know I did the right thing. I know it was ok
for me to have an abortion. Islam gave me that right," Fatima said.
"But now this country doesn’t recognise these rights. What will other
women like me do?"
Fatima explained that she still would have ended her
pregnancy, had abortion been outlawed ten years ago. She said she was affected
both physically and mentally just by knowing she was carrying a child born out
of rape.
"I think what these lawmakers don’t understand is
that by overturning Roe v Wade, access to safe abortion will no longer exist.
The keyword is 'safe.' Women will still
get an abortion. We will find a way," she said. "Women like me who
were sexually assaulted will get an abortion even if it actually kills
us."
Islamophobic tropes
According to the majority of Sunni Muslim scholars,
abortion is permitted for health reasons if it is carried out before 120 days.
If there is an extreme danger to the mother or child, then the time period can
be extended.
Asifa Quraishi-Landes, a legal scholar and professor
at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she teaches Islamic law, says
religious minorities within the US are feeling unseen. She says that women
should be able to continue going to their imam or rabbi to make their own
decisions rather than have to contend with state-imposed decisions.
"It is signalling that the state is aligning with
one particular view within the Christian community and using the power of the
state to impose that particular Christian view on everybody. And that should be
a concern to any religious minority," she said.
Many have been referring to the Supreme Court's
decision as being akin to "sharia". But according to Quraishi-Landes,
apart from being an Islamophobic trope, the rhetoric also unnecessarily drags
Muslims into the conversation over the Christian right's crackdown on LGBTQ and
women's rights in America.
"The complaint is basically you're being
theocratic. But instead of saying theocratic, they say: 'that's sharia', with
the presumption that sharia insists that the state should impose moral
religious values on everybody," she said.
"But if you look at the history of Muslims, that
is actually not the case at all."
Denise Ziya Berte is the executive director of
Peaceful Families Project, a non-profit organisation working toward preventing
various types of abuse in Muslim families.
She explained how the overturning of Roe v Wade
"makes the Christian standard of this idea of 'conception at birth' the
law of the land" and that's not actually how Islamic law addresses the
issue.
"The multitude of sort of issues around Roe v
Wade and Muslim women, especially in the area of domestic violence, is mostly
about power and control; having to follow a law that is not our law," she
said.
"What domestic violence is, is a system of power
and control. And when women are in most danger is when they have less power and
control either socially, legally, or economically."
'I would do it again'
Kavita Mehra is the executive director for Sakhi for
South Asian Women, a New York-based organisation that serves survivors of
gender-based violence through direct service, advocacy, technical assistance,
and community outreach.
She explained how there is a direct linkage between
gender-based violence and the overturning of Roe v Wade.
"[The overturning of Roe v Wade] is essentially
state-sanctioned, state-imposed, gender-based violence to women because
essentially, it's preventing individuals from getting something or being able
to fully utilise their bodies or have access to health care and have
determination over their own bodies," she said.
"Survivors of gender-based violence have people
stepping into how they control their bodies and their lives. And so this is
very much pervasive. It's like a woman's body is no longer her own. It's being
controlled by individuals who are inflicting some form of power onto
them."
Sakhi has had many cases where survivors of domestic
violence have reached out and wanted to have an abortion. In 2020, the
organisation worked with 375 survivors. In 2021, the number went up to 450.
Now, Mehra is expecting that number to increase even more.
"The decision to overturn Roe v Wade won't have
an impact on survivors in New York City, but it will impact those across the
country, especially in the 26 trigger states where Roe v Wade will be
immediately overturned," she said.
There are 13 states with "trigger bans" that
are designed to take effect as soon as the law is overturned, and in several
other states where anti-abortion laws were blocked by the courts and now
legislation will become active again.
For women like Fatima, hearing talk of abortion take
over the news and politics is too much to bear. A decade after she went through
her own, it doesn't get any easier.
"I pray no woman has to go through what I went
through, what I am still going through. Women don't just have an abortion and
go ahead with the rest of their day. It is not like that. We have an abortion
and that sticks to us like glue for the rest of our lives. I didn't ask for any
of this to happen to me. But I did and now I have to live with it," she said.
"Someone invaded my body and I stood up for
myself, all by myself. And I would do it again with or without laws protecting
me. And I can assure you that every woman would do the same."
Source: Middle East Eye
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/roe-v-wade-us-muslim-women-say-overturning-hurts-everyone
--------
Iran Arrests 10 in Shiraz after Video Shows Teenage
Girls without Hijabs Mingling With Boys
Iranian authorities have
arrested 10 people in the south-central city of Shiraz, an official said, after
teenage boys and girls were filmed mingling freely at a public gathering.
(Screengrab)
------
24 June, 2022
Iranian authorities have arrested 10 people in the
south-central city of Shiraz, an official said, after teenage boys and girls
were filmed mingling freely at a public gathering where girls were not wearing
headscarves.
A video posted on social media on Thursday showed
several teenage girls and boys mingling freely in public, with most of the
girls not wearing headscarves. A hijab is mandatory for women in Iran and is
considered a red line for the country’s theocratic rulers.
“Ten people have been arrested so far for organizing
this event,” the semi-official Mehr news agency quoted Lotfollah Sheybani, governor
of Shiraz, as saying on Thursday.
“As soon as we became aware of this issue, with the
coordination of the judiciary and law enforcement, the necessary measures were
taken to identify the individuals behind this event,” Sheybani said.
Since Iran’s 1979 revolution, all women have been
required to cover their hair in public. Women who break the strict dress code
risk being harassed and arrested by Iran’s morality police, known as Gasht-e
Ershad.
Source: Al Arabiya
--------
Her Highness Sheikha Fatima of UAE Honours Outstanding
Female Graduates of Higher Education Institutions
File Photo/ Her Highness Sheikha Fatima bint Mubarak,
-----
24 Jun 2022
Her Highness Sheikha Fatima bint Mubarak, Chairwoman
of the General Women’s Union, President of the Supreme Council for Motherhood
and Childhood, Supreme Chairwoman of the Family Development Foundation, and the
“Mother of the Nation”, honoured the outstanding female graduates of UAE
University (UAEU), Zayed University and the Higher Colleges of Technology
(HCT).
On the occasion, each graduate received a
congratulatory letter from Sheikha Fatima and a financial reward.
Sheikha Fatima said the graduates were driven by a
passion for excellence and hard work, enabling them to build their professional
careers and engage in the country’s development process.
She also highlighted her confidence in the capacities
of Emirati women and her pride in their achievements and their engagement in
all areas, most notably in advanced sciences, including the launch of the Hope
Probe, as well as in space sciences, the economy, the environment and food
security.
She then affirmed the significant role of the UAE’s
leadership, headed by President His Highness Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al
Nahyan, as well as the significant efforts of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin
Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, and Their
Highnesses Supreme Council Members and Rulers of the Emirates, in improving the
country’s higher education and scientific research system.
Sheikha Fatima congratulated the graduates and wished
them success in their professional careers.
Dr. Ahmad Belhoul Al Falasi, Minister of Education,
highlighted the importance of education in the process of sustainable
development, pointing out the significant attention given by the UAE’s
leadership to the efforts to produce skilled and qualified generations.
He then thanked Sheikha Fatima for supporting the
female students of national universities.
Dr. Zaki Anwar Nusseibeh, Cultural Advisor to the UAE
President, and Chancellor of the UAEU, congratulated the UAE’s leadership on
the occasion of the graduation ceremony, under the patronage of Sheikha Fatima,
lauding her support for women’s education and empowerment.
Noura bint Mohammed Al Kaabi, Minister of Culture and
Youth and President of Zayed University, thanked Sheikha Fatima for supporting
the 20th batch of graduates of Zayed University.
Dr. Abdulrahman Al Awar, Minister of Human Resources
and Emiratisation and President of the HCT, thanked Sheikha Fatima for her
keenness to celebrate outstanding female graduates every year.
Source: Khaleej Times
--------
Women Earthquake Victims Neglected For Lack Of Female
Physicians In Afghanistan
June 25, 2022
Khost residents said that due to the lack of female
physicians in the province many of the injured women have not yet been treated.
They say that in the current situation, they are
facing a shortage of medical facilities in the hospitals.
“There are no female physicians. There are a number of
injured women and there is no physician for them,” said a resident of Khost.
“We have suffered a lot of casualties. Women and
children have been injured. We do not have a female physician,” said another
resident of Khost.
Meanwhile, a number of international organizations,
including Save the Children and the United Nations Office for the Coordination
of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA), have expressed concerns over the poor health
conditions of those injured in the deadly earthquake of Khost and Paktika.
“Save the Children has grave concerns for more than
118,000 children who may have been impacted by the earthquake in Afghanistan’s
south-east. We have reports of people sheltering out in the open under plastic
sheets and many children are now most likely without clean drinking water, food
and a safe place to sleep,” Save the Children said in a report.
“Cholera outbreaks in the aftermath of earthquakes are
of particular and serious concern. Already, 500,000 cases of acute watery
diarrhea have been confirmed across the country. Preparations to avoid an
outbreak are underway,” UNOCHA in Afghanistan said in a statement.
This comes as some of the world’s humanitarian
agencies including the World Health Organization (WHO), the Norwegian Refugee
Council and many other aid agencies have said that they will provide assistance
to the victims’ families of the deadly earthquake in the southeast of
Afghanistan.—Tolonews
Source: Pak Observer
https://pakobserver.net/women-earthquake-victims-neglected-for-lack-of-female-physicians/
--------
Pakistan President For Undoing Obstacles To Encourage
Women Choose Diplomatic Career
June 24, 2022
President Dr Arif Alvi Friday stressed the need to
tackle the obstacles for encouraging the women to choose diplomacy as a career
and provide them a conducive working environment.
The president, in his message on 1st International Day
of Women in Diplomacy observed on June 24, said it was also essential to create
enabling conditions to help them alleviate to higher decision-making positions.
He said such enabling conditions could be ensured by
overcoming deep-rooted legacies of gender bias which still hindered the
professional advancement of women.
He said the first International Day of Women in
Diplomacy was aimed at celebrating the achievements of women in diplomacy,
recognize and applaud their outstanding services.
The Day is also meant for making a pledge to promote
the full and equal participation of women at all levels of diplomacy.
The president said it is indeed encouraging that the
number of women ambassadors worldwide was increasing with the share of women
ambassadors going from 16% in 2018 to an approximate 22% in 2022.
“I am happy to note that Pakistani women diplomats are
and have been serving in various capacities from foreign ministers to foreign
secretaries and at many Ambassadorial positions in our embassies abroad,” he
remarked.
President Alvi believed that the Day would accelerate
the pace to achieve sustainable development and peace and democracy in Pakistan
and around the world.
“I am confident that with the right encouragement and
provision of a conducive environment we will be able to further improve women’s
participation and representation in diplomacy,” he added
Source: Pakistan Today
--------
US Supreme Court Eliminated the Constitutional Right
to an Abortion: Muslim Women Say Overturning Of Decision Will Hurt Everyone
By Zainab Iqbal
24 June 2022
Fatima* remembers every painstaking detail as if it
were yesterday.
Her parents had gone out for dinner and she stayed at
home with her uncle. She was wearing purple pyjamas under her Abaya. Her
T-shirt had a small hole near the collar.
She had never imagined that someone in her family
could betray her. In the few hours that her parents were gone, she was raped.
Fatima soon found out she was pregnant. Without the
support of her immediate family, she left home and eventually met a woman at a
mosque in Connecticut that offered to help. A week later, she had an abortion.
Speaking to Middle East Eye, she says she doesn't know
how she would have coped if she had been forced to keep the baby. But now,
women across the US might have to face that exact reality.
On Friday, the US Supreme Court eliminated the
constitutional right to an abortion. The Court overturned Roe v Wade, a 1973
landmark decision which ruled that the constitution protects a pregnant woman's
right to choose to have an abortion. Now, the question of abortion legality
will be decided by each state.
It's a decision that will have an impact on Americans
from all walks of life.
"I would consider myself a practising Muslim. I
try my best to abide by the Quran and the Sunnah [teachings of the Prophet
Muhammad]. Based on my faith, I know I did the right thing. I know it was ok
for me to have an abortion. Islam gave me that right," Fatima said.
"But now this country doesn’t recognise these rights. What will other
women like me do?"
Fatima explained that she still would have ended her
pregnancy, had abortion been outlawed ten years ago. She said she was affected
both physically and mentally just by knowing she was carrying a child born out
of rape.
"I think what these lawmakers don’t understand is
that by overturning Roe v Wade, access to safe abortion will no longer exist.
The keyword is 'safe.' Women will still
get an abortion. We will find a way," she said. "Women like me who
were sexually assaulted will get an abortion even if it actually kills
us."
Islamophobic tropes
According to the majority of Sunni Muslim scholars,
abortion is permitted for health reasons if it is carried out before 120 days.
If there is an extreme danger to the mother or child, then the time period can
be extended.
Asifa Quraishi-Landes, a legal scholar and professor
at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where she teaches Islamic law, says
religious minorities within the US are feeling unseen. She says that women
should be able to continue going to their imam or rabbi to make their own
decisions rather than have to contend with state-imposed decisions.
"It is signalling that the state is aligning with
one particular view within the Christian community and using the power of the
state to impose that particular Christian view on everybody. And that should be
a concern to any religious minority," she said.
Many have been referring to the Supreme Court's
decision as being akin to "sharia". But according to Quraishi-Landes,
apart from being an Islamophobic trope, the rhetoric also unnecessarily drags
Muslims into the conversation over the Christian right's crackdown on LGBTQ and
women's rights in America.
"The complaint is basically you're being
theocratic. But instead of saying theocratic, they say: 'that's sharia', with
the presumption that sharia insists that the state should impose moral
religious values on everybody," she said.
"But if you look at the history of Muslims, that
is actually not the case at all."
Denise Ziya Berte is the executive director of
Peaceful Families Project, a non-profit organisation working toward preventing
various types of abuse in Muslim families.
She explained how the overturning of Roe v Wade
"makes the Christian standard of this idea of 'conception at birth' the
law of the land" and that's not actually how Islamic law addresses the
issue.
"The multitude of sort of issues around Roe v
Wade and Muslim women, especially in the area of domestic violence, is mostly
about power and control; having to follow a law that is not our law," she
said.
"What domestic violence is, is a system of power
and control. And when women are in most danger is when they have less power and
control either socially, legally, or economically."
'I would do it again'
Kavita Mehra is the executive director for Sakhi for
South Asian Women, a New York-based organisation that serves survivors of
gender-based violence through direct service, advocacy, technical assistance,
and community outreach.
She explained how there is a direct linkage between
gender-based violence and the overturning of Roe v Wade.
"[The overturning of Roe v Wade] is essentially
state-sanctioned, state-imposed, gender-based violence to women because
essentially, it's preventing individuals from getting something or being able
to fully utilise their bodies or have access to health care and have
determination over their own bodies," she said.
"Survivors of gender-based violence have people
stepping into how they control their bodies and their lives. And so this is
very much pervasive. It's like a woman's body is no longer her own. It's being
controlled by individuals who are inflicting some form of power onto
them."
Sakhi has had many cases where survivors of domestic
violence have reached out and wanted to have an abortion. In 2020, the
organisation worked with 375 survivors. In 2021, the number went up to 450.
Now, Mehra is expecting that number to increase even more.
"The decision to overturn Roe v Wade won't have
an impact on survivors in New York City, but it will impact those across the
country, especially in the 26 trigger states where Roe v Wade will be
immediately overturned," she said.
There are 13 states with "trigger bans" that
are designed to take effect as soon as the law is overturned, and in several
other states where anti-abortion laws were blocked by the courts and now
legislation will become active again.
For women like Fatima, hearing talk of abortion take
over the news and politics is too much to bear. A decade after she went through
her own, it doesn't get any easier.
"I pray no woman has to go through what I went
through, what I am still going through. Women don't just have an abortion and
go ahead with the rest of their day. It is not like that. We have an abortion
and that sticks to us like glue for the rest of our lives. I didn't ask for any
of this to happen to me. But I did and now I have to live with it," she
said.
"Someone invaded my body and I stood up for
myself, all by myself. And I would do it again with or without laws protecting
me. And I can assure you that every woman would do the same."
Source: Middle East Eye
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/roe-v-wade-us-muslim-women-say-overturning-hurts-everyone
--------
UN
body to hold urgent debate on women, girls’ rights in Afghanistan
24
June, 2022
The
UN’s top human rights body is to hold an urgent debate next week to discuss the
erosion of rights of women and girls in Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover
nearly a year ago.
Human
Rights Council spokesman Rolando Gomez said Friday that the Geneva-based rights
body was expected hold the debate on July 1 as part of its ongoing summer
session, following a request for the discussion by the European Union and
France.
In
a letter seeking the session, the EU and French ambassadors wrote that they
were “profoundly concerned about the growing erosion of respect for human
rights and fundamental freedoms of women and girls by the Taliban” since their
return to power last August.
They
cited Taliban restrictions on schooling, employment, freedom of movement and
full participation in public life, and called on the 47-member-country rights
body to consider adopting a resolution on the matter.
A
draft resolution would be presented “as soon as possible,” wrote EU Ambassador
Lotte Knudsen and French Ambassador Jerome Bonnafont in the letter.
Source:
Al Arabiya
--------
Scholar
Stresses Role of Women in Religious Research Following Islamic Revolution
June
25, 2022
This
is according to Dr. Yahya Jahangiri who offered a lecture on the issue on
Saturday at a conference titled “Religion, Religious Organizations, Strategies
and Practices of Deradicalisation: Gender Aspect”.
After
the Islamic Revolution, women played as much role in expanding religious
studies as they had done during the past 14 centuries, he told IQNA while
offering a summary of his speech.
According
to Jahangiri, only a handful of women active in this arena could be found
before the Islamic Revolution in universities and seminaries but there has been
a sharp increase in this number after 1979 with the establishment of
specialized institutions that train women researchers in religion.
“Today,
religious research in Iran is not men-centered as both men and women are
working in this field,” he added.
Organized
by Russian Science Foundation and hosted by Dagestan State University, the
event aims to obtain new data on the role of women in Islam, religious
organizations and countering social threats, terrorism, and ideological
extremism. The conference will wrap up on Sunday.
Source:
IQNA
--------
Female
mountaineers set eyes on becoming first Pakistani women to summit K2
June
25, 2022
Two
female mountaineers have set their eyes on doing something which no other
Pakistani woman has done so far — scaling the world’s second-highest mountain
K2 at 8,611 m.
K2
is considered to be one of the most difficult peaks to scale and there are less
than 10 women who have successfully summited this mountain.
This
year two Pakistani women climbers – Sa-mina Baig and Naila Kiani – have set
their eyes on reaching the top of K2.
Samina,
who in 2013 became the first Pakistani woman to climb Everest, has already
reached the K2 basecamp from Skardu and will move to Camp 1 in a day or two.
Her
summit is expected to be completed by the third week of July but it will be
depending on weather conditions at the mountain. She made two attempts – in
2015 and 2021 – to summit K2 but accidents and weather conditions forced her to
abort her expedition then.
Naila,
who now lives in Dubai with family, has also arrived in Pakistan on Thursday
night and will move to Skardu on Saturday before trekking to the K2 base camp.
Kiani
was the first Pakistani woman to climb 8,035m Gasherbrum II, which also made
her the first-ever Pakistani woman to climb an 8,000 inside Pakistan.—Agencies
Source:
Pak Observer
https://pakobserver.net/female-mountaineers-set-eyes-on-becoming-first-pakistani-women-to-summit-k2/
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URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-women-feminism/us-supreme-court-abortion-constitutional-right/d/127324