Conservative Muslim and Christian Egyptian families, have their daughters circumcised as a means to preserve their chastity. Recent studies revealed that about 90 per cent of Egyptian women have been subjected to the practice.

In June, the health ministry banned doctors and nurses from carrying out the procedure. The announcement followed the death of an 11-year-old girl in Upper Egypt as a result of the procedure. Medics who carry out circumcisions may face imprisonment and being stripped of their medical licenses.

While al-Badri argues that the practice is necessary in curbing women’s sexual inclinations, women’s rights activists and physicians disapprove of his view.

“Many of the circumcised women who seek our help were traumatised having no ability to lead a normal sex life, which affects their relationships with their husbands,” said Nihad Abul-Qomsan, head of the Egyptian Centre for Women’s Rights.

“No one of the sheikhs coming up with such arguments has ever considered in his agenda the deteriorating socio-economic conditions we are undergoing,” she noted. “Instead they try to play the role of the Islam advocates.”

Egypt’s top Islamic and Christian authorities were quick to voice support for the ban, saying the practice had no basis either in Koran or in the Bible. “The constitution is based on the Islamic sharia law, which does not stipulate FGM, giving a wife the right to enjoy sex with her husband,” Khalil Mustafa Khalil, who holds a masters degree in FGM legislation, told the independent al-Badeel newspaper.

In the 1950s, the Egyptian government tried to stop midwives from performing the procedure, while allowing doctors to do so, in a bid to minimise the risk of families who insist on circumcising their daughters, doing so in unsafe conditions.

Public outcry followed the 1994 CNN television broadcast of the procedure being performed on a 9-year-old girl by a barber. The minister of health at the time decreed that female circumcisions should be performed only one day a week at government facilities, and by trained medical practitioners, only in the even that they failed to persuade the parents from going through with it.

According to the World Health Organization, FGM comprises all procedures involving partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs whether for cultural, religious or other non-therapeutic reasons.

Muslims and non-Muslim girls and women alike residing mainly in sub-Saharan Africa, including but are not limited to Egypt, Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, Kenya and Chad. A more minor form of the procedure is also undertaken in some parts of the Middle East and South Asia.

Late Monday night, one of those many conflicted Muslim teens died, succumbing to injuries she received at the hands of her own father, if the police version of events is true. Friends said the 16-year-old Mississauga teen, Aqsa Parvez, had enraged her parents by refusing to don a hijab, the Islamic headscarf worn by some Muslim women.

Canadian Muslims condemned the slaying, calling it an extreme and reprehensible perversion of Islam. But some said the cultural clashes that reportedly precipitated the killing - a teenager’s rebellion against her strict, devout father - are playing out within Muslim families across the country and must be addressed.

“This is a wake-up call for law enforcement to tighten its grip on incidents like this,” said Farzana Hassan, president of the Muslim Canadian Congress.

“The atmosphere is unfortunately there for something like this to happen again. People from back home are coming to Canada with these very rigid notions of religiosity that makes them do these things - that enrages them to ensure compliance to such an extent.” Ms. Parvez’s friends told reporters the Grade 11 student would wear a hijab on the bus to school and change into Western-style clothing after arriving at Applewood Heights Secondary School in Mississauga. The family infighting over her dress had become so intense that Ms. Parvez temporarily moved out of their two-storey Mississauga home in September, friends said.

Ms. Parvez’s father, Muhammad Parvez, 57, appeared in a Brampton, Ont., court yesterday, charged with murder. Her brother, Waqas Parvez, 26, is charged with obstructing police. Police have so far refused to say how Ms. Parvez died.

The tragedy appears to be an extreme case of the cultural and religious clashes that roil many families in Canada. “So many girls are trying to live a faith-based life within a larger secular society,” said Ausma Khan, editor-in-chief of Muslim Girl magazine. “They are trying to fit in with friends and stay true to Islamic values. It can be a struggle.”

Frustrated parents often phone Saudia Azeez of the social services department at the Islamic Foundation of Toronto with issues that face all parents of teens: missed curfews, slacking grades, too much time spent with a boyfriend, or pregnancy, Ms. Azeez said. Other conflicts are more culturally specific. “It’s unrealistic expectations sometimes,” she said. “Parents come to a country and there’s really the illusion that their kids are going to be just like them.”

Seeking help can be difficult, Ms. Azeez said, because parents may feel ashamed, or don’t know what services are available. There’s also a need for programs geared specifically to minorities to accommodate language and cultural needs, she said.

In the past, that shame has led to murder - sometimes called “honour killings” - in other countries, but cases are rare in North America. A court in British Columbia convicted Rajinder Atwal of murder in the July, 2003, stabbing death of his 17-year-old daughter, Amandeep, who died shortly after she moved in with her non-Sikh boyfriend, whom she had been dating secretly.

There have been several high-profile cases in Europe, including the death of 20-year-old Banaz Mahmod, whose father and uncle were given life sentences in London this summer for killing the young woman whom they believed had shamed their family by leaving her marriage and finding another lover.

Tarek Fatah, the outspoken founder of the Muslim Canadian Congress, said this type of violence against women will continue until certain religious leaders quit pressing young woman to wear headscarves.

يقال أن الفلسفة اليونانية تمثل البداية الحقيقية نحو تأكيد استقلال الفكر بذاته بعيدا عن عالم الأسطورة، ولكن ليست الفلسفة هي موضوعنا الرئيسي هنا، ولكنه استقلالية الفكر، والمبدأ، والرأي…

 لعله لا يخفى على البعض أن مجتمعاتنا الشرقية ما زالت تفكر في نفس الأطر بحجة الحفاظ على العادات والتقاليد والتي من الممكن أن  تتضارب مع المنطق أو الدين، لذلك أصبح من الطبيعي جدا أن تستصعب تغيير ما هو عليه الحال من تراكم الخبرات المدعاة من أفراد وجماعات، متأملا انك ستساعد في التغيير الايجابي للأفضل، وأيضا من الطبيعي جدا أن تسأل عن ما هو الأفضل؟؟ 

يتضح لنا مع الوقت أن هناك مشكلة المصطلحات في مجتمعاتنا العربية ، فمثلا عندما نقول عن فلان انه ليبرالي الفكر، فهذا يعني عند أفراد انه متحرر من جميع القيود التي قد تفرض من قبل الدين أو المجتمع أو البيئة المحيطة بما في ذلك العادات والتقاليد، وعند أفراد آخرين انه مستعد لتقبل أو مناقشة أي فكر آخر مع الحفاظ على مبادئه وقيمه الخاصة((مع استثناءات)) ، فترى من ذلك تفاوت واضح جدا عند التعامل مع مختلف الفئات ، لذلك يجب تخصيص مجهود ليس بالسهل ولا باليسير لتغيير بعض المفاهيم قبل أن نتحدث بأريحية عن حقوق المرأة.

 أذكر هنا حادثة حصلت معي قبيل ذهابي لدولة الكويت، كنت في أحد المتاجر في عمان، صدفة بدأ صديقي بالحديث معي عن موضوع زيارتي للكويت والهدف منها، وما إلى ذلك ، فوجدت شخصا تبدو عليه هيئة المواطن المتمسك بشدة بالعادات والتقاليد أو حتى الدين كما يدعي البعض، ((يجب أن انوه هنا أن الدين غير مرتبط بأشخاص و أفعالهم)) ، فقال: هل أنت متأكد من انك تعمل من اجل حرية المرأة وحمايتها (كما تدعي) من الاضطهاد والعنف، أم تحريرها من العفة والشرف؟؟حقيقة لقد صدمت من طرحه المفاجئ لموضوع لطالما ارق مضاجع الكثير ممن يدعون حماية المرأة وهم بأفعالهم إنما يفرضون قيود هي لم تكن بمكان لا بدين ولا بفكر ولا حتى تقبله نواميس الكون…في الحقيقة أنني اتخذت موقف المحاور ((وليس المدافع، لأني مقتنع تماما بأنني لست على خطأ)) منه على أمل إيصال فكرة أو الدفاع عن فكرة قد تسعفني في محاولتي لإقناعه بأن حرية المرأة لا تعني خلعها للعفة والشرف كما روج لها البعض فقط لتنفيذ أجندات معينة، وأنا اكرر، ليس للدين علاقة بهؤلاء، إنما هي أجندات فردية لأهداف سياسية كانت أو غير ذلك…

المهم أنني في كل مرة أجد فيها نفسي في موقف كهذا ، أتذكر انه ((لا يجب أن نتكلم إلا إذا كنا لا نستطيع الصمت)) المهم أنني مع محاولاتي التي باءت بالفشل لإقناعه بان المناداة بحقوق المرأة ليست مناداة بخلع المرأة من عرين العفاف والشرف..فبعدما احتد النقاش تارة وهدأ تارة أخرى ، نقل دائرة النقاش إلى ، هل عقيدتي كمسلم سليمة أم لا؟ ((كما ترون انتقل الهجوم الآن على عقيدتي..!!)) فاتضح لي أن المشكلة ليس الاعتراف بحقوق المرأة أم لا ، وإنما المشكلة في مفهوم ((حقوق المرأة)) المتجذر بشكله الخاطئ عند البعض، بدون أن يملك أدنى دليل على مشروعية فعله أو إدانته حتى للغير، وذلك إنما يتم تحت الانصياع لمشاعر وحتى مصالح فردية قد تطغى وتمحو أي بصيص لأمل، لنشر العدالة والمساواة للمرأة العربية..!!!  

(Othello : then must you speak of one that loved not wisely, of one not easily jealous, but ,being wrought, perplexed in the extreme; of one whose hand like the base Indian threw a pearl away richer than all his tribe�)

What does Othello gain from all the glorious victories that he achieved in Italy and Europe when he committed the mistake of his life? The answer is nothing, and he deserves to die dishonored; yes dishonored because he doesn�t understand what honor is, and he looks for it in the red drops of innocent Desdemona�s blood.

How many of that rash Othello do we have in our midst today, living with us, breathing the same impure air of the Middle East that we breathe; they might be people we know and see frequently.

The last Othello I heard about is from Syria, and what a hair-raising story that was! This person had unjustified suspicions that his wife was cheating on him, and one night he heard noises coming from the roof of his house in a late hour; brave Othello held his gun and went up to find out who was there. He didn�t find any trace, but his sick mind told him that that was his wife�s lover trying to get in. What he did was that he shot HIS WIFE two fatal bullets and she died directly. It was found out later that the noises were that of a CAT! ( read the story in details in Arabic on my blog http://ghashmary.blogspot.com )

But still the future is in our hands, and hand in hand we can change the world. All I need from you is to support LAHA the new Mideast feminist initiative to save the innocent souls of our women.