HONOR KILLINGS

HONOR KILLINGS

Honour killing is not new news. However, it is only in the past decade that it is made known to the public especially after it became prevalent in western countries like Europe. Before I go any further on this topic, it is important that we know exactly what an honour killing is. From Wikipedia, an honour killing is the homicide of a member of a family or social group by other members, due to the belief of the perpetrators that the victim has brought dishonour upon the family or community.  Honour killings are directed mostly against women and girls, but have been extended to men. 

Human Rights Watch defines honour killings as acts of vengeance, usually death, committed by male family members against female family members, who are held to have brought dishonour upon the family.  A woman can be targeted by (individuals within) her family for a variety of reasons, including: refusing to enter into an arranged marriage, being the victim of a sexual assault, seeking a divorce - even from an abusive husband - or (allegedly) committing adultery. The mere perception that a woman has behaved in a way that “dishonours” her family is sufficient to trigger an attack on her life.

Honour killings date back to 1200 B.C. under the rule of Hammurabi  and other Assyrian tribes. They were also encouraged in ancient Rome, where male family members who did not take actions against the female adulterers in their family were "actively persecuted".  In ancient Rome, being raped was seen as dishonourable to the point of destroying a woman's life and reputation, and honour killing was supposed to be a "merciful" act. This is because the Roman law Pater familias  gave complete control to the men to do whatever they liked to their wives and children. The Greeks also deemed their women and children as socially below men. The Namus concept of ethical category and now more popularly used in a strong gender-specific context of relations within a family described in terms of honour, attention, respect/respectability, and modesty also seemingly promotes honour killings.  

This barbaric act is also apparent in many other different cultures and traditions.  It has been noted how in ancient Babylonian, Egypt, Chinese, North American Native American tribes and Persian cultures, women convicted of adultery were subjected to extreme punishments. In Babylonian societies, women suspected of adultery were forced to throw themselves into a river to prove they were innocent. In Egyptian culture, imprisonment, flogging, or mutilation were common punishments for women who had been convicted of adultery. Chinese culture suggested that husbands cut off the hair of adulterous women and then lead them to their death by an elephant trained to kill. Some Native American tribes punished adulterous women by cutting off their limbs and mutilating their bodies. In Persia, adulterous women were left to die after being placed into a well.

Honour killings know no geographical boundaries.  They happen everywhere. Some of the locations with the most number of honour killing cases are Europe, the Middle East, the Americas such as Canada, the United States and South America and South Asia such as Pakistan and India.  In western countries, the cases happen in areas with high number of immigrants. In India, many cases are results of people marrying without their family’s consent or marrying outside their caste. 

Every year in the United Kingdom, officials estimate that at least a dozen women are victims of honour killings, almost exclusively within Asian and Middle Eastern families. According to the United Nations Population Fund, an estimated five thousand women are victims of so-called honor killings.  Often cases cannot be resolved due to the unwillingness of family, relatives and communities to testify. A 2006 BBC poll for the Asian network in the UK found that one in ten of the 500 young Asians polled said that they could condone the killing of someone who dishonoured their family. The Women’s Rights Organisation is reported to have said about the victims as such: “about two-thirds are Muslim. Yet they can also be Hindu and Sikh.”  However, precise statistics of how many women are killed every year are hard to come by as the crimes usually go unreported. Frequently, women killed in honour killings are recorded as having committed suicide or died in accidents. 

Some of the victims of honour killings are sisters Amina and Sarah Said.  They were shot by their own father and were left to die. Another famous case is of Hatun Surucu , a Kurdish woman living in Germany. She was killed by three gunshots to the head by her youngest brother for divorcing her cousin whom she was forced to marry at the age of 16. Anooshe Sediq Ghulam , a 22-year-old Afghan refugee in Norway, was killed by her husband, Afghani Nasruddin Shamsi, in an honour killing. Anooshe had been abused by her husband and, with the help of the Norwegian social services, had divorced him and left him while taking the couple's two children, two boys aged 6 and 7. She was afraid for her life and contacted Human Rights Service for help. She was murdered on the way to court for her custody case.

The stoning of Du’a Khalil Aswad , a 17-year-old from the Yazidi faith for allegedly converting to Islam too sparked an international outrage. The case only came to light after videos of the stoning became viral and circulated on the internet.  During the stoning, which lasted approximately 30 minutes, Aswad can be seen in the video attempting to sit up and calling for help as the crowd taunts her and repeatedly throws a large chunk of rock or concrete on her head. After her death in the town square, Aswad's body was tied behind a car and dragged through the streets. She was buried with the remains of a dog, allegedly to demonstrate that she was worthless.

There is a severe lack of implementation of laws against honour killings.  Men convicted of this crime are given very light and minimum sentencing. The countries in which the law is interpreted to allow men to kill female relatives in a premeditated effort are Haiti and Jordan while Syria allows men to kill female family members without premeditation. On the other hand, countries where honour killing is not legal but is known to occur include Italy, Turkey, Pakistan and Egypt. For example, in Pakistan, women who made accusations of rape were required to provide four male witnesses. If unable to do this, the alleged rape could not be prosecuted in the courts. However, because the woman had admitted to sex outside of marriage, she could be punished for having sex outside of the marriage. Police enforcement, in situations of admitted murder, does not always take action against the perpetrator. Also, judges, rather than ruling cases with gender equality in mind, also seem to reinforce inequality and in some cases sanction the murder of women who are considered dishonourable.

In India, the National Commission for Women set up a statutory body in order to address the issues of honour killings among some ethnic groups in North India. This body reviewed constitutional, legal and other provisions as well as challenges women face. The NCW's activism has contributed significantly towards the reduction of honour killings in rural areas of North India. Activists have suggested that governments of countries affected by honour killings use Indian law as a model in order to prevent honour killings in their respective societies.

The irony of the situation is that Islamic laws uphold the rights of women. The Quran clearly states that raped women are not to be punished and the blame and punishment are to be put solely on the shoulders of the rapist: “And those who launch a charge against chaste women, and produce not four witnesses (to support their allegations) - flog them with eighty stripes; and reject their evidence ever after: for such men are wicked transgressors.”  The Quran also explicitly mentions that men and women are equal: “Never will I suffer to be lost the work of any of you, whether male or female, you are members, one of another…”  Moreover, Islam also elevates the status of women as child-bearers: “O mankind! Be careful of your duty to your Lord who created you from a single soul and from it created its mate and from them twain hath spread abroad a multitude of men and women. Be careful of your duty toward God in whom ye claim (your rights) of one another, and toward the wombs (that bear you).” 

Not only that, Islam strongly stresses the preservation of the right of life for each individual. “On that account We ordained for the Children of Israel that if anyone slew a person unless it be for murder or for spreading mischief in the land – it would be as if he slew the whole people: and if anyone saved a life, it would be as if he saved the life of the whole people. Then although there came to them Our Messengers with clear Signs, yet even after that, many of them continued to commit excesses in the land.”  Another Quranic verse also supports the sanctity of human life: “Who so slayeth a believer of set purpose, his reward is Hell for ever. Allah is wroth against him and He hath cursed him and prepared for him an awful doom.” 

There is also nothing Islamic about punishing rape victims according to Islamic scholars themselves. Imam Maalik (may Allah have mercy on him) said: “In our view the man who rapes a woman, whether she is a virgin or not, if she is a free woman he must pay a "dowry" like that of her peers, and if she is a slave he must pay whatever has been detracted from her value. The punishment is to be carried out on the rapist and there is no punishment for the woman who has been raped, whatever the case.” Furthermore, Ibn Abd al-Barr (may Allah have mercy on him) said: “The scholars are unanimously agreed that the rapist is to be subjected to the hadd punishment if there is clear evidence against him that he deserves the hadd punishment, or if he admits to that. Otherwise, he is to be punished (i.e., if there is no proof that the hadd punishment for zina may be carried out against him because he does not confess, and there are not four witnesses, then the judge may punish him and stipulate a punishment that will deter him and others like him). There is no punishment for the woman if it is true that he forced her and overpowered her, which may be proven by her screaming and shouting for help.” 

Besides that, Dr. Zahid Aziz says: "Since to falsely accuse a woman of illicit sex (fornication or adultery) is such a serious crime and grave sin in Islam, as indicated in the above verses, it is quite clear that to force a woman to commit such an act must be a much more heinous crime, deserving of a much greater penalty. If to tarnish a woman's honour and character by word of mouth is regarded so seriously by the Quran then obviously it is much more serious to assault her bodily and coerce her by physical force to commit that very same act a mere accusation of which destroys her honour. Exactly what the punishment for it should be, would be determined by the law of a Muslim country (assuming that it is a law sanely derived from the Quran and true Sunna), and then applied in different cases according to the seriousness of the offence.”  Many other religious scholars like Sheikh Atiyyah Saqr and Sheikh Muhammad Al-Hanooti who are eminent and well-known Muslim scholars have stated that Islam can never permit unjustifiable killing without any verdict issued by an authoritative law court and no one is permitted to take the laws in his own hands otherwise Allah has set very serious punishment for the violator. 

The western perspective of honour killing is a distorted one in which Islam condones this heinous act.  They make accusations based merely on what they see around them and what they read on the news. However, they do not provide any Islamic texts as evidence along with their accusations. They think that Muslim women are a backward lot compared to western women or other non-westerners like Japanese and Koreans Moreover, they also accuse Islamic scholars of sugar-coating what is written in the Quran and Sunna to make it look like women have equal rights as men.

Westerners also believe that we need their help in overcoming this problem. They say that the only reason some Muslim women feel they are not oppressed is because these women live in western countries and oppressive behaviours are not tolerable there. In fact we already have our own organizations in the Muslim world  working in a variety of ways for women’s rights. They do not realize that their intervention on other issues has done more harm than good to us.

How has honour killing affect the image of Islam? In a lot of ways starting from how it inflames the image of Muslim women as being oppressed and backwards. Non-Muslims believe that Muslim women do not have any rights at all be it in marriage, wealth or education. They think that these women are weak and second-class to the men. However, it is Islam who first granted the rights of inheritance to women even before the Europeans did so. This can be proven by the Quranic verse: “Unto the men (of a family) belongeth a share of that which parents and nearer kindred leave, and unto the women a share of that which parents and near kindred leave, whether it be little or much – a legal share.”  

Honour killing cases are also used by detractors to send wrong information to the community that Islam is a violent and unjust religion.  This further escalates into people becoming Islamophobes and making radical interpretations of Islam. These people then antagonize and pin every other violent case on Muslims. They also make accusations that women are simply objects of pleasures for men. They claim that the teachings of Islam are becoming a danger to women’s rights.

We, the community can help in stopping honour killings. First and foremost, we have to know that honour killing is not simply an abuse case.  It is premeditated as evidenced by the threats that the victim receive before their murders. The murders are also planned well and usually involve many family members such as the father, mother and brothers. Besides that, the perpetrators do not realize that what they are doing is wrong and are not condemned by their family as they think that their actions are done in the name of Islam. This is unlike the behaviour of an abuser who sometimes may show guilt or remorse. We should encourage and advise the victim to get immediate help before further damage is done. Together, we should also denounce this cruel act and remind everyone that violence is not acceptable in our religion.

Muslims should not turn a blind eye on their fellow Muslims who are about to commit this barbaric act. Many of us today are unwilling to address this issue for fear that it will further taint the image of Islam. However, this should not be so even when the perpetrators are those from our own faith. If this continues, irresponsible Muslims will violate Islamic laws even more and there go our principles of human decency, integrity and justice.  After all, the Quran clearly states that we should uphold justice: “O you who believe! Stand out firmly for justice, as witnesses to God, even as against yourselves, or your parents, or your kin, and whether it be (against) rich or poor: For God can best protect both. Follow not the lusts (of your hearts), lest you swerve, and if you distort (justice) or decline to do justice, verily God is well-acquainted with all that you do.”  Lastly, I would like to stress again that honour killings transcend religion. It is not an act of Islam but rather a cultural-tribal practice followed by backward criminals who use Islam to justify their heinous crimes. Islam does not tolerate any kinds of honour-related violence what-so-ever.