Thank Allah for Little Girls?
by Jonathan Tuttle
"The average woman is born into near slavery, leads a life of drudgery, and
dies invariably in oblivion. This grim condition is the stark reality of
half our population simply because they happen to be female." —Findings of
a 1985 Pakistani governmental commission investigating the status of women
in that country
It is disturbing that many Catholics have adopted a philosophical preference
for Islam over Judaism. Furthermore, in some instances, some prominent Catholics
have even made the unfortunate suggestion that there is much commonality
between the true Faith and the religion of Islam.
I have to believe that in doing so, they have little or no idea what Islam
preaches or how its followers manifest their faith in the real world. It's
time for an expose of what the Koran and Islamic Law actually teach, and
how that teaching is applied by its proponents.
It is not enough to simply say that life for Moslem girls is harsh and leave
it at that. Catholics must come to some understanding of what life is really
like for young girls in Islamic countries, so no reputable Catholic may ever
again make the absurd claim of commonality between the Mohammedan religion
and the one, true Catholic Faith.
Forced Mutilation
One grisly practice that is common in most Moslem countries is female circumcision,
or, as the Western medical authorities have more aptly named the practice,
female genital mutilation (FGM). Without going into graphic detail, this
process involves the removal of female genitalia.
According to the World Health Organization, "female genital mutilation is
normally performed by traditional practitioners with crude instruments, such
as knives, razors, blades and broken glass, usually without anaesthetics."
1 This report finds that, though some girls are mutilated at birth, "most
girls are mutilated between the ages of 4 and 12." 2
Not only is this practice completely medically unnecessary, barbaric, and
unethical, it carries significant health risks. The WHO report continues:
The practice of FGM often leads to complications. Short term complications
include severe pain, shock, hemorrhage, urine retention, ulceration of the
genital region and injury to adjacent tissue. Hemorrhage and infection can
cause death. Long-term complications include cysts and abscesses, keloid
scar formation, damage to the urethra resulting in urinary incontinence,
dyspareunia (painful sexual intercourse), sexual dysfunction, urinary tract
infection, infertility and childbirth complications. 3
Why do Moslems promote a practice which is clearly so damaging? It is seen
as a way of controlling sexual appetites. Since a girl who has undergone
mutilation experiences no pleasure in the marital act, she has no reason
to seek it; therefore, her virginity is preserved until her wedding night.
In other words, Moslem men are willing to risk the lives of young girls for
no other reason than to ensure the status of their young brides.
It is estimated that between 100 and 150 million women have undergone this
dreadful practice, almost entirely within Moslem countries.
Western Moslems and Moslem sympathizers are quick to point out that female
circumcision is not required by the Koran. That is true. However, it has
long been maintained by many Islamic scholars that Mohammed himself did recommend
the practice. Further, the Reliance of the Traveler, a classic manual of
Islamic sacred law, states that circumcision is "obligatory for both men
and women."
While the practice might ritualistically survive among tribes of other faiths,
it thrives in Islamic countries. Many Islamic clerics view it as essential
for women, and they tirelessly promote the procedure.
When Egyptian health authorities attempted to ban female circumcision in
1995, they met major opposition from Islamic clerics. Inter Press Service
reported that Egyptian Sheikh Yussuf el-Badry, in an attempt to establish
Islamic Sharia law, sued the health agency for ordering the ban. Eventually,
Egyptian authorities overturned the ban and legalized the practice. El Badry
saw this as a major victory for Islam.
Most Moslem women understand the danger of the practice, and it is routinely
performed against their wills. Many of these women have attempted to escape
before they were mutilated. The best known example of this is the case of
Fauziya Kassindja, a Moslem girl from West Africa, who immigrated to the
United States.4 Due to her tribulations, the United States government now
grants political asylum to those women who are fleeing Islamic authorities
in order to avoid mandatory mutilation.
Sentenced to Hell
Another item which makes Islam reprehensible is the protection of men who
forcibly violate women. Under Islamic Law, a man cannot be convicted on a
charge of rape unless it happens in the presence of four male witnesses who
are willing to testify against him. In the course of my research, I have
not been able to discover a single instance in which four men testified against
one of their own. A Moslem man can freely rape women without worry of conviction,
and this happens constantly in Islamic countries. To make matters worse,
if a Moslem woman charges a man with rape and she is unable to find four
male witnesses to testify against him, she is then charged with fornication.
In countries under Islamic law, the punishment for fornication is death.
Further, this situation of a woman facing a fornication charge for a rape
committed against her is hardly rare. As a matter of fact, it has been estimated
that a whopping 75% of women in Pakistani prisons are there on trumped-up
fornication charges5 —and many of them are under ten years old! Simultaneously,
the real criminals, the rapists, walk free.
The term "living hell" is often overused. Yet, without an appeal to this
cliche, it is difficult to summarize the predicament of young girls in Islamic
countries. Had Hobbes' been referring to their lives, he would have been
considered prescient with his quip that life is brutish and short. It is
impossible to read about these young girls and not be moved by pity.
In many Islamic countries, other than the alleged crime of fornication, the
most common crimes are insignificant or nonexistent violations of the Koran,
and many of these crimes are punishable by death. A significant percentage
of crimes in Islamic countries are capital crimes. Decapitation is common.
Young girls who are sentenced to death in Islamic countries present a problem
for Islamic authorities. Islamic clerics and rulers, unsatisfied with a mere
penalty of death for the accused, wish to ensure that these women will suffer
eternity in hell as well. However, quite a number of the accused girls are
virgins, and Islam teaches that virgins go to Paradise upon their deaths.
As a solution this problem, in order to ensure the damnation of the accused,
Islamic authorities will often order the prison guards to systematically
rape female prisoners before they are killed. According to Amnesty International,
this practice is widespread in Islamic countries. There is no way of knowing
the exact number of such cases, but suffice it to say that under the Khomeini
Revolution in Iran, twenty thousand girls and women were executed in the
first three years of the Ayatollah's rule.6 And Khomeini was a strict follower
of the Koran.
During Khomeini's rule, the minimum age for the death penalty for girls was
nine years old, and all these girls were systematically raped before they
were executed.
All this to ensure damnation. All under the sanction of law. All because
of the teachings of the Koran.
What this all adds up to is a very unpleasant picture. Those girls who are
in prison on fornication charges are actually victims of rape. The remaining
female prisoners are raped to ensure damnation. It is no exaggeration to
say that Islamic countries are nations of rape victims.
Institutionalized Pedophilia
All practicing Moslems revere Mohammed as the great prophet—the greatest
man who ever lived, or who could ever live. They seek to imitate him in every
conceivable way. This is bad news for women in Islamic countries, for Mohammed
had a penchant for little girls. When Mohammed was little over fifty years
of age, and already had at least nine wives and countless concubines, Mohammed
took a new six-year-old wife named Aisha, although Moslem historians claim
that he did not consummate this marriage until Aisha had achieved the ripe
old age of nine.7
Of course, defenders of Mohammed and Islam will argue that it was a "long
time ago," and girls used to marry younger then. Let's table that argument
for a moment and fast forward to the Islamic world of today. There is an
old saying: "Times change." In the case of the Islamic faith, it would be
more accurate to say: "Times don't change." In imitation of the prophet Mohammed,
Moslem men marry girls at the age of nine (and younger) all the time.
After the Revolution in Iran, girls as young as seven were allowed to be
married, with the approval of a physician, who could testify to her sexual
maturity. But even this minor stipulation was eventually dropped. Jan Goodwin
reports on an interview she conducted with an Iranian physican regarding
this situation:
"In villages where child marriage is most common, doctors don't even see
the girl," she told me. "They just take the family's word that she is physically
mature enough to marry. Consequently, we have had very young girls badly
injured when they have had what amounts to forced intercourse. Infection
sets in and they have died. Only with girls under seven did the Ayatollah
say that sex was forbidden." 8
This problem of pedophila is not specific to Iran. Pedophilia is not an Iranian
thing—it's an Islamic thing. Time magazine recently reported that in Afghanistan
and Pakistan, they found that two-thirds of second grade girls "were either
married or betrothed." 9
Second grade!
And they are not engaged to boys of the same age in a cute little arrangement
ceremony. Typically, they are engaged or married to men four or five times
their age. One ten-year-old girl in the camp was engaged to a man of sixty.10
Partially due to the fact that these girls have already undergone the sexual
mutilation of female circumcision, and partially due simply to their juvenile
biological makeup, these children suffer immensely when they are married.
In Egypt, honeymoon centers have been built outside communities "so that
the screams of the brides will not be heard." 11
There is no nice way to say it: Moslems across the world are practicing pedophiliac
rape, a most vicious form of child abuse, and nothing in their behavior contradicts
"true Islam." Since 9/11, we have constantly heard Moslems tell us that people
such as these "are not practicing true Islam." However, the men who pedophile
nine year old girls are practicing true Islam. Anyone who would argue otherwise
either does not understand the Islamic faith or is lying.
Slavery
Allah likes slavery, and he doesn't discriminate between little girls and
anyone else.
The Koran teaches: "Blessed are the believers who…restrain their carnal desires
(except with their wives and slave-girls, for these are lawful to them)."
12 Islam teaches: "For if a man purchases a slave girl, the purchase contract
includes his right to have sex with her." 13 Islamists have for centuries
preached that the rape of child slaves is perfectly commendable in the eyes
of Allah.
In modern times, Islamic countries practice widespread slavery. In the Islamic
Republic of Mauritania, child-slavery is common, as are slave raids. The
revolutionary Ugandan Lord's Resistance Army practices child sex-slavery
and military slavery on a wide scale. Although not technically a Moslem entity,
the LRA receives military and logistical support from the Islamic country
of Sudan.14
In Sudan, slavery is a way of life. According to a recent report conducted
by the American Anti-Slavery Group:
Accumulated evidence suggests the re-emergence of two particular forms of
slavery. The first is the women and child slaves used to look after cattle
and perform domestic and sexual services for Arab tribesmen in regions bordering
southern Sudan and the Nuba Mountains; the second involves children who are
captured and dispatched to military training camps or hard-line Koranic schools
where, it is alleged, attempts are made to transform them into Muslims who
are prepared to fight in the "holy war" against the south. 15
It would be imprecise to say that only Moslems practice slavery today. However,
it would be precise to say that the Islamic authorities are obeying the their
religion in taking slaves, beating them, mutilating them, and raping them.
All this is blessed by their religion.
Conclusion
Imagine for a moment the life of a young Christian girl in an Islamic country,
such as Sudan.
She is abducted from her parents in a slave raid at the age of four. She
is given a new Islamic name and, under gunpoint, forced to pray as a Moslem.
At age five, she is forced to undergo the torture of mutilation. At age six,
she is engaged to a man ten times her age. At age nine, she is married and
repeatedly forcibly raped. For the next year, she is beaten daily. At age
ten, she is forcibly raped by another Moslem man, and is sentenced to death
because of a charge of fornication. The night before her death, she is raped
by a prison guard and assured that she will spend eternity in hell. The next
day, she is whipped with lashes until she dies.
During her life, none of her perpetrators have once violated Islamic law.
Everything she was subjected to was sanctioned by the "most merciful Allah."
This is not an overdramatization. This is real life. This is the biography
of millions of girls. The fact that this is so horrific does not mean that
it is not happening in numerous countries to thousands of girls as you read
this right now.
Islam is the enemy of these millions of girls, and we do a supreme disservice
to them by attempting to reconcile the Islamic faith with the true Catholic
faith. Instead of trying to figure out how we can get Moslems more land,
discussing how much we all have in common, and having interfaith services
with Islamic revolutionaries, it is time we expose Islam for what it is:
the sworn enemy of Jesus Christ.
***
ENDNOTES:
1 (World Health Organization Press Release, UN AGENCIES CALL FOR END TO FEMALE
GENITAL MUTILATION, April 9, 1997)
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid.
4 Kassinjia, Fauyiza, Do They Hear You When You Cry, Delta, 1999.
5 Robert Spencer, Islam Unveiled, San Francisco: Encounter Books, p. 91.
6 Jan Goodwin, Price of Honor, Boston: Plume, 1995, p. 115.
7 Spencer, 47.
8 Goodwin, 113, 114.
9 Spencer, 48.
10 Spencer, 47.
11 Goodwin, 335.
12 quoted in Spencer, 63.
13 quoted in Cati, Married to Mohammed, Lake Mary, FL: Creation House Press
14 Amnesty International, 1 March 1999, Solidarity Action for Universal Rights:
Uganda
15 The American Anti-Slavery Group, Slavery in the Sudan: A Challenge to
International Law
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