Columns

This week stress on female virginity is put on blast, a women’s rights book is allowed onto Malaysian shelves, and the burqa debate continues in France and Denmark.

This week, Muzzammil Hassan changes his defense and says he was the victim; Pakistani scientist Aafia Siddiqui is on trial in New York for shooting at U.S. officials while in custody in Afghanistan; a limited burqa ban in France may be easier to pass on the grounds of security than a total ban; and a Malaysian court ends the ban of book on challenges facing Muslim women.

This week, the burqa ban discussion continues in France, attempts to outlaw hair straightening are rejected in Indonesia, FGM finds new opponents in Mauritania, and Hamas’s Islamic veil project is highlighted.

This week, a €700 fine for burka clad women to be voted on in France, Coptic girls continue to be kidnapped and converted to Islam, a battered women’s shelter provides refuge for Muslims in Baltimore, the culprits who maimed a Pakistani woman receive unusual and severe sentences, and world religions play a key role in the oppression and liberation of women according to the Elders.

This week, violence against women in Gaza is highlighted along with a Canadian Muslim women calendar. Muslim punk music and niqab bans continue to ruffle feathers and a Chinese professor speaks out about the Uighur, predominantly Muslim, minority.

The attempted Christmas Day airplane bomber may have written 300 posts on the Internet about his struggles, brainwashed boy flees the Taliban just before pulling the pin on his suicide vest, and an increase in gender segregation in Iran is reported.

This week, the widow of Ayman al-Zawahiri takes up the call of her late husband, a story on Muslim women bankers, a variety of opinions and analysis on veiling, and a book that led five young Americans to join the Taliban – The Pact

This week, men don headscarves in Iran to mock authorities, an artificial paradise created by the Taliban to recruit young male would-be suicide bombers was seized, Indian investigators conclude that two Kashmiri women drowned and were not raped and murdered by Indian police as claimed by local residents, and in the view of the Christian Science Monitor, Muslim women are not required by the Qu’ran to observe a head covering.