"A Moroccan man who refused to shake hands with a French female official and whose wife wears the full Islamic veil has been denied French citizenship, the immigration ministry said Friday.

"A veteran Iranian human rights activist has warned that Sakineh Mohammadie Ashtiani, a mother of two, could be stoned to death at any moment under the terms of a death sentence handed down by Iranian authorities.

"The fact that in some way, the products that I'm buying is supporting [violence against women in Congo] is something I can't live with. So it just seems like a no brainer," Smith said.

A Middle Eastern journalist has revealed that "one of the most explosive issues in the relations between Christians and Muslims of Egypt is the abduction of Christian Coptic minor girls, to force them to embrace Islam, after humiliating and demeaning them psychologically and mo …

"I was initially drawn to exploring the prevalence of prostitution under Islam in 2001 after encountering impoverished Afghan widows in the refugee camps of the North-West Frontier Province in Pakistan.

"Most people in the UK associate Islam with extremism and the repression of women, a survey has suggested.

"A former member of the Dutch parliament and longtime human rights advocate, Ayaan Hirsi Ali has lived in constant threat for her outspoken beliefs and collaboration with controversial director Theo van Gogh (who was murdered by a radical Islamist).

The video speaks for itself

"Five female news presenters at the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera satellite television channel have resigned over conflicts with management over dress code and other issues, a journalist there conveyed on Sunday.

"Saudi law forbids women to socialize with unrelated men or walk in public without a male guardian, other than her husband, father or brother.

"Men on motorcycles splattered 15 students, teachers with acid in Kandahar. The men squirted the acid from water bottles onto three groups of students and teachers walking to school Wednesday, principal Mehmood Qaderi said.

When a Saudi religious policeman questioned a young couple walking together in an amusement park he got a painful surprise - when the woman suddenly attacked him. The officer, from the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, asked the pair to confirm their …

The United States and 12 other Western democracies kept silent this week as Iran was nominated for membership of the United Nations' Commission on the Status of Women, thus enabling Iran to get the seat.

"The following excerpts are from a TV report on Komalah, a Kurdish opposition group fighting Iran, which aired on Al-Arabiya TV on March 18, 2010.

"I vacillated pretty heavily between the urge to burst out laughing and the impulse to bang my head against the wall reading about Sue Ostler's flirting courses for women in a recent Guardian article.

"With army service mandatory by law, women have always played a large role in the Israeli Defence Forces. Women represent a 1/3 of all IDF soldiers and can serve in any combat or supportive role.

"Who doesn't support ending violence against women across the world?

"A 16-year-old girl was buried alive by relatives in southeastern Turkey in a gruesome honor killing carried out because she reportedly befriended boys, the Anatolia news agency reported Thursday.

A glimpse of political / social debate within Saudi Arabia.

"The world's response to Haiti is fully warranted - anything less would be reprehensible.

"The article, which was published on 11 December, has sent ripples through the blogosphere due to its provocative content and tone. In the article, Nadine asks why Muslim men are allowed up to four wives, while women must settle with one husband.

"Rayhana is starring in At My Age, I Still Hide to Have a Smoke, a play she wrote about a group of women who chat about their lives during a visit to an Algiers spa. The sell-out play features unflattering views on Muslim men.

"Women's magazines have come under fire in recent years, and for good reason.

December 16, 2009 on BBC World News "Hunger to Learn" - ..

"Honour killings" are now running at the rate of one a month, it has emerged, following a shocking rise in violent crimes committed in Britain in the name of religion.

"Cyrus Nowrasteh is soft-spoken and polite, not the qualities you would expect from a man who has directed The Stoning of Soraya M., one of the most disturbing and controversial movies you will ever see.

" BEIRUT: The road to equality is still a long one in Lebanon. The promises for reform made after the culmination of the 1974-90 Civil War, especially those regarding women's rights, have not yet been fulfilled. "

""I've been trying to open a bank account for my two sons for 10 years now, but I was continuously told that only my husband could sign the papers," Lebanese-American Barbara Batlouni told AFP.

"While it is impossible, given their diversity, to paint one picture of women living under Islam today, it is clear that the religion has been used in most Muslim countries not to liberate but to entrench inequality.

NYALA, Darfur — When Sudanese President Omar Al Bashir was indicted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in March, he responded by expelling 13 international aid agencies from Darfur and disbanding three other domestic relief groups.

"PRESIDENT NICOLAS Sarkozy's recent declaration to French parliamentarians was greeted with loud applause: "I say it solemnly," he said, "the burka is not welcome in France."

"Women may soon be banned from wearing tight trousers in parts of an Indonesian province that practices strict Islamic law, and offenders could see their attire cut up.

"Women scientists say they want to be treated equally by their male colleagues and employers, but at the same time, special accommodations and grants would be welcome, as it is much more difficult for women to pursue their research careers without having a "wife" to back them up.

As violence against women in Pakistan continues to grow, every new incident is eerily reminiscent of an earlier event that was equally if not more shocking. Two reports from Punjab on Monday are a blot on society's collective conscience.

"Lubna Hussein, the Sudanese woman found guilty of the crime of wearing trousers, may not have won her case, but she has done one important thing: made the Khartoum regime fear the world's response.-

wRecently, in Saudi Arabia, two sisters were murdered by their brother after they were picked up by the Saudi religious police on suspicion of hanging around with boys.

"QURAN 4:34 - "Men have authority over women because God has made the one superior to the other, and because they spend their wealth to maintain them. Good women are obedient. They guard their unseen parts because God has guarded them.

'A Sudanese woman has been jailed for a month after refusing to pay a fine for "dressing indecently" by wearing trousers, her lawyers say.

MAHMOUD Ahmadinejad announced on Sunday that for the first time since the 1979 revolution, women will be named to the Iranian Cabinet, a development the news media promptly described as a bid "to soften his hardline image'' and to "mollify the opposition . . .

"Millions of Afghan women will be denied their chance to vote in presidential elections this week because there aren't enough female officials to staff the women-only polling stations.

""The Stoning of Soraya M." is banned in Iran, just released in America, arriving in Canada around mid-July and soon to be distributed in the Middle East.

A sharp criticism of the abuse of women..

"George Galloway's confrontational approach to politics has created a malestrom for him. He stands accused of inflaming anti-British sentiment in Iran after its supreme leader publicly singled out "evil" Britain as the foremost enemy of the Islamic republic.

Pat Condell is a devout Atheist-- and quite controversial. I disagree with many of his views-- but he makes some excellent points in this video.

One of the more striking features of Iran's political tumult these past two weeks has been the prominent role of Iranian women in leading the pro-reform movement.

Dhaka (Asia News) – Rahima Akter, a woman from Noagon (Daudkandi sub-district, eastern Bangladesh), was mercilessly whipped until she lost consciousness after she dared to file a paternity claim against a married man with children.

ABU QASH — Rofayda Qaoud — raped by her brothers and impregnated — refused to commit suicide, her mother recalls, even after she bought the unwed teenager a razor with which to slit her wrists.

Excerpt: ""Arab News, a Saudi English-language daily newspaper based in Riyadh, reported that Judge Hamad Al-Razine said that "if a person gives SR 1,200 [$320] to his wife and she spends 900 riyals [$240] to purchase an abaya [the black cover that women in Saudi Arabia must wea …

"A BRITISH air stewardess was sacked for refusing to fly to Saudi Arabia after she was ordered to wear a traditional Islamic robe and walk behind male colleagues.

"Never have women achieved equality by somebody coming in and giving it to them. We can't bomb our way into equality."

"The number of state-sanctioned executions almost doubled last year. A report by Amnesty International shows Iran, Saudi Arabia and China as being responsible for 90 per cent of all executions in 2008.

"The Middle East's decades-long population boom is coming to an end, according to new United Nations data. In fact, eight of the 15 countries that witnessed the greatest decrease in fertility since 1980 are Middle Eastern, led by the Islamic Republic of Iran.

"A still-unpublished report from Denmark's National Organization of Shelters for Battered Women and Their Children (LOKK) indicates that an increasing number of young people from minority ethnic groups are seeking help as a result of family threats or violence, according to the C …

"Afghan student-writer Sayed Perwiz Kambakhsh was sentenced to death for insulting Islam. The 23 year-old student and writer downloaded an anti-Islamic report from the internet in 2007 relating to the role of women in Islamic societies and handed copies out to his friends.

"Here in Washington DC, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum hosted a premier of Save Darfur's short documentary, Reclaiming Dignity, and a panel discussion on the topic.

Her Interview with Frontpage: In my first interview on Al Jazeera I was asked why are you trying to be American more than Americans? I responded that I don't take my American freedom, for granted, as many Americans do.

WE ARE AT WAR. Like it or not, some Muslims have declared a holy war against you and me. Many innocent people will die because some fanatics are hell-bent on destroying us. We must fight them or we will lose this war by default. And we must fight them aggressively.

One of the issues that we discussed in our interview was the need for the left in this country to take the lead in advancing a strong and coherent critique of radical Islam.

" a Melbourne Islamic cleric has told his male followers they can force their wives to have sex and hit them if they are disobedient.

But if the acid attack against Shamsia and 14 others — students and teachers — was meant to terrorize the girls into staying home, it appears to have completely failed.

"Terrorism in this part of the world usually means bombs exploding or hotels burning, as the latest horrific scenes from Mumbai attest.

In a tangle of bushes and trees outside a remote village in southwest Pakistan, six close male relatives of three teenage girls dug a 4-foot wide by 6-foot deep ditch, on a sweltering night in mid-July, and allegedly buried the girls alive.

" EGYPTIAN police have rounded up hundreds of teenage boys in Cairo in a day-long crackdown on sexual harassment. "We have arrested a large number of boys who were flirting with girls," Cairo's police director Faruq Lashin said.

'Britain's highest court has criticised Islamic law for discriminating against women...

"A journalism student who downloaded and distributed an article on women's rights from the Internet has been sentenced to 20 years in prison in Afghanistan.

What kind of an ideology causes a man to show no remorse for murdering his own daughter, but rants and raves at being served ham sandwiches while in prison? The media picked up the story quickly and asked, "Is Islam to blame?"...

The questions to Ahmadinjead weren't softballs: What about Iran's crackdown on human rights and dissidents? Iranian policy toward Israel? Treatment of women? Iran's foot-dragging on issuing visas even to peace movement representatives? And, of course, the big issues: What about a …

"Almost nine months have passed and a baby is now born in Britain. His name is Sharia.

"Governor Palin, the Republican nominee for vice president, was scheduled to speak today at a rally in Dag Hammarskjold Plaza to protest the appearance here of President Ahmadinejad of Iran. Her appearance was canceled by rally organizers who sought a nonpolitical event.

"Left-wing feminists have a hard time dealing with strong, successful conservative women in politics such as Margaret Thatcher. Sarah Palin seems to have truly unhinged more than a few, eliciting a stream of vicious, often misogynist invective.

"Basically, it's this: John McCain only endangers Democratic chances of victory this November, but Sarah Palin is an existential threat to the Democratic Party. She threatens a core element of the party's base - women.

"here is something ignoble about these elite, affluent, and well-connected observers in smug fashion savaging Palin, when — especially in the case of the sneering power-women — we should all at least grant that Palin is intrinsically bright, energetic, savvy, and independent  …

"Three teenage girls have been buried alive by their tribe in a remote part of Pakistan to punish them for attempting to choose their own husbands, in an "honour" killing case.

The three International Rescue Committee (IRC) workers were a Canadian, a British-Canadian and a Trinidadian-American. Five gunmen carried out an ambush in Logar province and opened fire with Kalashnikovs, a wounded survivor said.

'We all heard how the vice chancellor of Zanjan University, Hassan Madadi, was caught on camera, by students of Zanjan university, while abusing his position and trying to sexually assault a student girl who was due to appear before the university disciplinary committee.

"Football Under Cover is a documentary about a 2006 women's football match between Iran and Germany.

" Infuriated because his younger sister was going to clubs, wearing immodest clothing and planning to leave her family for a new life in New York City, Waheed Allah Mohammad stabbed her outside their Henrietta home, prosecutors allege.

"Firas Press reports that a Jordanian man was sentenced to only six months of jail after electrocuting his 16-year old daughter in 2006. She had admitted having an affair.

"In Istanbul, at least one person dies every week because of honor killings according to the report, which is the most comprehensive in its field. The number of murders committed for honor in the last five years has exceeded 1,000.

"Danish police have arrested a couple of Sudanese origin suspected of taking their two young daughters to Sudan to be circumcised. "Female circumcision usually involves the partial removal of the woman's genitals

"UN Watch expressed concern today after 114 UN General Assembly members failed to respect human rights standards by electing Pakistan to the Human Rights Council, with an even larger 142 supporting Bahrain.

"Police in Norway have arrested a Gambian-born man and charged him and his wife with subjecting five of their six daughters to genital mutilation, officials said on Friday.

"A court has sentenced a male activist for greater female rights in Iran to one year in prison, his lawyer and a fellow campaigner said on Monday.

"Iranian human rights activists in exile find a policy of "unconditional dialogue" hard to fathom."

"Ahmad O. stabbed his sister more than 20 times because the 16-year-old girl didn't live her life according to his values. Women's rights advocate Seyran Ates is now calling for German society to intensify its efforts to stop honor killings.

"Neighbors of Maryam, an 18-year-old girl who was raped in a pedestrian tunnel here recently, are claiming that her family will not take her back because of the stigma associated with victims of sex crimes. Maryam's family would not speak to Arab News.

"Those who think that England is a politically correct tyranny where bigots face interrogation by the cops for daring to speak their minds should look at what happened to Channel 4 when it tried to expose the bigotries of well-funded, Saudi-backed clerics working in Britain.

"A teacher was shot to death in northern Afghanistan after he gave a speech condemning suicide bombings, officials said Wednesday.

The following are excerpts from an interview with Egyptian author Dr. Sharif Hatata, husband of Egyptian feminist and activist Nawal Al-Sa'dawi. The interview aired on Al-Mihwar TV on March 31, 2008. "

Women's groups in Malaysia have reacted angrily to proposed government restrictions on women travelling abroad on their own. State media say the plan would require women to obtain written consent from their families or employers.

"So four years ago, after earning a university degree, Fatima—then in her early 20s—was escorted to Pakistan by her father to reluctantly wed the cousin. She was forced to remain with him at her in-laws' house for two weeks, where she says he repeatedly raped her.

"A former senior executive of Al-Jazeera English is seeking compensation that could be more than £1m, after her dismissal by the broadcaster.

"Farida (not her real name) was paid 40,000 Afghani (£400) last summer for marrying her 13-year-old daughter to her father's 20-year-old cousin. "The child, her freckled face half hidden behind a blue veil, says she does not like her husband, and begins to cry.

"A 33-year old Italian artist, Giuseppina Pasqualino, also known as Pippa Bacca, was found dead in Turkey on Saturday, after having been raped and murdered. Paqualino was hitchhiking towards Israel dressed in a wedding dress in an appeal for peace.

''A quiet epidemic of missing teenagers has Britain questioning its multicultural beliefs and asking why authorities have not acted to protect these children.

''A quiet epidemic of missing teenagers has Britain questioning its multicultural beliefs and asking why authorities have not acted to protect these children.

Some people claim that Muslims do not speak out against extremism.But this is untrue. Irshad Manji is but one example of a progressive Muslim-- who does have the courage to speak out. She is also a respected reformer (and a lesbian as well).