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RAPE victims have led a chorus of disgust after one of Australia's leading Muslim clerics likened sex assault victims to pieces of meat who brought attacks upon themselves. In a Ramadan sermon to 500 faithful, Australia's Mufti Sheik Taj el-Din al-Hilaly said hungry cats couldn't be blamed if meat was left on the street. "If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside on the street, or in the garden or in the park, or in the back yard without a cover, and the cats come and eat it . . . whose fault is it, the cats' or the uncovered meat?" he asked. "The uncovered meat is the problem," he said in an apparent reference to victims of Sydney's gang rapes. "If she was in her room, in her home, in her hijab, no problem would have occurred," Sheik Hilaly said last month in Sydney. Tegan Wagner, who has been an advocate for women's rights since she was gang-raped by three brothers at age 14, said she was heartbroken by the sheik's comments. "I've spent the last four years trying to change what society thinks of rape and sexual assault victims," she said. "Then here this man comes and tells a whole generation of young men that women are meat." Many Islamic leaders condemned Sheik Hilaly's comments and Prime Minister John Howard described them as appalling. A 16-year-old victim of one of the gang rapes, whose family now lives in hiding, said Sheik Hilaly should attend rape counselling sessions. "Your comments and your words hurt me and also many other young girls," she said. "You want Australians to be more respectful of your beliefs and your cultural ways, but then you make these silly comments . . . you should be ashamed of the way you have spoken. "To all young women within Australia, please do not be offended by this sad man. The sheik thinks that by him degrading women to the rest of the Islamic society, it gets him respect. "OK sheik, now . . . your mistaken views on women have landed you in a situation where many average Australians will view you and some Muslim people as racist. "You are the one who is initiating the cultural problems we have today. "Maybe you too should stand trial when another one of your so-called good Islamic men are charged with rape." Mr Howard described the sheik's comments as appalling. "The idea that women are to blame for rapes is preposterous. I not only reject the comments, I condemn them unconditionally," Mr Howard said. The sheik was forced to apologise yesterday but claimed his comments were taken out of context. "I unreservedly apologise to any woman who is offended by my comments," he said. But he refused to retract his statements, saying his sermon was about prostitutes, sex outside marriage and "religious teachings on modesty". "This does not condone rape, I condemn rape and reiterate that this is a capital crime. I had only intended to protect women's honour," he said. His qualification contradicted his sermon recorded last month, in which he said women were weapons used by Satan to control men. The Islamic Council of Victoria and a score of federal MPs demanded Sheik Hilaly be sacked from his position. And sex discrimination commissioner Pru Goward called for his deportation. "It is incitement to a crime – young Muslim men who now rape women can cite this in court, can quote this man . . . their leader in court," Ms Goward said. "I think it is time he left." Sheik Hilaly was born in Egypt and came to Australia in 1982. He has Australian citizenship. Victorian Muslims said the sheik's comments were an insult to Islam. Victorian Islamic Women's Welfare Council chair Tasneem Chopra said Sheik Hilaly's comments were repulsive. AAP (27-10-2006) Mark Dunn/ Nicolette Casella/ Gerard McManus |
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THE nation's most senior Muslim cleric has blamed immodestly dressed women who don't wear Islamic headdress for being preyed on by men and likened them to abandoned "meat" that attracts voracious animals. In a Ramadan sermon that has outraged Muslim women leaders, Sydney-based Sheik Taj Din al-Hilali also alluded to the infamous Sydney gang rapes, suggesting the attackers were not entirely to blame. While not specifically referring to the rapes, brutal attacks on four women for which a group of young Lebanese men received long jail sentences, Sheik Hilali said there were women who "sway suggestively" and wore make-up and immodest dress ... "and then you get a judge without mercy (rahma) and gives you 65 years". "But the problem, but the problem all began with who?" he asked. The leader of the 2000 rapes in Sydney's southwest, Bilal Skaf, a Muslim, was initially sentenced to 55 years' jail, but later had the sentence reduced on appeal. In the religious address on adultery to about 500 worshippers in Sydney last month, Sheik Hilali said: "If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside on the street, or in the garden or in the park, or in the backyard without a cover, and the cats come and eat it ... whose fault is it, the cats or the uncovered meat? "The uncovered meat is the problem." ... He told The Australian the message he intended to convey was: "If a woman who shows herself off, she is to blame ... but a man should be able to control himself". He said if a woman is "covered and respectful" she "demands respect from a man". "But when she is cheap, she throws herself at the man and cheapens herself." www.theaustralian.news.com.au (26-10-2006) Richard Kerbaj |
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