No comment:Saudi Cleric Promises “Paradise� to 14 YO Girls Who Have Sex W. Terrorists

[hetz]

Saudi Cleric Promises “Paradise” to 14-Year-Old Girls Who Have Sex with Terrorists



According to Sheikh Mohammed al-Arifi, these “temporary marriages for intercourse” (http://www.jihadwatch.org/2012/12/no-honor-among-thieves-iran-whines-about-saudi-cleric-approving-temporary-marriage-with-syrian-women.html) (an Islamic legalistic way of permitting prostitution or concubinage) will satisfy the militants’ sexual desires and boost their determination in killing Syrians.


I’m not sure I completely follow the logic of that last part, but I imagine that the Al-Nusra Front, despite its boasts that it is forcing its fighters to live a clean lifestyle without any smoking or drugs, may be having trouble keeping homicidal maniacs in the fight without sex and Islam is a practical enough religion that there’s always a wake to take the forbidden and make it permitted in the name of Jihad.
The Jihadis get to molest an underage girl and the girl is told by her family that if she goes through this, she’ll earn paradise and unlike most women, who are hellbound according to Mohammed (http://www.islamreview.com/articles/incredibleteachings.shtml#women), will not have to worry about the afterlife.
Islam. It’s really feminist.

A hard-line Wahhabi cleric in Saudi Arabia has recently issued a special religious decree that permits the militants in Syria to engage in short-term marriages with Syrian women.
Sheikh Mohammed al-Arifi said that the marriages between the foreign-backed militants and Syrian women will satisfy the militants’ sexual desires and boost their determination in killing Syrians.
He added that the marriages, dubbed by him as “intercourse marriages,” can be with Syrian females as young as 14 years old.
He also promised “paradise” for those who marry the militants.
Arabic sites provide more background stating the Sheik was upset that the Mujahadeen have gone for two years without sex, and that a temporary marriage of a few hours for girls over 14, divorced women and widows, will help them attain paradise.


http://frontpagemag.com/2012/dgreenfield/saudi-cleric-promises-paradise-to-14-year-old-girls-who-have-sex-with-syrian-sunni-fighters/

[Comrade Dracula]

This is utterly disgusting on countless levels, as is this al-Arifi character. Almost makes me wish there was a hell to send bastards like these to.

[hetz]

Note how it's a Saudi (!) cleric "allowing" terrorists to "marry" Syrian women and girls before raping them.

[cynicles]

Another in a long line of social achievements from the kingdom of horrors.

[Homo Songun]

Why are you uncritically posting links to far-right pig David Horowitz' website, and trash like "Jihad Watch" ?

There is a rotten smell here.

Also, Mohammed never said most women are going to hell. Any body with a brain could guess thusly, even if they don't speak Arabic.

[hetz]

Why are you uncritically posting links to far-right pig David Horowitz' website, and trash like "Jihad Watch" ? I don't even know who the fuck D. Horowitz is. It doesn't matter.
It might be some far-right site, but what matters is whether that actually happened or not.



There is a rotten smell here.Yes, a rotten smell of Jihadists-terrorists operating in Syria being given "spiritual support" ( :crying: ) from Saudi clerics.


Also, Mohammed never said most women are going to hell. Any body with a brain could guess thusly, even if they don't speak Arabic. Probably, but that's not the point.

EDIT: You're right, it's a far-right site, I simply didn't notice it, I just copy-pasted the relevant part. Sorry. Moderators can remove the link.

[Ocean Seal]

I don't even know who the fuck D. Horowitz is. It doesn't matter.
It might be some far-right site, but what matters is whether that actually happened or not.
Are you saying that the political position of the reporter might not have anything to do with the veridity of the article? The source is always relevant to the content. Take this as an opportunity to not jump on everything you read.

[Homo Songun]

It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with whether it is true or not. It is absolutely true that reactionary wahhabism is fucking up Syria. It's just weird to use Islamophobic blogs or whatever.

[l'Enfermé]

Shit if Bin Laden came up with that he would have overthrown America a long time ago.

[Raúl Duke]

The problem I see with the source is that the "news" site only cites a website called "Jihad Watch" and that site doesn't link to any sources to back up what it's saying.

...so I'm quite skeptical of the whole thing. Is there any other more relevant sources that can back this up? (If not, than it's probably just whack-job neo-con crap lies and this thread is worthless, discussing a possibly made up thing)

[Red Commissar]

The problem I see with the source is that the "news" site only cites a website called "Jihad Watch" and that site doesn't link to any sources to back up what it's saying.

...so I'm quite skeptical of the whole thing. Is there any other more relevant sources that can back this up? (If not, than it's probably just whack-job neo-con crap lies and this thread is worthless, discussing a possibly made up thing)

They all fall back on Press TV amusingly, and we know of course that Press TV is trying to point out the horrid nature of some of the more nutty rebel militias because it's tied to the government of Iran. In this case, they are covering al-Nusra Front which has emerged, at least in the media covering the conflict, as the largest of the religious-flavored groups. Unsurprisingly this whole conflict has made for some strange bedfellows in the sense that an Islamic theocracy that islamophobes would freak out over is their source of information in this respect.

It's likely that the guy the article covers probably believes what he said, the problem the article assumes like most of the islamophobe sites when they pick out some random blow off

A. He is representative of most Muslims
B. He carries authority among a large group of Muslims
C. The news is intentionally repressed by Muslim-manipulated media

Of course, islamophobes tend to be highly idealistic in the sense that they don't acknowledge other drives that might cause people to jump on board these nasty groups. Never mind their hard-on for lumping all sorts of people who are Muslims (and again, they see them as one, big homogenous group) as subscribing to the same exact thing and jumping the moment a guy says something because he happens to be a religious cleric. How many people can we attribute to joining the al-Nusra front because of the activities of this one cleric? At best the cleric is sympathetic to the group, but it would be exaggerating to claim that this is the cleric who is the brains behind al-Nusra- there are bigger profile Salafis than that. It's amusing really since these kinds of guys get more coverage from these sites in the long run that gives the false appearance that they actually matter. The article points out that it isn't the first time they've covered this individual.

Funny thing is most religions tend to look down on sexual relations outside of marriage, so I'm not sure what the line of logic here that anyone should willingly participate in such a move, even if paradise is promised. It doesn't make sense at all for any cleric to be saying this, they would at least attempt to involve marriage in it as they always do. The article says he's trying to justify it with some religious quotes but still I don't think it's something particularly pronounced among those in the Middle-East, there are issues but that's not one of them.

Honestly this'd be like picking out some crazy evangelical preacher in the States then saying that he represents both national policy and the beliefs of all the citizens in that country or members of religion.

Edit: Also worth noting that the image in the right wing rag, FrontPageMag, showing the young girls with the grown men is a oft-posted image in islamophobe sites out of context, making it seem those young girls are being married to older men. It's been floating around for sometime: the image is actually a ceremony for Hamas fighters marrying widows, the young girls being bridesmaids for the widows.

http://www.snopes.com/photos/politics/masswedding.asp

[Flying Purple People Eater]

I echo the questions raised to the validity of the article by other posters in this thread.

Also, there's no such thing as a 'terrorist'.

[RedHal]

David Horowitz articles in politics and not in OI? What's next, scumfront "anti zionist" articles?

[freepalestine]

The problem I see with the source is that the "news" site only cites a website called "Jihad Watch" and that site doesn't link to any sources to back up what it's saying.

...so I'm quite skeptical of the whole thing. Is there any other more relevant sources that can back this up? (If not, than it's probably just whack-job neo-con crap lies and this thread is worthless, discussing a possibly made up thing)hmm.
yes this is a big story of last week.despite that authors interpretation.
the cleric is very famous on arabic television etc..


the yt is from lebanese al jadeed news

http://uprootedpalestinians.blogspot.fr/2012/12/only-for-hour-jihad-marriage-to.html



.

[Red Commissar]

hmm.
yes this is a big story of last week.despite that authors interpretation.
the cleric is very famous on arabic television etc..


the yt is from lebanese al jadeed news

http://uprootedpalestinians.blogspot.fr/2012/12/only-for-hour-jihad-marriage-to.html

.

I keep a track of foreign media and I don't really see this guy come up all that much, except when they want to point out a dumb cleric, which come by the bucketloads in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere. A good way to see if he really matters is to see if there's much about him before five years ago.

The issue is the interpretation of this, and how it is used over here as overtly islamophobic interpretations. Again, the FrontLinePage article has a picture of a completely unrelated event of some Hamas guys in a marriage ceremony. This was also used to advance the fact that they were pedophiles, and by extension Palestinians as awhole were terrible people that don't deserve any sympathy. Can we say that this guy has as much influence over these particular band of religious salafis that Mullah Omar had with the Taliban?

Basically if these guys were reposting the story, it wasn't because they were interested in highlighting the religious nuts in the FSA, but another reason to paint the Middle-East as awhole as a bunch of backwards idiots.

[Prof. Oblivion]

The Orientalism in this thread is appalling.

[Red Commissar]

ElectronicIntifiada picked up the news and called out outlets for carrying it without doing any fact checking of their own:

http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/how-progressive-alternet-and-salon-fell-gang-rape-fatwa-peddled-islamophobes

http://electronicintifada.net/sites/electronicintifada.net/files/styles/large/public/ldan5mtnxhe.png
Still image from YouTube video capture of Al Jadeed broadcast (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDAn5MTnXHE).

Progressive news organization AlterNet has fallen for and disseminated a story, pushed by Zionist, Islamophobic and Iranian outlets, claiming that a prominent Saudi cleric issed a religious edict authorizing sex-deprived fighters in Syria to rape women there.

Earlier today, AlterNet claimed (http://www.alternet.org/world/saudi-religious-leader-accused-calling-gang-rape-syrian-women-issues-denial):
A prominent Saudi cleric has issued a fatwa (a religious ordinance) that calls for the gang rape of Syrian women. Expressing frustration that the “warriors of Islam” fighting in Syria may be getting weary for the lack of sexual pleasure, the religious leader issued a decree that promotes hours-long “intercourse marriages.”
The story was later updated to include a statement that the cleric, Muhammad al-Arifi, had issued a denial. But the story has – as of this writing – not been retracted (see update (http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/how-progressive-alternet-and-salon-fell-gang-rape-fatwa-peddled-islamophobes?utm_source=EI+readers&utm_campaign=d7e2939967-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email#update) below), and even worse, it was picked up by Salon.com whose story has not – as of now – been amended with the denial (http://www.salon.com/2013/01/02/saudi_religious_leader_calls_for_gang_rape_of_syri an_women/) (see update 3 (http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/how-progressive-alternet-and-salon-fell-gang-rape-fatwa-peddled-islamophobes?utm_source=EI+readers&utm_campaign=d7e2939967-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email#update3) below).

Al-Arifi is an ultra-conservative Wahhabi cleric with 3.5 million Twitter followers (https://twitter.com/MohamadAlarefe) and more than 1.4 million Facebook fans (http://www.facebook.com/3refe).

He has been prominent in calling Syrians to join the armed opposition to the government of President Bashar al-Assad and demanded that other countries intervene militarily and send weapons to overthrow it.

Al-Arifi has openly engaged in sectarian incitement against Shia Muslims, for example in this video from February 2012 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GE6En9e7dew), which has more than 1.1 million views.

The claim about the “gang rape” fatwa should raise immediate red flags. It is reminiscent of other recent shocking claims about Muslims that turned out to be libels disseminated by Islamophobic organizations.

These include a false story – disseminated credulously by LGBT magazine The Advocate (http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/benjamin-doherty/sodomy-jihad-venerable-lgbt-magazine-advocate-spreads-vile-islamophobic-hoax) – that a Muslim cleric had issued a “fatwa” declaring that sodomy between men was permissible if it was for the purpose of widening their anuses for the insertion of explosives to carry out “jihad.”

There was also the libel of a Muslim “rape epidemic” in Norway that The Electronic Intifada debunked a year ago (http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/debunked-zionist-and-islamophobic-libel-rape-epidemic-muslims-norway).

g7OXrgTSw1s
A video posted on YouTube on 1 January shows al-Arifi ridiculing the supposed fatwa, saying such a thing could never be said by any “sane person” and warning that he knows of at least nine social media pages that impersonate him and try to attribute words to him that he hasn’t spoken. He also said that such falsehoods were disseminated by stations – which he did not name – whose goal is to harm the image of Sunni Muslims.

Al-Arifi also posted a denial on his Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/3refe/posts/10151246153142839) and on Twitter.

د. محمد العريفي

✔

@MohamadAlarefe (https://twitter.com/MohamadAlarefe)
تغريدة تحمل فتوى سيئة نُسبت لي، ولجهل كاذبها زادت عن140حرفاً! وقد كذّبتها بتويتر وفيس بوك، ولا تزال تنشرها قنوات بشار!ا pic.twitter.com/l2KUGmmx (http://t.co/l2KUGmmx)

http://pbs.twimg.com/media/A_ViYNNCUAAaSgU.jpg
The Twitter denial includes an image of a fake tweet al-Arifi said was circulating online, which was an obvious hoax because it contained far more than 140 characters.

Genealogy of the lurid story

The claim about the “fatwa” was made on Lebanon’s Al-Jadeed channel (New TV) at least as early as December 29. Al-Jadeed does not provide any evidence of the “fatwa” or say when, where or by what means it was supposedly issued. As of now, no one has produced any evidence that the “fatwa” exists, which means that no responsible news organization should behave as if it does.

News of the “fatwa” was then disseminated widely on social media in Arabic, particularly by personas eager to discredit opponents of the Syrian government.

What is also interesting is how it traveled through Zionist and American Islamophobic networks to AlterNet and Salon.

Iran’s English-language Press TV carried a report on the alleged fatwa on its website. However it is not the Iranian report that appears to have been the most influential.

Effort to discredit Syrian opposition

On 29 December a Twitter user called @Eretz_Zen tweeted the New TV video except now with English subtitles and a logo with the words “Eretz Zen” obscuring the New TV logo.

Eretz Zen @Eretz_Zen (https://twitter.com/Eretz_Zen) NEW VIDEO: #Saudi (https://twitter.com/search/%23Saudi) #Wahhabi (https://twitter.com/search/%23Wahhabi) Preacher Issues Fatwa Allowing Jihadis to Rape Syrian Women: youtu.be/6Qvo4_hMrF4 (http://t.co/hIO0eyI5) #Syria (https://twitter.com/search/%23Syria) #RealSyria (https://twitter.com/search/%23RealSyria) #FSA (https://twitter.com/search/%23FSA)

Twitter user @Eretz_Zen’s bio claims to be “A secular Syrian opposed to having my country turned into a Taliban-like state.” This is of course completely unverifiable.

Zionist and Islamophobic connections

On 1 January the English-subtitled “Eretz Zen” video was embedded in a report on the website RadicalIslam.org with the headline “Cleric Issues Fatwa Allowing Gang Rape of Syrian Women (http://www.radicalislam.org/news/saudi-cleric-issues-fatwa-allowing-gang-rape-syrian-women).”

RadicalIslam.org states that it is supported by the Clarion Fund, which several years ago distributed tens of millions of copies of a virulently anti-Muslim film titled Obsession: Radical Islam’s War Against the West.

As Ali Gharib and Eli Clifton reported (http://www.ipsnews.net/2008/09/politics-neo-cons-ex-israeli-diplomats-push-islamophobic-video/), Clarion Fund is closely tied to the Israeli organization Aish HaTorah, and the group is at the center of a web of ultra far-right Islamophobic, Zionist and anti-Palestinian organizations (http://www.lobelog.com/clarion-fund-discloses-hawkish-advisory-board-before-launch-of-iran-documentary/). One of its “advisors” has been notorious anti-Islamic and anti-Palestinian agitator Daniel Pipes (http://electronicintifada.net/tags/daniel-pipes).

Another key figure in this anti-Palestinian and Islamophobic network is Frank Gaffney, another Clarion Fund advisor (http://www.religiondispatches.org/dispatches/sarahposner/3996/frank_gaffney_appointed_to_clarion_fund_board). Gaffney’s Center for Security Policy sponsors Latma TV (http://electronicintifada.net/tags/latma-tv), an Israeli “satirical” show responsible for producing virulently anti-African propaganda (http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/israeli-satire-show-latma-tv-represents-africans-dancing-banana-eating-baboons) and disseminating the Norway “rape epidemic” hoax.

What’s notable is that the RadicalIslam.org report uses the term “gang rape” which also appeared later on AlterNet and Salon.com. The term “gang rape” does not appear in the New TV report.

This is a clue that perhaps the story traveled from ultra-right-wing RadicalIslam.org to “progressive” AlterNet without anyone raising any red flags.

Indian website jumps on the bandwagon

Notably the AlterNet report links directly to an Indian website called Daily Bhaskar (http://daily.bhaskar.com/article/BZR-saudi-cleric-urges-rebels-to-indulge-in----intercourse-marriage----with-syrian-w-4134620-NOR.html) that also carries the “Eretz Zen” video.

Daily Bhaskar appears to be a website that habitually reports lurid and dubiously sourced stories of non-Muslim women being raped and victimized by Muslims.

Going viral

It’s a telling sign of how deep and common liberal Islamophobia is that even progressives at AlterNet will believe anything they hear and not stop to ask a question.

What these repeated episodes show is that it is easy for many people to believe negative and shocking information about unpopular and disreputable figures. When the claims are lurid – especially involving sex and violence – they spread more rapidly. And when they fit multiple agendas – as in this case – there’s apparently no limit to how far they can go.

Update
AlterNet has posted an apology and analysis of the story’s origins.
On January 2, AlterNet was one of several outlets that published what turned out to be an article based on a false report. We would like to apologize to our readers for the error.
Read Exhibit A in How an Islamophobic Meme Can Spread Like Wildfire Across the Internet (http://www.alternet.org/world/exhibit-how-easily-islamophobic-meme-can-spread-wildfire-across-internet) by Sanam Naraghi Anderlini.

Update 2
Even after this analysis and AlterNet’s apology and retraction, MSN.com promoted the hoax with the title Saudi cleric calls for gang rapes to soothe weary Syrian fighters (http://now.msn.com/muhammed-al-arifi-saudi-cleric-calls-for-intercourse-marriage-for-syrian-fighters). It was published one hour after The Electronic Intifada posted this analysis.

Update 3
At approximately 15:30 UTC on 3 January 2013, Salon deleted their story which was sourced from AlterNet.

Update 4
At 18:22 UTC on 3 January 2013, The Electronic Intifada was notified that the MSN Now story has been amended with this correction:
AlterNet, which was one of several outlets reporting on the allegations, has issued a retraction on this story after Muhammed al-Arifi denied he made these comments. “No sane person” would’ve said such a thing, the cleric says in a new YouTube video.

Electronic Intifada @intifada (https://twitter.com/intifada) 3 Jan 13 (https://twitter.com/intifada/statuses/286832007412084736) Our post has been updated to show that even after the gang rape fatwa hoax was exposed, @msnNOW (https://twitter.com/msnNOW) promoted it. electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abun… (http://t.co/3iI2jLLF)
https://si0.twimg.com/profile_images/2767340790/6a942bbae392f0ca848bf195cfb4ad6e_normal.png msnNOW

✔

@msnNOW (https://twitter.com/msnNOW)
@intifada (https://twitter.com/intifada) Thank you for alerting us and reading msnNOW.com (http://t.co/cIHVrXyU). We have retracted the story.

The online news portal of New Zealand’s Channel 3 promoted the hoax (http://www.3news.co.nz/Jihadist-calls-for-gang-rape-in-Syria/tabid/417/articleID/281930/Default.aspx) before it was exposed by The Electronic Intifada and corrected by other publications. Other reports of the hoax “fatwa” at The Inquisitor (http://www.inquisitr.com/465657/saudi-religious-leader-encourages-gang-rape-of-syrian-women/), B92 (http://www.b92.net/eng/news/world-article.php?yyyy=2013&mm=01&dd=03&nav_id=83976), and Digital Journal (http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/340408) also report the denial.



From Alternet

http://www.alternet.org/world/exhibit-how-islamophobic-meme-can-spread-wildfire-across-internet

AlterNet / By Sanam Naraghi Anderlini
Exhibit A in How an Islamophobic Meme Can Spread Like Wildfire Across the Internet
January 2, 2013 |

Exhibit A in How an Islamophobic Meme Can Spread Like Wildfire Across the Internet

The apparently fabricated story of a Saudi cleric issuing a fatwa condoning gang rapes in Syria is an object lesson in the pitfalls of breakneck online journalism.

January 2, 2013 |

Editor's note: On January 2, AlterNet was one of several outlets that published what turned out to be an article based on a false report. We would like to apologize to our readers for the error.

On January 2nd, the story of a Saudi Sheikh issuing a fatwa that condoned 'intercourse marriage' or gang rape in Syria exploded over the internet.

According to various sources, Sheikh Mohammad Al-Arifi had stated that foreign fighters in Syria had the right to engage in short term marriages to satisfy their sexual desires and boost their determination to fight against the Assad regime. Syrian girls and women from age 14 upwards were considered fair game and apparently secured their own place in heaven if they participated in these 'intercourse marriages'.

By the evening a simple Google search of the words, 'Saudi Sheikh' , Syrian, and 'women' brought up some 5 million references and at least 3 pages of links to articles spreading the news. Not surprisingly there was immediate online uproar too, though as one commentator put it, much of the discussion was about whether these arranged temporary marriages technically constituted 'rape'. This in itself is worrying.

There was also skepticism from many quarters about the veracity of the report, particularly among savvy Mideast experts. Rightly so. The story, much like the one a few months ago about Egyptian Islamist MPs proposing laws that permitted sex with a deceased spouse up to 6 hours after his/her death, turned out to be a gross lie. Sheikh Al-Arifi has issued a denial (https://www.facebook.com/3refe/posts/10151246153142839) via his Facebook page. Over the next few days, the various websites and media outlets that spread the story will no doubt issue their retractions. But the story also raises many questions. For starters, where did it come from? AlterNet inadvertently picked it up from the overtly anti-Islamic Clarion Fund site. Others pointed to the Iranian regime backed Press TV as the primary source on December 31 2012. (http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2012/12/31/280993/militants-can-marry-syrian-women/) But the earliest English language reporting comes on December 29 from an obscure YouTube news site called Eretz Zen (http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=6Qvo4_hMrF4), tagged as a YouTube channel by a “secular Syrian opposed to having [his] country turned into a Taliban-like state."

What's extraordinary and depressing is that a slew of websites picked up the story and ran with it, some claiming legitimacy because the other had posted it and clearly no one bothered to do some basic fact checking. Arguably this is just the nature of the net and minute by minute news updates. The story was too sensational to give up. But one would imagine that if a similar story emerged about a Christian cleric or a Rabbi, someone, somewhere would have paused before posting it. Sadly, in the case of stories about Muslim clerics or Islamists the same red flags don't seem to apply.

Perhaps western journalists are so ignorant of Islam and the cultures in the Middle East that they are willing to believe anything. It's nothing new -- after all Western notions of the East were always immured in sexual decadence and the allure of harems. That was a trademark of the patronizing Orientalism of the past. Today we have a phobic version of Orientalism -- expecting and only seeing and reporting the bad and the ugly.

It's not just ignorance that fans these flames. The Syrian war is being manipulated by all sides and if journalists and their websites want to be taken seriously, they need to be bit more savvy about who's who on the net. The Clarion Fund is so extreme in its Islamophobia that it's almost satirical. Anything it posts must be taken with a pinch of salt and more. Press TV is the English language satellite station of the Iranian regime. Given that the Syrian conflict is turning into a de facto proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran, it should come as no surprise that either side would opt for any smear tactics and propaganda for its own ends. Finally, the timing of the so-called story should have been questioned. It broke just as the world is up in arms about the gang rape and subsequent death of 23 year-old Indian woman by six men on a bus. It's hard to imagine this would be so coincidental.

The issue of sexual violence against women is serious and seriously under-reported everywhere, including in Syria today. There are countless stories to report on that are horrific and true. Yet time and again the news media opts to bypass the real cases, question the validity of sources or claim that these 'rape' stories are too graphic and sensational, while hopping on the band wagon of false stories that could themselves lead to more rape. Hopefully this fake news story will lose wind and die a quick death. But on the net nothing disappears forever. What if this story becomes a sort of urban myth of its own, morphing into a justification of even greater numbers of forced marriages, or even results in gang rapes? These things are happening all the time and there is always some rationalization behind them.

Sadly, sometimes a story like this takes a life of its own, despite the later retractions. For example, in Africa the urban myth that sex with a virgin can cure AIDS has lived on for years in shanty towns, cities and villages. From South Africa to Liberia, the numbers of child rapes - including of babies - has been reported - and too often the explanation given is that the rapists believed some myth about curing AIDS or gaining strength from a virgin's blood.

Regardless of the story or the country, the end result is the same. Women and girls are the primary victims and ever more vulnerable when these myths emerge. Hopefully the net explosion remains just that. Another blip, another day and then its done with no impact for the real lives of people on the ground in Syria. In other words one hope could be that all this news and journalism is basically inconsequential. But what a depressing way to think of journalism. I'd much rather see these writers dig a little deeper, investigate a bit further, reach out to legitimate active sources and sites to write up the true stories, the untold and unheard stories of Syrians today. Their stories of courage and resilience, their stories of striving for peace and justice for everyone and yes their true stories of sexual violence and torture. It's all there waiting to be reported on. It is much more sensational than a fake news story.

Sanam Naraghi Anderlini is Co-Founder of the International Civil Society Action Network (ICAN) and a Senior Fellow at the MIT Center for International Studies.

[hetz]

Is this counterfeit too? Saw it in mainstream newspapers originally...

http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/12/31/257933.html


The Orientalism in this thread is appalling.

What?

[Red Commissar]

Is this counterfeit too? Saw it in mainstream newspapers originally...

http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/12/31/257933.html


What?

I don't know- it probably isn't since the civil war in Syria has gotten very brutal- but that's not what this topic is about. The original topic was the story you posted about this fatwa, and it seems to be mostly a hoax that somehow went from islamophobic sites to mainstream media. Much like the corpse bride law in Egypt.

[hetz]

Fair enough then, this thread can be locked now.

[Trap Queen Voxxy]

This is some fucking Islamaphobic bullshit from start to finish. First off, the first website you have listed is Jihad Watch, a xenphobic, far right website that does nothing but try to paint Muslims as demonic, blood thirsty barbarians. It's not a credible website, the authors no nothing of Islam and it's utter nonsense. The Sunnis, which Sheikh al-Arifi is, have always condemned the practice of mut'ah or to be more accurate nikah mut'ah (what the authors attempt to describe or portray), which typically is more of a Shia practice. It's an extremely debated issue. Sunni theologians and clerics believe the practice of nikah mut'ah to have been declared haraam by caliph Umar ibn Khattab, who was a member of the rashidun (rightly guided caliphs) and was sahaabi (companion of the prophet). You're meaning to tell me some contemporary cleric is trying to over-turn a fatwa or ruling given by one of the caliphs whom traveled with the prophet himself so 'militants' can go bugger Syrian women? No.