Women with Head Veils Are Being Denied Access to Bars in Egypt

An interesting if somewhat unfair trend if true:"Why are veiled women denied entry to bars in Egypt?"

Nightclubs included, apparently.

Nostalgia Website: Egypt Before the Hijab "Obsession"

This Facebook collection  is called "A look at women and Egyptian society before the Wahhabi invasion and obsession with hijab and niqab  رصد للمرأة والمجتمع المصري ما قبل الغزو الوهابي وهوس الحجاب والنقاب

Egyptian Miss World, 1954

It's old pictures of an Egypt before the hijab was so widespread even among elites; I think the title shows the host's viewpoint. It's also a great nostalgia collection.

It's definitely worth a browse.

Aliaa Elmahdy invites Women to Tell their Stories of Giving Up Hijab

Aliaa Elmahdy, diversifying a bit from her fame (or notoriety) as "Egypt's nude blogger,"  has invited women who wore hijab and then gave it up, or still wear it and have thought of giving it up, to send her their stories telling their experiences, why they wore it and why they stopped, or didn't, and before-and-after pictures. lt may not get the attention of a naked picture of a 20-year-old, but it actually does offer some illumination.

Her invitation (Arabic and English) is here  (the adult content warning is due to the original picture of Aliaa nude, on the same site, not the post in question here), and she is posting the resulting stories and photos here (also bilingual). A story on the subject here.

Remembering the Revolution's Great-Grandmothers: Hamieda Khalil, Hoda Sha‘arawi, Safiyya Zaghlul and the Revolutionaries of 1919

Women Demonstrating in 1919

I've posted previously about resemblances between Egypt's revolution of 1919 and the ferment that brought down Husni Mubarak. Yesterday's big march by angry women evokes memories of another march some of their great-grandmothers may have joined, the first great demonstration by women during the 1919 Revolution (sometimes called an uprising by the British Occupation it sought to end, but always thawra to Egyptians.)

With the crescent-and-cross flag

Women had played a role from the beginning of the troubles, and on March 14, 1919 a woman from Cairo's Gamaliyya district, Hamieda Khalil, was killed, the first woman martyr of the revolt. Two days later, on March 16, Hoda Sha‘arawi organized a demonstration consisting entirely of women, at least 300, to march and protest. March 16 is now celebrated as Egyptian women's day. Much of what little is available about Hamieda Khalil is in Arabic, or in general accounts of women in the Revolution, and I don't know if she was ever photographed.

Hoda Sha‘arawi

On multiple occasions, however, I have posted about the pioneering Egyptian feminist Hoda (Huda) Sha‘arawi, who famously stepped off a train in Cairo in 1923, returning from a feminist meeting in Europe, without her face veil. She became the heroine and patron saint of Egyptian feminism. But as the 1919 march shows, she was an activist long before she took off the veil.

Hoda Sha‘arawi & Safiyya Zaghlul

Another early activist and feminist was Safiyya Zaghlul, wife of nationalist leader Sa‘ad Zaghlul; her husband's forced exile to the Seychelles by the British was the spark that ignited the 1919 Revolution. Sha‘arawi and Safiyya Zaghlul are shown together at right.

These women were the pioneers. I'm sure they'd applaud yesterday's March, but also be appalled that things have not progressed more and may in fact be moving backward.

Battle over Niqab in Tunisia

With Islamists holding the largest number of seats in the Tunisian constituent assembly, a new Islamist Prime Minister in Morocco, Islamists playing a major role in Libya (though largely unrepresented in the interim Cabinet), and the Muslim Brotherhood and Salafi al-Nour Party running strong in the Egyptian elections' first round, some secularists are worried that the whole northern tier of Africa is suddenly turning into a hotbed of Islamism. I think we need to see what happens next: I'm not convinced that all Islamists everywhere are incapable of functioning within a pluralist system.

Tunisia has long been the most Westernized North African country by far, where women have equal rights with men in almost every sphere, there is a French-influenced secularism in place and President Bourguiba famously once sipped orange juice during Ramadan on national television. The large number of European tourists on Tunisia's beaches are mostly French, German, and Italian, and dress as they would on beaches on the opposite shore of the Med, with the Tunisians largely not objecting.

The fact that an Islamist party, Al-Nahda, led in the elections has of course caused some concern; Tunisia is, however, not just Avenue Bourguiba (or whatever they're calling it now) in Tunis, and the beach resorts: it's Kairouan and the rural areas as well. And Al-Nahda leader Rachid Ghannouchi's daughter is one of his main spokespeople, suggesting that he at least (though perhaps not all of Al-Nahda's rank and file) is indeed moderate. (Exiled Islamists usually go to Saudi Arabia or someplace similar. Ghannouchi spent 20 years in London.)

In this transitional period we're seeing our first Islamist-secularist confrontations (well, there were a few earlier ones, but these are the first I've blogged about): over several days now, Salafis and secularists have been clashing at the University of Manouba, in a university town west of the capital, over the niqab, the full body-and-face-veil. The university refused to let women wearing niqab to take their exams. (Egyptian universities have imposed similar rules, arguing that a fully veiled woman might not actually be the student being graded.) Salafi students and Salafis from outside the university protested, shutting down classes and, or a while, holding the dean hostage. Press reports here and here, a blog post from blogger A Tunisian Girl (who was a mainstay during the revolution) here. (Though her blog is titled in English and Arabic, this post is in French.)

A video report here:



I do believe there are religious freedom issues here, but also security issues. In several Arab countries niqab-wearing women must unveil to prove their identity for certain purposes, and making sure you're not sending in a ringer to take an exam for you seems to be a valid one. On the other hand, Tunisian secularists  may just be reacting viscerally to the idea of niqab. Certainly I know many Muslim women who, even in the West, choose to wear hijab, but that's not the issue here. I can't say I actually know any women who, uninfluenced by their fathers/husbands/brothers, choose to wear niqab, but that's in part because they wouldn't engage in conversation with an unrelated male anyway. I'd be furious if Manouba University were requiring niqab, but I'm not so sure about the wisdom of banning it, if some form of security and identification procedures can be implemented.

For International Women's Day after Tahrir Today: A Brief Tribute to Hoda Sha‘arawi

In belated tribute to the brave Egyptian women who were harassed and cursed in their demonstration for International Women's Day in Tahrir Square today, a moment to reflect on the pioneer of Egyptian feminism, Hoda (Huda) Sha‘arawi.

Sha‘arawi (1879-1947) is generally seen as the first real feminist activist within the Egyptian national movement. Though she has a street named for her in central Cairo, I fear that if she were alive today she would be shocked by what she would see as a retrograde direction in women's rights. For background see her Wikipedia page here; a page devoted to her here; and a Facebook fan site here.

Educated, the daughter and wife of prominent men, she was active in the nationalist movement and organized women's demonstrations in the 1919 Revolution. She visited Europe, and attended an international women's suffrage conference in Rome in 1923 (it is worth remembering women were just achieving the vote even in the US and Europe). On her return to Cairo in 1923, the same year as Sa‘d Zaghloul's return, she famously and symbolically removed her veil in public at the railway station. (Though she was more active on political and other rights issues, she is perhaps most remembered for the symbolic removal of the veil.) The same year she founded the Egyptian Feminist Union. She was active in the Wafd Party until it rejected her proposed reforms; at left she is shown (on the left) with Safia Zaghloul, wife of Sa‘d Zaghloul (at right).

Though many of her goals were frustrated, she raised consciousness among elite Egyptian women and was seen as as pioneer of later women activists who achieved the vote and other progress in the Nasser era and since.

The Marwa al-Sherbini Case and the Outrage of the Egyptian Street

Have you heard of the Marwa al-Sherbini case? If not, it may be worth asking why not, since that's what Egyptians are asking.

Some of my readers, most of whom are presumably involved professionally or academically in Middle East affairs, may have heard of Marwa al-Sherbini, but the case has been little noted in the Western media. Sherbini was a young (32 years old) mother killed in a German court — yes, in an open courtroom during a judicial sesssion — in Dresden July 1 in front of her three-year old son. She was stabbed (18 times) in the courtroom by a xenophobic German who had previously attacked her as a "terrorist" for wearing hijab, leading her to lodge a complaint against him. He was appealing a fine when he stabbed her. Adding insult to injury, when her husband sought to protect her from her attacker, the security in the courtroom shot the husband, not the attacker. (As one person notes in one of the links, "he wasn't blond so he must be the attacker.") And to add more insult to that one, the prosecutor initially charged the attacker with manslaughter (for stabbing someone 18 times in an open courtroom?). (Now there are reports the charge will be changed to murder.)

Oh, sorry, now it appears she was also pregnant with her second child. And why, exactly, are people outraged? Oh, right. All these reasons.

It's received very little coverage in Europe or the US, and that fact as well as the crime itself has outraged the Egyptian street to a remarkable degree. Her body was met at Cairo airport; thousands reportedly turned out for her funeral in Alexandria. Everyone from the Sheikh al-Azhar on down to the most secularist bloggers are expressing concern. The Egyptian blogosphere has been awash with postings, many noting that the killing of Neda Soltan in Iran (by the government, admittedly) led to Western outrage, while the killing of a Muslim mother in a European courtroom by a man clearly motivated by hatred of Islam and Muslims, is ignored. The Egyptian reaction is pretty intense so far, and interestingly, some of the opposition forces seem particularly incensed. Though the official media is incensed as well, these kinds of popular outcries can backfire on unpopular regimes.

Here's an overall account of the case. And here are some of the blogposts so far, starting with English:

Zenobia at Egyptian Chronicles;

Hicham Maged's Blog;

Here, Bikya Misr argues that the Western media is showing its bias by ignoring the case; many have compared the coverage of Neda Soltan, the Iranian women killed by the Basij, with this case, though obviously this was not a killing by an arm of the state;

And newspaper accounts. In English:

at Al-Misri al-Yaum.

at Daily News Egypt

Blogs in Arabic:

The funeral in Alexandria at Iskanderani Misri.

Newspapers in Arabic:

The main government daily Al-Ahram;

Reactions at the website Al-Misriyun;

The opposition Al-Dustur calling her shahidat al-hijab (martyr of the hijab);

. . . and so on. This feels, at a distance, like real outrage, from bloggers conservative and leftist, and in the street. This case is going to get a great deal of attention in Egypt and probably throughout the Muslim world.