Bush urges patience on Iraq; cites Israel as example of working Mideast democracy

The Associated Press

Published: June 28, 2007

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/06/28/america/NA-GEN-US-Bush-Mideast.php?page=2

NEWPORT, Rhode Island: President George W. Bush held up Israel as a model for defining success in Iraq, saying Thursday that the goal of the U.S. mission in the war-ravaged Arab nation is not eliminating attacks but enabling a democracy that can function despite continuing violence.

With his Iraq policies under increasing fire from the American public and lawmakers from both parties, Bush went to the U.S. Naval War College here to declare progress. As he pleaded for patience, his top national security aide went to Capitol Hill to meet with Republican critics.

Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, the senior Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee, delivered a lengthy floor speech earlier this week contending that Bush’s war strategy will not have time to work and that U.S. troops should start leaving now.

National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley met with Lugar and others including Republican Senator John Warner. Hadley would not discuss the meetings, but Warner said a defense policy bill that is expected to attract several war-related amendments in July was a main topic.

The White House thought it had until an expected September assessment by military commanders to deal with political fallout on the unpopular war.

But a majority of senators now believes troops should start coming home in the next few months. House Republicans want to revive the independent Iraq Study Group to get new options.

Bush sought in his speech to put the brakes on these efforts.

He characterized the fight in Iraq, where tensions between Shiite and Sunni factions have kept the country in a cycle of violence, as primarily against al-Qaida forces and their use of grisly suicide attacks and car bombings.

“They understand that sensational images are the best way to overwhelm the quiet progress on the ground,” Bush said.

The president laid out in some of his plainest terms yet how to determine when the U.S. presence in Iraq has achieved its goals. This, Bush said, is “the rise of a government that can protect its people, deliver basic services for all its citizens and function as a democracy even amid violence.”

“Our success in Iraq must not be measured by the enemy’s ability to get a car bombing in the evening news,” he said. “No matter how good the security, terrorists will always be able to explode a bomb on a crowded street.”

He suggested Israel, the frequent target of terrorist attacks and a country in a decades-long, intractable and often violent dispute with Palestinians, as a standard to strive for.

“In places like Israel, terrorists have taken innocent human life for years in suicide attacks,” Bush said. “The difference is that Israel is a functioning democracy and it’s not prevented from carrying out its responsibilities. And that’s a good indicator of success that we’re looking for in Iraq.”

It was likely to be controversial — and possibly even explosive — for Bush to set out Israel as a model for a Muslim Middle Eastern nation.

Aside from Israel’s security problems, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is such a sensitive issue in the Muslim world that it has become a rallying cry for many and major recruiting tool for Islamic extremist groups such as al-Qaida.

The president ordered 21,500 additional U.S. combat troops to Iraq in January. With those troops finally all deployed, Bush ticked through the details of operations in several areas, declaring with the aid of maps and charts on screens that flanked him that progress already is being made in many places.

He said sectarian murders, after spiking in May, are now down substantially from January levels. Car bombings and suicide attacks continue, but declined in May and June. He cited “astonishing signs of normalcy” such as soccer matches and crowded markets.

“Even as our troops are showing some success in cornering and trapping al-Qaida, they face a lot of challenges,” Bush said.

The president asked lawmakers and the public to give more of a chance to his effort to create breathing room for Iraqi leaders to achieve political reconciliation.

“It’s a well-conceived plan by smart military people,” he said. “And we owe them the time, and we own them the support they need to succeed.”

Afterward, Bush took a few questions. A woman asked “with all due respect” how much the president listens to military officers when making decisions about the war. “A lot,” he replied.

Outside, about 150 anti-war protesters held signs saying “Shame,” “Impeach,” and “War is never the answer.” It was Bush’s first presidential visit to Rhode Island, a heavily Democratic state where opinion polls show he is unpopular.

The president spent about two hours later meeting privately with families of soldiers killed in Iraq. He then traveled to his family’s summer home in Maine, where he is spending the weekend and meeting on Sunday and Monday with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The Senate, meanwhile, confirmed Army Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute on Thursday to oversee the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from the White House.

___

Associated Press writer Eric Tucker contributed to this story.

Egypt Says Mummy of Ancient Queen Identified

Talk of the Nation, June 27, 2007 · Ancient Egypt’s most powerful female pharaoh, Queen Hatshepsut, has been identified Egyptian archaeologists said Wednesday. A monumental builder, she wielded more power than two other famous ancient Egyptian women, Cleopatra and Nefertiti.

Guest:  Zahi Hawass, secretary general of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities in Cairo

Click here to listen to NPR report.

                                                       

Behind the Veil

An Egyptian court has ruled that universities can’t bar Islamic face-coverings. But that’s unlikely to stop the headdress attracting unwelcome attention on the streets of Cairo that universities can’t bar Islamic face-coverings. But that’s unlikely to stop the headdress attracting unwelcome attention on the streets of Cairo

 

Newsweek

June 19, 2007

By Vivian Salama

http://www.newsweek.com/id/33637 

 

June 19, 2007 – It was a risky—and frightening—experiment.  Taxis refused to stop for me, but male drivers kept pulling over to compliment my eyes (the only part of my body on show) and inviting me into their vehicles. Others just stared.  Why the unwelcome attention? Because I was wearing a niqab, the full face veil, on the streets of Cairo. Egypt may be a Muslim country, but its government places numerous restrictions on those who make this religious commitment. That, however, may be about to change in the wake of a decision earlier this month by Egypt’s High Administrative Court.

 

 

 

A special chamber of the court ruled on June 9 that the American University in Cairo (AUC) could not bar a female scholar who wears the niqab from using university facilities.  That decision upheld a 2001 ruling by a lower court, which cited personal and religious freedom as the reason that Iman al-Zainy could not be barred from campus for wearing the garment. (Zainy was pursuing a Ph.D. in English at Egypt’s prestigious Islamic institution Al-Azhar University, but had enjoyed library privileges at the AUC for over a decade.)  She has since completed her doctorate, but her lawyers say she continued her legal battle as a matter of principle.

 

Egypt’s battle against the niqab has a long history. Authorities originally banned students from wearing it to school in 1994, saying that it violated security standards.  Dozens of pupils were suspended in the decade that followed.  In nearly all cases however, the court overturned the decision and allowed the girls to return to class. 

 

More recently, Cairo University, with the highest enrollment in Egypt, has allowed students to attend wearing the niqab. However, the American University stayed firm, refusing to permit even the niqab-wearing mothers of graduates to attend the commencement ceremony, according to some students. (A more lenient attitude is taken toward the hijab, which covers the hair but leaves the face visible.) The university says the decision is not a religious one, but was made “because all members of the AUC community have a basic right to know with whom they are dealing, whether in class, labs or anywhere else on campus.” 

 

Certainly, the concerns run the gamut from women using the face veil to cheat in exams—be it by stashing away crib sheets or trading places with other students—to young men using it as a disguise to sneak into the girls’ dormitory.  Then there are the political concerns; across the region, the increasing influence of Islamic parties poses a viable threat to the old, Western- friendly boys’ club of Arab rulers.  In Egypt’s last parliamentary election, the Muslim Brotherhood—which is officially banned—nonetheless earned 20 percent of the seats. Though party members are still subject to mass arrests and intense security protocol, bit by bit, its Islamic agenda is gaining ground, as is evident from decisions such as the niqab ruling.

 

 

Still, many activists caution, it is hasty to claim this particular ruling as an Islamist victory.  “The positive aspect of the decision is that the court refused to take a moral or religious position on the niqab and merely confined itself to upholding Muslim women’s right to personal liberty and nondiscrimination,” says Hossam Bahgat, director of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights. 

 

Certainly, the decision is a sign of the times.  Just 30 years ago, young women attended Cairo University wearing miniskirts and the latest Paris fashions.  They strolled along the beaches of Alexandria in skimpy swimsuits.  The hijab was often perceived as a social-status indicator; women of the upper and middle classes rarely veiled at a young age and those who did usually observed more fashionable interpretations of the religious head-covering. 

 

All of that changed along with the politics of the region.  The Iranian Islamic revolution caused a religious shakeup that leaked into the Arab countries to its west. Government crackdowns on Islamic parties grew fierce as the country’s poor turned more to groups like the Muslim Brotherhood for support.  Recently, the war in Iraq set off a tidal wave of anti-Western sentiment across the region, causing millions to embrace their own traditions and beliefs more proudly than ever before.

 

Ironically, despite the conservative trend that has engulfed the nation, the face veil is viewed by many Muslims as an “un-Egyptian” tradition and in many places, the practice is shunned.  In fact, one of the stereotypes that exist among some communities is an association between the niqab and prostitution.  “Prostitution is certainly one of the stereotypes for both hijab and niqab—as though these women hide behind it,” says Pakinam Amer, a Cairo-based journalist.  “However, many also associate it with extremism, as well as terrorism, even here in Egypt.”

 

That was certainly my experience. I had decided to experiment with wearing the niqab after an upscale Cairo restaurant tried to keep out a colleague wearing only the hijab. (We were eventually seated, though my party was cooped up in a dark corner where they hoped no one would see us.)  After just a single day, I discovered how unpleasant and terrifying it could be. Aside from all the unwelcome attention, I also had to take into account the fact that my action could have been interpreted as a mockery or blasphemy—and the repercussions could have been severe. 

 

Despite the obstacles and harassment, any casual observer on Egyptian streets can see that the number of women wear the niqab is growing. Nor does it seem to be confined to specific social classes or ages.  Some women insist that it is nothing more than an “outfit.”  One even suggested to me that if young women in the West can mimic the fashions of pop icons “like Britney Spears,” she too should be able to dress like her icon—the wife of the Prophet Mohammed.  “We are not coming from a repressed household or a repressed society,” says Sarah El-Meshad, a graduate of the American University in Cairo who took on the face veil after graduation.  “This is just a little something extra I am doing for my religion, but I am no different from any other girl.” For now, though, that’s not an argument the Egyptian government seems willing to accept.

To read a similar story on the struggle of Muslim women in Europe, check out Fareena Alam’s Beyond the Veil

And click here to see my original story on niqab life in Cairo.

Breastfeeding Fatwa Causes a Ripple

NEWSWEEK Japan

By Vivian Salama

http://nwj-web.jp/periscope/index.html

An Islamic scholar in Egypt is under investigation after proposing a religious edict saying that women should breastfeed their adult male colleagues.  The fatwa, issued by Ezzat Atiyaa, a professor at the prestigious Islamic al-Azhar University, suggested that such an action would create a familial bond between male and female colleagues, and therefore make it permissible in Islam for them to work in close proximity. 

 Atiyaa first made his comments several weeks ago during an appearance on a cultural program on Egyptian national television.  Almost instantly, it sparked what is an ongoing firestorm of criticism in the Arab media, with commentators lashing out at the audacity of such a suggestion.  Atiyaa, who few had heard of prior to his controversial remarks, has been suspended indefinitely by al-Azhar University. 

“A lot of jokes came out afterwards, like people asking their bosses to designate space for breastfeeding; or a sign on the secretary’s desk that says she is away because it is breastfeeding hour for the boss,” says Amr Darrag, a spokesman for the Muslim Brotherhood.    

 

Despite the conservative trend that has engulfed the region in recent years, Egyptian society remains one of the more liberal in the Middle East.  Along the banks of the Nile River, for example, men and women – even those wearing the traditional Islamic hijab (head scarf) – can be seen holding hands and conservatively flaunting their affection.  Work places across the country are most certainly mixed, although women last year made up only 24 percent of the workforce, according to the UN.   

  

This is not the first time someone suggests a fatwa on collegial breastfeeding, nor one that is unusual in nature.  Six years ago, Egypt’s Grand Mufti Sheikh Ali Gomaa issued a fatwa which said it was a blessing to drink the urine of the Prophet Mohammad.  Last year, following the issuance of a fatwa which forbids the display of statues, riot police encircled the Egyptian National Museum which is home to hundreds of thousands of ancient artifacts (in 2001, a similar fatwa led to the destruction of ancient statues of the Buddha by Taliban rulers in Afghanistan). 

The word fatwa literally means “an answer to a question” – Egypt’s Grand Mufti emphasizing that they are merely opinions.  Religious scholars are blaming the media for the hype surrounding recent fatwas, saying they should be taken with a grain of salt.  “It is impossible for someone to say something without it getting exploited,” insists Sheikh Khaled Abdullah, a member of the Cairo-based Scientific Center for Quran and Sunna Research.  “This whole thing was just one big misunderstanding.”        

—————————————- 

***For those who understand Arabic, this is an interesting clip hosted by my dear friend Moataz El Demerdash on Mehwar TV on this issue: