The Bodies of Permanent War

Masculine bodies in the war on terror.

Women on the Frontline in Palestine

By Raya Ziada

In yesterday’s protests, Palestinian women showed that they have the spirit of a fighter, yet the heart of a protective mother.

Young Palestinian women took the initiative to be in the front line of the March 15 protests in Palestine to protect the protesters. With their bodies they created a human shield in an attempt to prevent any expected fights noting that some of them were on hunger strike for the third day.

How to Write About Muslims

(This was originally posted over at my own blog – you can read the comments – negative and positive – there) Last week, I read Judy Bacharach’s “Twice Branded – Western Women in Muslim Lands” (bint battuta already dug into it here). You may also want to take a gander at the growing catfight between [...]

Saudi Girls Deserve Sports Heroes, Too

This has been talked about to death in some circles, I know – fortunately this isn’t one of them. As the Beijing Olympics roll on and the Michael Phelpses and Nastia Liukins (or the Cheng Feis and Yang Weis, if you prefer) win medal after medal, it’s almost too easy to forget those left out [...]

Noor: The Conspiracy Against the Arab Family and Unromantic Arab Men

A Turkish TV soap opera, ‘Noor,’ is making the Arab world, and especially, but not exclusively, the women, into captive zombies. They are mesmerized by the lead male, Mohannad, played by a tall young Turk — a former basketball player — with icey blue eyes (the model, Kivanc Tatlitu). Noor is a modern fashion designer. [...]

Regulating Women’s Bodies

Faiza Silmi, a 32 year-old Moroccan woman married to a French national, was denied French citizenship this week on the grounds that the burqa she wears is incompatible with french values, specifically equality of the sexes. Denied not because she can’t speak French, or doesn’t correctly understand the french code of secularism, but rather, due [...]

A Reader Reflects: First Annual Bay Area Arab Women’s Conference

This report was submitted by Kristel. I had the honor of attending the first annual Bay Area Arab Women’s Conference this past Friday, March 14, in Mountain View, California. This event was organized by the Arab Cultural and Community Center of San Francisco and featured a diverse compilation of speakers and subject matters. Topics ranged [...]

Who is More Unelectable than a Black, a Woman, a Hispanic or a Mormon?

2 Answers: an atheist and a Muslim. Barack Obama has to face e-mail chain letters suggesting he is an atheist, and others that he is a Muslim. This Chicago Sun-Times article illuminates the whispering campaign being used to discredit Barack Obama. It is based on accusations apparently most detrimental to an American politician: being godless [...]

How many Muslim women leaders can you name?

Charismatic, striking and politically sly, Benazir Bhutto, 54, was reared amid the privileges of Pakistan’s aristocracy and the ordeals of its turbulent politics. Smart, ambitious and resilient, she endured her father’s execution and her own imprisonment at the hands of a military dictator to become the country’s – and the Muslim world’s – first female [...]

The Hijabi Cabbie: Jerusalem’s Hottest Taxi Driver

Majda al-Bahr, 38, wife, and mother of five, is Jerusalem’s only female taxi driver. And that is not the only item on her list of “coolness,” her last name means “The Sea.” If I had such a cool last name, you people wouldn’t hear the end of it. As Jerusalem’s only female Muslim taxi driver, [...]