Not in the UK, where Shar'ia councils do not handle case law,
They aren't handling them legally - which I clearly pointed out - but anywhere else on earth things like divorce, inheritance, child custody arrangements and so forth are a matter of actual civil law.
and 90% of the cases brought before Shar'ia councils are initiated by women who are seeking divorce from their husbands, who refuse to give them one.
As a former Muslim I can tell you, the only place you should be if your husband is refusing to give you a divorce is the English legal system, because there you'll actually get one.
Without these Shar'ia councils, many women would find themselves stuck in a marriage they no longer wanted to be a part of.
Because I'm an American citizen with full access to the American legal system I was able to be legally divorced from my now ex-husband and actually move on with my life.
Without that access and ability I would still be legally married to that man. That is the horror.
Not personally, but I do work with members of a Muslim tribe in the Philippines and have experienced how an informal Shar'ia court works in that country. The tribe practices prearranged marriages; often these children are under 5 years old when the marriage
You can stop trying to sell that to me. I was bought out of it by Christ.
It’s not rainbows and unicorns.
Muslim women—even in parts of the UK—often cannot freely leave their homes. Many are not allowed to drive, and some never even learn how.
For many, social contact is limited to other women during holidays or Fridays at the mosque, with perhaps a little interaction through their husband’s friends and relatives. But because everything is segregated, even that contact remains very limited.
Language is another barrier. Many women do not know the local language well, if at all, which means they rarely converse with their neighbors outside the community.
In traditional households, men run the errands and do the shopping. Women are expected to cook whatever they are given. That leaves few opportunities for them to engage in wider community life.
In such an environment, what little a woman may know about her country’s legal system often comes second-hand—through other women in her immigrant community. This means many do not even realize what rights they have under English law, or how much better they could have been adjudicated if they had not been persuaded against using the English court system.
On top of this, their only support system is the very community that controls them. Cut off from broader society, they are less inclined—and less able—to fight for themselves.
But when that means of control is removed, they are in a far better position. Instead of being deprived of their rights in a sharia court, they can simply receive all that the law of their country already guarantees them.
Do you share the same concern for Jewish women who find themselves trapped in marriages for years because their husbands refuse to agree to a divorce, and the Beth Din does not allow the divorce even when civil divorces are being granted?
Jewish and Christian marriage is different from the outset: it is inherently covenantal - a lifelong covental promise before an Holy God. Divorce or annulment within the church (or synagogue) is a matter that goes beyond mere legality. Yet on the legal side, no Western woman is denied a divorce—she simply goes to court, and she grows up knowing that if her marriage is bad enough, she has that option. Whether or not she would be considered an adulteress after a legal divorce is a religious question alone.
Islamic marriage, by contrast, is contractual - it's only good so long as the contract is being uphekd by the parties involved A civil judge can rule on the terms of that contract and grant a divorce as far as the contract conforms to the laws of the land (for example, no contract can deprive a mother of contact with her children). Civil courts always honor written, witnessed, and signed contracts—and there is no Islamic marriage without one.
The only reason to appeal to a sharia court in the UK is to
deprive the woman of her rights under English law, because Islam inherently grants her fewer rights. If she wants a sheikh’s approval for divorce, she can meet with him privately. But English law already covers everything—because Islamic marriage is a contract under civil law. In truth, a parallel sharia court is unnecessary. In Islamic lands sharia courts are simply called “court.”
I cannot speak in detail to Jewish law, but Western Jewish women know they can always obtain a civil divorce in court and be legally resolved from a civil standpoint.
Now ask an Afghan woman who has lived in the UK for ten years if she understands the difference between English courts and sharia courts, and whether she feels she can choose English law.
What we rally have, then, are
two distinct cultures operating within the same country—one with full protection under English law, and another that deliberately withholds those protections from women. Multiculturalism may sound ideal, but the reality is not: it divides, it subjects women to horrible situations, and it keeps them under the control of very domineering people—some of them openly abusive.
If people come to a country, they need to integrate into it, not just bring their slaves and keep them in slavery in your country.
www.gbnews.com
