The New York Post reported August 17, 2021, how the world was shocked when the Taliban executed a woman in broad daylight for violating sharia law by simply not wearing a burqa.
Whether the 2021 withdrawal of U.S. troops giving Afghanistan to the Taliban was a simply an unorganized fiasco of President Biden’s advisors, or a foreign policy shift allowing China access to Afghanistan’s rare earth metals for batteries, or a strategic return to Obama era policies of appeasing Islamists, the U.S. left the Taliban stockpiles of billions of dollars of weapons, including night vision goggles, bullet-proof cars and Black Hawk helicopters.
Many are questioning if some of these weapons made their way to Hamas to be used against Israel in the unprecedented terrorist attack of October 7, 2023, killing over 1,400 innocent Israelis.
Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene @RepMTG posted: “We need to work with Israel to track serial numbers on any U.S. weapons used by Hamas against Israel. Did they come from Afghanistan? Did they come from Ukraine? Highly likely the answer is both.”
Not all Middle East leaders want Sharia Law.
Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, considered the father of the modern Republic of Turkey and its first President, 1924-1938, abolished sharia courts, and made Friday a workday, instituting the “weekend” of Saturday and Sunday.
He outlawed polygamy and elevated the status of women, appointing the first female judges, and insisting on education of girls.
He abolished women wearing of scarves, veils, chadors or burqas – the full-length body dress worn by Muslim women, and requiring women to wear skirts.
Ataturk stated:
“If henceforward the women do not share in the social life of the nation, we shall never attain to our full development. We shall remain irremediably backward, incapable of treating on equal terms with the civilizations of the West.”
Ataturk wrote in his book on citizenship (quoted in Ataturk, Yurttaslik Bilgileri, Yenigun Haber Ajansi, June 1997, p. 18):
“Mohammedanism was based on Arab nationalism above all nationalities …
The purpose of the religion founded by Muhammad, over all nations, was to drag them into Arab national politics … It might have suited tribes in the desert. It is no good for a modern, progressive state …
Even before accepting the religion of the Arabs, the Turks were a great nation … He is a weak ruler who needs religion to uphold his government.”
Ataturk abolished the position of the Sultan and set up a secular government He ended the religious Caliphate, thus preventing Muslim religious leaders from controlling government affairs.
In an effort to cut ties with the fundamentalist past, he introduced the western use of last names, replaced Arabic Islamic names with Turkish names, and encouraged the next generation not take Arabic names but instead ethnic Turkish names.
Ataturk abolished the use of Arabic and Persian script, and replaced it with the Latin alphabet. He abolished turbans and fezes – the red cap with a black tassel, and required meant wear western pants and suits.
Ataturk banned beards on men, and even required Muslim prayer leaders be beardless. He replaced Arabic muezzin’s call to prayer and made praying a private affair.
Similarly, in Egypt, President Gamal Nasser told a political gathering in 1958:
“I met with the head of the Muslim Brotherhood and he sat with me and made his requests.
What did he request? The first thing he asked for was to make wearing the hijab mandatory in Egypt and demand that every woman walking in the street wear a tarha scarf, [audience laughter] Every woman walking! [someone in audience shouted “let him wear it!”]
And I told him, if I make that a law they will say that we have returned to the days of Al-Hakim bi Amr Allah, who forbade people from walking at day and only allowed walking at night.
And my opinion is that every person in his own house decides for himself the rules,
And he replied “No, as the leader, you are responsible.”
I told him, “Sir, you have a daughter in the School of Medicine and she is not wearing a tarha. Why didn’t you make her wear a tarha? If you are unable to make one girl – who is your daughter – wear the tarha, you want me to put a tarha on 10 million woman myself? [laughter]
Shah Reza Pahlavi of Iran, in office from 1941 to 1979, was a strong supporter of the United States, and western ideals of freedom. He met with Presidents Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Nixon, till he was betrayed by President Jimmy Carter, who ushered in the fundamentalist Ayatollah Khomeini, who enforced Sharia Law.
This post originally appeared at https://americanminute.com/blogs/todays-american-minute/american-minute-with-bill-federer-u-s-law-vs-sharia-law-the-law-of-the-middle-east-is-the-antithesis-of-western-law-supreme-court-justice-robert-jackson-1955-law-in-the-middle-east