Words: Honor Killings

What Honor is there in Killing?

            The growing rise in “honor killings” is unreal & heartbreaking. Honor killings not only occur in parts of the Middle East but also in Europe & the U.S. From frontpagemag.com a Palestinian 27 year old woman who was a mother of three was viciously murdered by her husband. Nancy Zaboun, the victim, allegedly was looking for an early exit of her marriage due to the 10 years of the repeating beatings she was suffering. Unfortunately for Zaboun her attempt was fatal and unsuccessful. Also since Zaboun’s attempt to flee caused such a stain to her husband’s family honor he repeatedly stabbed her several times. Zaboun is not the only woman to fall under the category of

honor killings.  A report from the Palestinian Independent Commission for Human Rights stated that 25 women have been subjected to honor killings, with 13 women murdered in 2011 and 12 women slain in 2012. These statistics are not only tragic but deeply distressing. More victims includes 17 year old Rofayda Qaoud whose mother placed a plastic bag over her head and slashed her wrists after she was raped and impregnated by her brothers; 27-year-old Fadia Najjar, a divorced mother of five, beaten to death by her father because she owned a cell phone that he thought she was using to call a man outside of the family; and 20-year-old Aya Baradiya, tied up and thrown down a well to die by her uncle because he disapproved of her engagement. To believe that the Islamic culture believes this is right, is plain wrong. The Qur’ran does not state anything that proves that honor killings is a religious right, it is simply cultural. A study done by the Gaza-based Palestinian Women’s Information and Media Center found that “67 percent of Palestinian women reported being subjected to verbal violence on a regular basis, 71 percent to psychological violence, 52 percent to physical violence and 14 percent to sexual violence.” The sad part of this is that although there are laws that state honor killings are not supported, the government does not have enough power to show their authority over the people. In a quote by Israeli- Arab lecturer Yusuf Jabareen stated that, “Part of our [Palestinian] identity is to attack women… to beat women… – we must acknowledge it…Palestinian identity has its charms, but there are things that we have adopted from Arab culture for centuries that harm the individual and the woman…That’s part of our identity.” Unfortunately, the Palestinian misogyny may have that Arabic taste, Islam gives her, her full flavor where men often don’t treat women better than livestock. In order to solve this problem it’s going to take a lot more than just a cultural revolution to change what many countries believe is right.