A breath-taking equivocation on the issue of wife-beating in Islamic law by Sheik Ali Gum’a, Mufti of Egypt:

Wife-beating is associated with the cultural status of women in the different societies. Women in some cultures are not averse to beatings. They consider it as an expression of masculinity, and as a kind of control, which she herself desires. In other societies, it is the exact opposite. We must follow reason. When we are dealing with certain societies…

I got a question from Canada. The man said: "Here, it is a crime to beat a wife, even with a toothbrush. Is this prohibition acceptable in Islam? Yes. Islam accepts that the beating of Canadian wives, in this culture and ambience… From childhood they are taught that beating women is a type of barbarism, savagery, and so on. There is nothing wrong with taking this into consideration, and adapting to society, because Islam did not command us to be aggressive towards women.

If in their culture, this constitutes aggression towards women, then we are forbidden to be aggressive towards women. In this situation it is inevitable but to consider [beating] this way, and accepting the society, because Islam did not come and command me to be aggressive towards women. But when Allah permitted wife-beating, He permitted it to the other side of culture, which considers it as one of the means to preserve the family, and as one of the means to preserve stability.

In asking whether a prohibition of the Criminal Code of Canada is “acceptable in Islam”, the Canadian questioner makes it rather obvious which law code is considered superior.  The response from Sheik Ali Gum’a, moreover, presupposes that the belief that “beating women is a type of barbarism, savagery, and so on” is an inexplicably ingrained and bothersome squeamishness on our part that Muslims living in the West simply have to “adapt to”.

Last year Ashraf Choudhary, Labour MP in New Zealand and the sole Muslim in the NZ Parliament, said something eerily similar to the Mufti.  When asked if the Koran was wrong to allow stoning of homosexuals and adulterers, he responded, "No, no. Certainly what the Koran says is correct. . . . In those societies, not here in New Zealand."

“Those societies”?  “Their culture”?  Why do I get the feeling that Islamic forbearance of Western qualms would last only until Muslims acquire sufficient political and social power to overrule our cultural scruples?

via Dhimmi Watch.