Hind Ahmas, a 32-year-old French mother, is facing two years in prison and a $42,000 fine because she refuses to accept the government's new ban on wearing the burqa or niqab in public. Ahmas was banned from her own trial yesterday because she wouldn't remove her veil, and during the proceeding she was ordered to…
France instituted a ban on wearing face coverings in public in April, and the first fines may be handed down this week. In the past six months, authorities have been hesitant to enforce the measure, and many police officers are simply looking the other way when they see a woman in a veil. While the ban was ostensibly…
Princess Hijab is a street artist in Paris who uses dripping black paint to cover models in subway ads, giving them niqabs. Veils.
Two self-described web-activists called Niqabitch are making a splash in the French (and European) media landscape. To protest France's burqa ban, they're mixing things up a bit and throwing together a niqab with a miniskirt.
The vote was 246 to 1, banning any veils that cover the face. A person wearing a veil can be fined 150€ ($190). Force a woman to wear a niqab or burqa and spend a year in prison.
Ultra-Orthodox rabbis in Israel are about to issue an edict banning a particular outfit adopted by a few women — because it's too modest. That outfit? A burqa.
• Even though the video game RapeLay (which allows you to stalk and assault multiple women and girls) was removed from Amazon and other outlets, the game remains a viral sensation, and is commonly available for download online.
"In France, the nation and the republic remain the strongest ramparts against ... fundamentalist tendencies. France is diversity, and France is unity."-France's immigration minister, Eric Besson, claiming that burqas do not fit France's "national identity." [MSNBC]
Since a pregnant woman was stabbed to death in a German courtroom, apparently for wearing a headscarf, the debate over Islamic women's dress in Europe has grown more urgent.
