The war with Niqab and Burqa

It is a walking prison.

-DANIEL BACQUELAINE, Belgian MP, on an impending law banning face-covering veils. The law, expected to pass April 22, would make Belgium the first country in Europe to make the wearing of burqa and niqab illegal

So that's what the Belgian MP says about Niqab or covering the face. And as the time.com said Belgium might be the first country to ban wearing it .

First of all, for those who don't know what a niqab or a burqa is . It's the covering of the face except the eyes. And some even cover their whole faces .

In most Arabic countries and all over the world , this is the niqab that most women wear.

In Afghanistan and Pakistan , women wear this kind of niqab or burqa as it came to known world-wide after 9/11

It's a duty for Muslim women to wear decent dresses. Moving from there, the opinion varies between covering the face or not. But all agrees that a woman should cover her body . Except - and that's where they vary- the hands and the face , mostly about face. Walking the streets of any Islamic or Arabic countries you will see different kinds of Hijab and the continuous battle between the right one and the unacceptable one won't end.

This is what a Saudi scholar have said about Hijab in islamtoday.net when asked :-

Does a Muslim woman have to cover her face?

Sheikh Nâsir al-Mâjid, professor at al-Imâm University in Riyadh Said : -

Observing hijâb is obligatory by the consensus of scholars. It is clearly established by both the Qur’an and Sunnah. However, whether the face must be covered is a legitimate matter of disagreement. The most preferable saying is – and Allah knows best – that the woman should cover all of her body, including her face and hands. Allah says: “And say to the believing women that they should lower their gaze and guard their modesty; that they should not display their beauty and ornaments except what (ordinarily) appear thereof; that they should draw their veils over their bosoms” [Sûrah al-Nûr: 31]. `Aishah said: “May Allah bless the first immigrant women, when Allah revealed “that they should draw their veils over their bosoms” they cut some pieces of their clothes and use them as veils. [Sahîh al-Bukhârî] Ibn Hajr writes in Fath al-Bârî:

The word ikhtamarna in the verse means they covered their faces. The clearest evidence for the correctness of this saying is Allah’s saying: “O Prophet! Tell thy wives and daughters and the believing women that they should cast their outer garments over their persons (when out of doors)”. This verse is addressed to the believing women along with the wives of the Prophet (peace be upon him). There is no disagreement that the wives of the Prophet (peace be upon him) have to cover their faces in front of strangers. Thus, this becomes evidence that other women should do the same as the command for the veil mentions both groups of women together.

Ibn `Abbâs said: “Allah orders the believing women to cover their faces whenever they go out of their houses by something above their heads and to show only one eye.” This is something natural and obvious as the beauty of a woman is most concentrated in her face. Whenever someone says about a woman that she is beautiful, he means the face. The scholars agree that women should cover their hair, neck, arms and everything else besides the face. However, the face is the most important to be covered as it is the part that would cause the most trials. And Allah knows best.

Islamonline.net quoted from the book (The Lawful and the Prohibited in Islam) of Sheik Yousuf Al-Qaradawi about how a Muslim woman conduct her self with the following:

Her clothing must conform to the standards laid down by the Islamic Shari`ah, which are as follows:

a) Her dress must cover her entire body with the exception of [that which is apparent] (An-Nur 24: 31) which, according to the most preferable interpretation, refers to the face and hands.

b) It must not be transparent, revealing what is underneath it. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) has informed us that, “Among the dwellers of hell are such women as are clothed yet naked, seducing and being seduced. These shall not enter the Garden, nor shall (even) its fragrance reach them.” Here, the meaning of “clothed yet naked” is that their light, thin, transparent garments do not conceal what is underneath. Once some women of Bani Tamim, who were clad in transparent clothes, came to see `A’ishah, and she remarked, “If you are Believers, these are not the clothes which befit believing women.” On another occasion, when a bride wearing a sheer and transparent head-covering was brought into her presence, she commented, “A woman who dresses like this does not believe in surat an-Nur.” (This is surah 24, which together with surah 33 (al-Ahzab) contains many injunctions concerning purity and propriety, man-woman relations, and dress.)

c) Her dress must not be too tight so as to define the parts of her body, especially its curves, even though it may not be transparent. This describes many of the styles of clothing current in the sensuous, materialistic civilization of the Western world, whose fashion designers compete with one another in devising clothing for women which tantalizingly emphasizes the bustline, waist, and hips, etc., in order to elicit the lustful admiration of men. Women who wear such clothes likewise fall under the definition of “clothed yet naked”, since such a dress is often more provocative than one which is transparent.

d) She must not wear clothes which are specifically for men, such as trousers in our time. The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) cursed women who try to resemble men and men who resemble women, and prohibited women from wearing men’s clothing and vice-versa.

e) In her choice of clothing she should not imitate non-Muslims, whether they are Jews, Christians, or pagans, for Islam disapproves of conformity to non-Islamic modes and desires its followers to develop their own distinctive characteristics in appearance, as well as in beliefs and attitudes. This is why Muslims have been asked to be different from non-Muslims in many aspects, and why the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) has said, “Whoever imitates a people is one of them.”

So you can see there are differences between the scholars of the Muslim world about Hijab, but they all agree that it's the covering of the hair and modest dress for the whole body.

Since 9/11 , the whole world seems to be interesting about the states of the Muslim women in the Arabic and Islamic worlds . A very few care before that .

The first way of liberating women was to get rid of her Hijab but mostly to get her rid of her niqab and burqa , specially since the west enemy back then- the Taliban- force women to wear the burqa and force them to do nothing but to sit at home with no work.

And then the hit came from where liberty resides in the west. And in the name of secularism and freedom , countries started to attack Niqab and burqa leaving the normal Hijab alone, except in some countries.

They have stated many reasons for this

but most of them claimed that wearing the Niqab or Burqa is against the secularism of the country by banning all religious symbols.

And the rallies didn't stop

First it was in some places in France, and now probably Belgium.

But I wonder why didn't the South American countries go after the Niqab ? how about the non-Muslim African and Asian countries? . Though it is attacked in some Arabic countries.

Why is it the industrial west. And why didn't America go after it, too ?

P.S: Does the size of the font bothers you ? or is it ok ?