Violations of 'Islamic teachings' take deadly toll on Iraqi women

Because life for women in islamist society isn't quite hellish enough...

Iraq (CNN) -- The images in the Basra police file are nauseating: Page after page of women killed in brutal fashion -- some strangled to death, their
faces disfigured; others beheaded. All bear signs of torture.

The women are killed, police say, because they failed to wear a headscarf or because they ignored other "rules" that secretive fundamentalist groups want to
enforce.

"Fear, fear is always there," says 30-year-old Safana, an artist and university professor. "We don't know who to be afraid of. Maybe it's a friend or a student you teach. There is no break, no security. I don't know who to be afraid of."

Her fear is justified. Iraq's second-largest city, Basra, is a stronghold of conservative Shia groups. As many as 133 women were killed in Basra last year -- 79 for violation of "Islamic teachings" and 47 for so-called honor killings, according to IRIN, the news branch of the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. One glance through the police file is enough to understand the consequences. Basra's police chief, Gen. Abdul Jalil Khalaf, flips through the file, pointing to one unsolved case after another.

Well… at least we can be sure that someone's "honor" was preserved in the midst of this carnage.

Scared women hiding in their homes or under a shapeless black sack under threat of death for making a simple choice about how they covered their hair.

Super!

You know, I’ll just never understand a politico-religious ideology that so vigorously controls the women that make up approximately one half of it’s population. Well, I suppose you could understand it if you're a man in Islamic society.

With Islam, a man doesn't need to be bothered with providing moral or logical justification for his blatant sexism and misogyny. It's already pre-approved by God! It's not like women are suited to make their own choices about what they can or can't do with their lives anyway, right? Yeah, it's best just to keep them in check with a little koranic tough love.