Illustration: Female supporters of Hizb ut-Ta
Illustration: Female supporters of Hizb ut-TaReuters

Pan-Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir is continuing an extensive campaign to combat Western values regarding women's rights by holding conferences about women in Sharia [Islamic] law, who are raised to be strictly obedient to their fathers and later to their husbands. The conferences are being held in Judea and Samaria as well as in Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem. 

According to Islamic law, women must ask permission to leave the house at any time. After marriage, they are instructed that they must be available at all times to satisfy their husband's whims - with or without her explicit consent. 

One of the events held in Jerusalem featured a 13 year-old girl named Zeinab, who appeared in conservative Muslim garb and read a speech calling Islam "the kindest religion in mankind", urging women to keep the strictures given to them by Sharia law. Zeinab emphasized her devoutness in prayer, reading the Quran, and religious dress. 

Zeinab immediately attacked women's rights organizations thereafter, claiming that the freedom given to women to leave their fathers' homes after age 18 leads to "licentiousness", including the ability to talk to men over the internet, at university, and eventually behind closed doors. 

Zeinab also attacked women's rights groups for encouraging women to complain if they suffered domestic abuse, leading to arrests of male family members. Western rights and freedoms don't apply to Muslim women, the girl claimed, and are simply tools by the West to encourage women to give up their bodies freely. 

Ironically, Hizb ut-Tahrir is banned in many Muslim countries due to its many alleged links to terrorism but remains legal in Israel and most western states under the very laws of freedom of expression it seeks to subvert.

The full speech (in Arabic) is available below.