The Sharia Problem

(The American Prospect)  This column was written by Asra Nomani.

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The convening of Iraq's new parliament is in some ways a victory for progress in the embattled country. Unfortunately, though, it seems that not everybody will enjoy equally in a victorious future: "In the name of God, the most compassionate, the most merciful. We have honored the sons of Adam," says the preamble of the country's new constitution. Where are the daughters of Eve?

The new constitution may seem at first glance promising — explicitly insuring "gender rights" and setting a target that "aims" to have 25 percent of the seats in Iraq's new parliament, the Council of Representatives, filled by women.

The constitution seems progressive — even poetic — for its inclusion of women in language, like the kind found later in the preamble: "We the people of Iraq who have just risen from our stumble, and who are looking with confidence to the future through a republican, federal, democratic, pluralistic system, have resolved with the determination of our men, women, the elderly and youth, to respect the rules of law." Later, Article 14 stipulates: "Iraqis are equal before the law without discrimination based on gender, race, ethnicity, origin, color, religion, creed, belief or opinion, or economic and social status."

In addition, the constitution grants women the right to vote and political participation (Article 20), protection from sex trafficking (Article 35), and "the protection of motherhood" (Article 29). It guarantees "the individual and the family, especially children and women," "social and health security and the basic requirements for leading a free and dignified life," including "a suitable income" and "appropriate housing" (Article 30). Amazingly, Article 35 also includes an important protection, "The State guarantees the protection of the individual from intellectual, political and religious coercion," echoing a proclamation in the Qur'an (2:256), "There is no compulsion in religion."

But it also leaves the door open for far-right clerics, both Sunni and Shiite, to band together on something about which they seem to agree: controlling women by making a strict interpretation of Islam the law of the land, which would threaten to revoke parts or all of the 1959 Iraqi Law of Personal Status (considered some of the most progressive family law in the Middle East).

In seemingly innocuous language, the constitution is in fact a nightmare for women. Article 2, for example, is a self-fulfilling prophecy for disaster: "First: Islam is the official religion of the State, and it is a fundamental source of legislation." The notion of Islamic law in legislation wouldn't be so frightening if the new leaders of Iraq could be trusted to rise to the highest principles of social justice and women's rights in Islam, but they can't — particularly considering the pressures exerted on them by militant and extremist political forces both on the Sunni and Shiite sides who seek to make Iraq a model Islamic state in the vision of Saudi Arabia, Taliban Afghanistan, and Iran.

Making Islam "a" fundamental source of the constitution is supposed to be a victory for Americans and secular Iraqis who bristled when the first draft of the constitution made Islam "the" fundamental source, but it's a hollow victory. It's just semantics that will allow the dogmatic conservative lobby to impose their narrow interpretation of Islamic law on women's rights. The future of women's rights in marriage, child custody disputes, inheritance, divorce, attire, and public office will be determined by a tug of war in which far-right theologians, clerics and politicians will most likely be the most powerful and intimidating.

The most alarming part of the constitution for women's rights follows in another provision in Article 2: "No law that contradicts the established provisions of Islam may be established." "Established provisions" reflect a euphemism that the Islamic religious establishment can use to codify conservative and puritanical interpretations of Islam that are nothing less than man-made rules – not "divine law," as they try to argue.

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