The practice of child-marriage & pedophilia, set forth by Prophet Muhammad through his marrying little child Aisha, continues to be practiced in Islamic societies. Little Muslim girls continue to be victim of Islamic child-sex abuse, which goes in the name of marriage and often takes the form of trade.
Prophet Muhammad had set the much-condemned tradition of pedophilia in Islam by marrying little child Aisha, aged 6, when he was 52. What is ignored is much wider and worse example of pedophilia, set forth by Muhammad, namely in his capture of the women and children of various tribes, namely Banu Quraiza, Mustaliq and Khaybar as slaves. The large number of underage girls in those lots of human booty were used as sex-slaves by their Muslim captors or were sold to pedophile buyers.
In his first major assault in India, Sultan Mahmud, the hero of Indian Muslims, drove away 500,000 women and children to be used or sold as slaves. How many young little girls, like Aisha, were there in this mind-boggling number of captives, who were to be condemned to much worse form of sexual violation and slavery until death.
And this tradition continued on a large scale well into the 20th century, especially in Islamic Africa. It's still widespread in Sudan and places like that.
International condemnation of slavery and pedophilia has reduced, for women and underage girls, the sufferings from this legal Islamic holy tradition. With lack of power and international pressure, today few non-Muslim children suffer this same pain. But this practice of pedophilia that the Prophet had set forth as holy tradition in Islam within Islamic society, continue to be practiced today. Little Muslim girls continue to be victim of Islamic child sex abuse, which goes in the name of marriage, and often takes the form of trade.
Egypt bans 92 year old from marrying a bride of 17
On June 14, 2008, Al-Akhbar, a Cairo-based newspaper, reported that Egyptian authorities have banned a 92-year-old Saudi man from marrying a poor teenage girl, 75 years his junior. The justice ministry of Egypt made its ruling under a law designed to prevent wealthy Arabs from the Gulf from snapping up young Egyptian girls. It forbade marriage when there is an age-gap of 25 years and more between the husband and wife. The report also said that the unidentified Saudi holidaymaker proposed to marry a 17-year-old village girl and offered a lucrative dowry of about US$ 28,000 as well as gold jewelry. Her parents, who were very poor, accepted the offer.
In this context, Indian readers may recall that the aged and wealthy Arabs from the Gulf countries, who come to India, mainly to Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, to prey on teenage girls, by paying fat cash as dowry to their parents. They generally enter into temporary marriage contracts (Mutah), and return home after a brief stay. In January, 2007, a 60-year-old Arab man married 3 girls -- Afreen, Farheena and Sultana -- at a single sitting within ten minutes in Hyderabad. (See: Mutah or Temporary Marriage in Muslim Societies).
However, according to Al-Akhbar, the Egyptian authorities allowed 173 such marriages in the previous year after the foreign husbands paid a fee of US$ 8,000 each. But the justice ministry refused to register the marriage this time in light of the new legislation mentioned.
While Egyptian authorities should be commended for barring that old man of 92 from marrying a girl of the age of his great grandchildren, but the important issue here is: How a man of 92, whose one leg is in a grave, can think of marrying a young girl of 17? Though it appears to be utterly incredible, it is the truth. The answer should be found in Islam's depraved sexual perversity as set by Prophet Muhammad as a sacred Islamic tradition and law, which Muslims refused to abandon. Renowned ex-Muslim author Anwar Shaikh said: Islam stands on two pillars—sex and violence. While, at 92, he is no good for violent jihad, concentrating on sex seem as good way of staying within Islam's sacred aura.
Prophet Muhammad also taught that emulating his depraved sexual indulgence in this world—namely polygamy, pedophilia, sex-slaves and rape of kafir women—would help open to Muslims the gates of paradise, filled heavenly damsels or houris and young slave-boys or ghilmans for their continued enjoyment for eternity. The old man of 92 might have just tried to emulate his Prophet by marrying a teenage girl and hence to secure a permanent place in jannat-ul-ferdause or the best place in Allah’s paradise.
Ayatollah Khomeini said: “A man can have sexual pleasure from a child as young as a baby. However he should not penetrate, but sodomising the child is OK. If the man penetrates and damages the child then he should be responsible for her subsistence throughout her life. This girl, however does not count as one of his four permanent wives. The man will not be eligible to marry the girls sister. …It is better for a girl to marry in such a time when she would begin menstruation at her husband’s house rather than her father’s home. Any father marrying his daughter so young will have a permanent place in heaven.” (“Tahrirolvasyleh” by Ayatollah Khomeini, fourth volume, 1990)
Hence, one should not be astonished if the said 92-year-old Saudi man had married a baby girl and sodomized her. Khomeini's above opinion is, perhaps, based on the holy Prophet's sodomizing Ayesha (by thighing etc.) till she was able to sustain vaginal penetration?
A 10 year old child-bride turned over to 80 year old husband in Saudi Arabia
On August 26, 2009, CNN reported that, in Saudi Arabia, a 10-year-old bride was forced to return to her 80-year-old husband by her father, after discovering that she had been hiding for about 10 days at the home of her aunt.
A local newspaper reported on the same day that the 80-year-old husband denied that he is really 80, as claimed by the girl's family and said: "And even if it is true, my marriage is not against Shariah Law. It included the elements of acceptance and response by the father of the bride." He also complained that the aunt of his wife is unnecessarily meddling in his private affairs. He refused to accept that he had broken any laws. Instead, he asserted that he was only following the footsteps of the holy and beloved Prophet Mohammed, who had married 6-year-old Ayesha at the age of 52.
He added that he had been engaged to his wife’s elder sister, which did not materialize as she wanted to continue with her studies. “As a consequence, her father offered his younger daughter. I was allowed to have a look at her according to Shariah Law and found her acceptable,” he said. While commenting on the affair, Maatouq Al-Abdullah, a member of the National Society for Human Rights (NSHR), said that there is no system in place in Saudi Arabia, regulating marriage of young girls, which sometimes results in adverse psychological, health and social effects. "Such marriages are considered a gross violation of charters on the rights of children, which the Kingdom has signed and which set the age of adulthood at 18," he added. (Sources here and here).
Saudi judge refuses to annul 8-year-old girl's marriage
According to another CNN report, on December 24, 2008, a Saudi judge refused to terminate the marital bond between an 8-year-old girl and her 47-year-old husband. The relatives of the girl told CNN that the girl could submit a petition only when she attains puberty. The lawyer, who pleaded for the husband, said that the girl's father arranged her marriage to a 47-year-old man to settle debts, and hence the marriage could not be dissolved. As a result, the judge turned down her petition for divorce aside for now. The girl’s mother filed a petition to the Appeals Court, asking for a revision of the decision of the Lower Court, but the original ruling was upheld. Girl's mother expressed her determination to fight the case and continue to seek her daughter's divorce. (See video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ms8tnn8klF8).
The case drew attention and criticism from local and international human rights groups and came to light in December, 2009, when the judge al-Habib declined to annul the marriage on a legal technicality. The judge also ruled that the girl's mother, separated from her father, was not the girl's legal guardian and therefore could not represent her in court.
The girl's father, according to the attorney, arranged the marriage in order to settle his debts with the man, who is a close friend of his. At the time of the initial verdict, the judge required the girl's husband to sign a pledge that he would not have sex with her until she reaches puberty, the mother’s lawyer, al-Jutaili, told CNN. The judge ruled that when the girl reaches puberty, she will have the right to request a divorce by filing a petition with the court, said al-Jutaili.
In fact, there is no age-limit in Saudi Arabia for marrying off girls. According to conservative clerics, girls of a few months old could be married off. But the issue of child-marriage has emerged recently as a hot-button topic in deeply conservative Saudi kingdom. While human rights groups have been petitioning the government to enact laws that would protect children from this type of marriage, the kingdom's top cleric insisted that it's OK for girls as young as 10 to wed. "It is incorrect to say that it's not permitted to marry off girls who are 15 and younger," the kingdom's grand mufti Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Sheikh told reporters of Al-Hayat newspaper. "A girl aged 10 or 12 can be married. Those who think she's too young are wrong and they are being unfair to her", he added.
"We hear a lot in the media about the marriage of underage girls. But we should know that Sharia law is the law ordained by Allah and hence it cannot bring injustice to women… Sharia law is Islamic law and Saudi Arabia follows a strict interpretation of Islam called Wahhabism”, said Sheikh Abdul Aziz Al-Sheikh.
Christoph Wilcke, a Saudi Arabia researcher for Human Rights Watch, told CNN that child-marriage in Saudi Arabia is a common phenomena. "We've been hearing about these types of cases once in every four or five months because the Saudi public is now able to express their anger over this kind of incidents, especially when minor girls are traded off to older men in the garb marriage", Wilcke said. "Though Saudi ministries occasionally take decisions designed to protect children, but it is the religious establishment that holds sway in the courts, and in many cases beyond the court", Wilcke explained.
Saudi child bride (12) drops 'divorce plea' from 80-year-old man:
BBC reported on February 2, 2010 that a 12-year-old girl in Saudi Arabia has withdrawn her request for a divorce from her 80-year-old husband. The girl, from Qaseem province east of Riyadh, was married last September in return for a dowry of US$ 22,600 paid to her father. She and her mother had asked a court to annul the marriage on the grounds that the girl had been raped. But now the girl has withdrawn her petition, saying that she wants to respect her father's wishes. There is no doubt that the girl had been compelled to change her decision under threat.
Okaz, a local newspaper, reported that the girl said in the court room: "I agree to the marriage. I have no objection. This is in filial respect to my father and obedience to his wish". The anticipation of threat gains ground when the girl, while talking to a reporter of Al-Riyadh newspaper in January, said that she begged him to save her. The lawyer appointed to help the girl said that her mother had not yet been informed about the change of heart of her daughter.
It has been mentioned earlier that Saudi Arabia has no law against child-marriage, even though it is a signatory to the UN declaration of Children’s Rights. In April last year the Justice Minister, while discussing about the marriage of an 8-year-old girl to a 60-year-old man, said that there should be increased regulation and closer watch to prevent parents from "selling off" their girl children.
It is important to note that the incident mentioned above has attracted the attention of the Saudi royal family. Princess Adela bint Abdullah, the daughter of King Abdullah bin Saud, said the marriage violated the child's rights. She has been reported by the Saudi media to have said, "A child has the right to live her childhood and not be forced to get married. Even an adult would not accept that". But conservative clerics and defenders of child-marriage say the practice is part of Saudi culture.
It is needless to say that these shameful and unethical things are going on in Saudi Arabia and other Islamic countries, because of the precedence, set by Prophet Muhammad, namely his marriage with the 6-year-old Ayesha.
