Fox News
Darkness for Women
By Rafia Zakaria
Karachi, Pakistan
With its swampy areas, the natural reserve of Oostvaardersplassen in the Netherlands has an air of remoteness and isolation. It is the place where the body of 18-year-old Rayan Al Najjar — a Syrian-Dutch girl — was found last year. She was murdered in May 2024. With the verdict expected next month, prosecutors are seeking long prison sentences for her father — who fled to Syria — and two brothers. They hold all three responsible for Rayan’s death in a case of ‘honor’ killing.
Rayan had been apparently punished for living a ‘Western lifestyle’. According to news reports, the men were frustrated because Rayan was refusing to wear the hijab and wanted to pursue a relationship of her own choice. Because of this, the men became extremely angry. Rayan knew of the threat to her life and had been under police protection, which was withdrawn before her murder. She was taken to the Dutch swamp, tied up with tape and drowned. Defensive wounds were found on her body. Her father’s DNA was found under her fingernails, establishing that she had put up a fight. Khaled Al Najjar now lives in Syria and has remarried. Syrian authorities say they are willing to assist in the case but have yet to receive requests from the Dutch authorities in this regard.
Unsurprisingly, the news of the killing was covered by some media outlets in a way that portrays Muslims as inherently misogynistic. They included sections of the American, Indian and Israeli media. But the horror of the tragedy raises the question — what retort does one give to Islamophobic agendas when such murders are carried out in the name of religious traditions? Can Muslims evade collective blame in situations like this when they do not speak up against the crime?
In Western countries, Muslim men are looked at with suspicion and fear because of crimes like this one. Many who have different beliefs protest against this stereotyping, but they fail to raise their voices against crimes such as the killing of an innocent teenage girl. Even today, it is nearly impossible to raise such issues inside many mosque communities in the West. It is often the case that men in leadership positions in the community think that a woman exercising her own will is leading a ‘Western lifestyle’ and, by the same logic has only herself to blame for the resultant violence to which she is subjected.
Pakistan too has its share of those who seemingly accept this narrative. Not too long ago, there was an outcry when a judicial note appeared to link live-in relationships to “horrible consequences” in the Noor Mukadam case. Many Pakistani activists as well as the National Commission on the Status of Women condemned this view as misogynistic. However, a ton of men commenting on news stories appeared to feel that choosing a ‘Western lifestyle’ in some ways made extreme violence, including beheadings, understandable, if not justifiable.
Unfortunately, such mindsets are widespread. That women making their own choices in life — like men in Pakistan do every single day — somehow explains a brutal murder reveals an extreme level of misogyny in society that is both grotesque and apocalyptic. Never mind that women — daughters, wives, sisters — living entirely submissive lives are also beaten and hacked to death in Pakistan without anyone caring one bit. Never mind that studies show that almost half the women have had some experience of physical, emotional and sexual abuse. Never mind that not even digital spaces are safe for Pakistani women. Never mind all of that — let us find a victim of a high-profile murder and then analyze everything she ever did so that she can be killed again for displaying ‘Western behavior’. No woman can be ‘perfect’ and in not being so, she is often deemed, in Pakistan, deserving of being raped, assaulted and murdered. On the other hand, men are always right.
There are moments when masks lift and true faces become visible. How long will men use the bogeyman of ‘Western’ this or that to hide their own hatred of women? How long until they simply acknowledge that the second a woman does something they do not agree with she is considered fair game — and can be tortured, punished or killed and it will all be ‘justifiable’? It is chilling to witness such hatred and to realize that the fathers, brothers, bosses, husbands and friends who had seemed so likeable, so understanding when a woman did their bidding can change in an instant — and justify cruel drownings in dark swamps, and beheadings in Islamabad mansions. When these truths come to light, Pakistan and all the homes where such men rule are revealed as very dark places.
(Rafia Zakaria is an attorney and human rights activist. She is a columnist for DAWN Pakistan and a regular contributor for Al Jazeera America, Dissent, Guernica and many other publications. She is the author of The Upstairs Wife: An Intimate History of Pakistan. She tweets @rafiazakaria . Dawn)
