WUNRN
PALESTINE - FORCES SHUT DOWN RADICAL
ISLAMIST SEMINAR ON WOMEN IN BETHLEHEM
By Khaled Abu Toameh - 11/20/2013
The Palestinian Authority on Tuesday night banned a radical
Islamic group from holding a seminar in Bethlehem under the title: “Women’s
groups and societies seek to corrupt women.”
The seminar was sponsored by Hizb ut Tahrir [Party of Liberation], a radical
group whose goal is to create an Islamic state or caliphate ruled by Islamic
law.
The group, which has a few thousand supporters in the West Bank, recently
launched a campaign against women’s organizations and societies, accusing them
of corrupting Palestinian women.
The campaign is being held under the motto “Women’s honor must be protected and
the infidels and their tools are conspiring against women.”
The campaign by Hizb ut Tahrir drew strong condemnations from women’s groups in
the West Bank. The groups accused the radical Islamic party of inciting against
women and appealed to the Palestinian Authority to take action to stop the
fundamentalists from pursuing their campaign.
Hizb ut Tahrir accused the PA governor of Bethlehem, Abdel Fattah Hamayel, of
succumbing to the “shameless intervention” of the women’s groups to prevent the
seminar from taking place.
“The governor ordered the closure of the meeting hall without any legal or
moral basis,” the party said in a statement.
The party reiterated the charge that women’s organizations were “puffing
Palestinian women with ideas of decadence and encouraging them to rebel against
the rules of Islam.”
The party’s main attacks have been directed against Western-funded women’s
NGO’s in the West Bank.
Hizb ut Tahrir is particularly concerned about the fact that the organizations
have been educating Palestinian women about their rights.
The party accused the NGOs of accepting financial aid from “infidel countries
that are hostile to Islam.”