WUNRN
Turkey – “You Deserve Rape,” Quran Teacher Tells Schoolgirls Without Headscarf Cover
DHA Photo
Investigation
launched into Quran teacher’s rape remarks
Parents are demanding that a teacher of religion classes in
northern Turkey be fired after he told some of his female students that they
“deserve rape” for not wearing an Islamic headscarf.
“You don’t cover your head anyway, so raping you or doing evil to you is
permissible [in Islam],” the female teacher, identified by the initials L.Y.Ý.,
told students at the Halil Rýfat Paţa Middle School in the province of Tokat on
March 9, according to parents who spoke to Dođan News Agency.
The teacher was reportedly angered by noise caused by mixed male and female
students in an elective class on the Quran, during which 17 seventh graders
were talking to each other instead of listening to the teacher.
According to the parents, the teacher also told the girls that they should have
prayed for Özgecan Aslan - whose brutal murder in southern Turkey on Feb. 13
caused national outrage - instead of going to demonstrations to commemorate
her.
Mahmut Demirbađ, the school’s headmaster, reportedly told the parents that the
teacher “apologized” for the comments. However, some parents have continued to
demand that she be dismissed, threatening legal action.
“She insulted 13-year-old girls for not wearing a headscarf during a Quran
class, which is elective. This teacher cannot lecture my daughter,” a parent
told the Dođan News Agency.
Levent Yazýcý, the education director in Tokat, said an official investigation
into the claims had been launched, adding that the teacher had been temporarily
appointed to another school.
Elective classes on the Quran and the life of the Prophet Muhammad have been
included in Turkish schools since 2012.
The religious education class, on the other hand, is compulsory. A recent
European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruling stated that high school students
in Turkey must be allowed to opt out of this class to “ensure respect for
parents’ convictions” and to guarantee the right to education.