Cross-posted from TheCommunity.com
Update: Reports have emerged that Sakineh Mohammadie Ashtiani has been granted a reprieve from death by stoning, but still faces the death penalty for adultery.
I am aware, as I am writing this, that I come from a country far from Iran, and a religious and political culture that are different in many ways. But there are elements that tie all religions together. Compassion and love are two of those elements.
Any person who has studied the words of God or felt Allah's blessings has been privileged to know His mercy and forgiveness. So how could it be that He would approve of our treating our fellow men and women -- our brothers and sisters in his family -- with anything less?
Sakineh Mohammadie Ashtiani and her children are His creations as surely as you and I are.
We do not always do well at interpreting the will of our God in this world. My Church, the Catholic Church, does not stand above reproach in this. We will always have the stain of the Spanish Inquisition and the torture of innocents assumed to be heretics in our history. Today the Church is dealing with shortfalls in its treatment of those who have abused children, God's precious young ones.
But we must remember that these acts are the acts of Man, not acts of God. As individuals, and citizens of this planet, can only say that we will continually strive to do better, and to better reflect God's wisdom and mercy in our lives and in the communities and civilizations we build.
As we strive to do this, we must at times recognize that barbarities that were a part of past cultures in our religious history no longer have a place in our lives. In the case of stoning, its roots are not in the Quran but are in the Torah, believed to have been written in 500 BC -- a world that has little in common with our world today.
It is time to leave stoning as a form of capital punishment behind us as a race, to relegate it to the same place we have put stringing heretics on racks -- in a chapter of our past that we are not proud of.
The case of Sakineh Mohammadie Ashtiani -- a terrified woman who does not even speak the language of her accusers -- is an opportunity for us to show God's wisdom and mercy to another.
I do not pretend to be a religious scholar and I do not pretend to be able to comment on the legal proceedings or details of her case. It is as a fellow human being that I appeal to those who are the Supreme Leaders of Islamic Justice, the interpreters of the will of Allah on Earth, to show His compassion and love, if not to the mother than at least to the two young children whose lives will be destroyed by this event, to touch their heads with the understanding that Allah would not want his innocent young children to be exposed to such extreme suffering at the hands of Man.
We can do better than this.
Dr. David Liepert: The Stoning of Women: Quranic Prescription or Barefaced Misogyny?
George Elerick: Stoning Sekinah: The Perversion of the Other
Iranian Family Campaigns to Save Mother, Sakineh Mohammadi ...
Sakineh Mohammadie Ashtiani, Iran Mother, Could Be Stoned To Death ...
YouTube - Stay With Me Sakineh
Save Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani from being Stoned to Death in Iran ...
URGENT! Save Sakineh Mohammadi from being Stoned to Death in Iran ...
Stories of repression against students
Interrupted Lives, is a short documentary created by the Abdorrahman Boroumand Foundation (ABF) to illuminate stories of the repression and interruption of the lives of students under the government of the Islamic Republic of Iran. The documentary examines documented human rights case histories of students imprisoned, tortured or executed for voicing religious or political dissent since the 1979 revolution. The film will be shown at the Interrupted Lives traveling exhibit... For more information contact ABF at: omid@abfiran.org
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRsb7ffHsdo&feature=player_embedded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgANsptj3m0&feature=player_embedded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nb9BA_huJWM&feature=player_embedded
Cyber memorial for victims of IRI sine 1979
http://www.iranrights.org/english/memorial.php
http://www.iranrights.org/
English http://www.PetitionOnline.com/IUCR1/petition.html
Farsi http://www.PetitionOnline.com/IUC2/petition.html
Akbar Mohammadi Born 1972
Iran Died July 30, 2006
Tehran, Iran Known for Imprisonment after July 1999 Iranian Student Protests and died at Evin prison due to hunger strike.
Note from the Amnesty International on Akbar Mohammadi's unjust murder: http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?lang=e&id=ENGMDE130862006
The repression you see in Iran right now; women's dress code, stoning, men's hair-dos are desperate acts of a dying/failed regime who is lashing out against her own people to claim that they are in-charge.
Let's help IRI realize their eventuality and see them out of Iran.
As a Muslim you have my unconditional support and admiration on this issue. Myself and my Iranian compatriots are appalled by the decision to reopen her case after already having been exonerated from the charges of killing her husband.
Our prayers are for Sakineh and her two young children, along with every single human being in Iran who are caught in the clutches of authoritarian regime in Iran and else where in the world.
Respectfully
-JT
The reality is the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan was wages by Godless MIC and Zionists and most murders has nothing to do with God.
Oh, but those automatons make you sick.
And certainly Obama and Bush kill with impunity and the labyrinth of bureaucracy and legalese that shield them from accountability.
Over 1 million killed in Iraq. No one's saying how many have been killed in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and elsewhere.
These stinking savages should be banished from Mankind until they can meet the minimum civilization level.... Give them another 10,000 yrs and they might make it.
You will be amused of the level of sophistication in their universities and research centers. The world is not that simple as its reflection inside your brain.
Whatever makes it easier to kill, right?
Over 1 million and counting....
The men would have been aquitted, since she could not produce four male witnesses who have seen the penetration. She is guilty because she has confessed to adultery. Victim becomes the accused; it is plain barbarism.
We expect human beings to be just and humane, for that is our nature."
SearingTruth
A Future of the Brave
So again, as I have urged in previous comments (although, sadly, many have chosen to ignore me), if you actually care about human rights, please set aside your squabbles and self-serving opinions for this issue and quite simply go and sign the petition (if you wish to do more, I encourage you to do so) at http://freesakineh.org/
As you said, it is time that these human rights violations be brought to the attention of the free world, and that leaders and citizens of the free world speak together to condemn and end these barbaric actions.
It is also profoundly cruel and wrong to punish this young woman with death or any harsh sentence.
.
Plain rubbish. Name one muslim country in the world that treats its minorities with equity and fairness. Name one non muslim country in the world in which muslims live as minority peacefully and productively without creating problems. Read this:
As he famously observed, "Wherever one looks along the perimeter of Islam, Muslims have problems living peaceably with their neighbors. The question naturally rises as to whether this pattern of the late 20th century conflict between Muslim and non-Muslim groups is equally true of relations between groups from other civilizations. In fact, it is not. Muslims make up 1/5 of the world's population but in the 1990s they have been far more involved in intergroup violence than the people of any other civilization....Islam's borders are bloody, and so are its innards" (The Clash of Civilisations. p. 256. Samuel Huttington)
Usama: Islam is the only religion that sanctions muslims to rape other women. Read the verse: "The captive from war that your right hand possessed" (Sura 4:3) Sheikh Al Hilali in Australia supported the rape of Ausie women and remarked that uncovered women who go around unescorted are like uncovered meat and cats can come an eat; in short they invite rape. Islam is not like any othert religion; it is evil.
They have the mental age of a 12yr old. All emotion and no logic what so ever.
[And if you fear that you cannot act equitably towards orphans, then marry such women as seem good to you, ,,,,,,,,,, ]
As a matter of fact Iran denies that she war ever threatened to be stoned.
Also new laws in Iran's Parliament to remove stoning from penalty code.
Just remember that all these propaganda against Iran is just for making an excuse to invade Iran, remember Iraq 2003, of course not, short memory huh?
I don't see this as propaganda against Iran. It's a specific case that highlights unjust legal treatment of women, but does not assume an immediate threat to another nation. Iran's nuclear policies are more likely to be a reason for attack. Currently, I don't believe an attack is imminent; what nation can afford another war? Maybe Canada.
Come on. Iranians are human like everyone else on the planet. They're not going to be any more perfect than anyone else. Of course they're going to get criticized for something barbaric like this; it does not reflect the better nature of the nation, but the worst of it. Sometimes your critics are your best friends; who else will tell you that you're walking around with toilet paper stuck to your shoe?
Does Iran really need to treat women like this? I don't think so. Will it suffer any shame or loss if it treats women with more respect and legal parity? Of course not. So why not make these changes?
It is NOW the nature of America today.
If you marginalize a segment of your population for centuries, then it becomes very easy to commit barbarous acts against them.
Do you deny that she may not have been able to adequately defend herself even under Iranian law, as she speaks only Turkish, and her trials were conducted in Farsi?
Do you deny that she was acquitted in all her trials, only to be convicted by a judge who acted on his own personal opinion, even though there was no evidence to indicate her guilt?
I recall someone else from Tabriz who was also murdered. Remember Shams?
As you seem to consider Iran so just and misunderstood, perhaps you would care to comment on the brutal torture and murder of Iranian-Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi by Iranian authorities.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/kazemi/