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"If
the law is passed, we will seek to file a legal complaint because
this law will be in contradiction with the French
constitution," Qaradawi
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DOHA,
January 7 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Prominent Muslim
scholar Sheikh Youssef Al-Qaradawi threatened legal action if France
adopts a law banning hijab in public schools.
"If
the law is passed, we will seek to file a legal complaint because this
law will be in contradiction with the French constitution,"
Qaradawi told Agence France-Presse (AFP) in an interview on Tuesday,
January 6.
Sheikh
Qaradawi, a well-known moderate scholar, said "measures like
banning the headscarf will feed extremism".
He
said the European Council for Fatwa and Research, which he chairs, has
called on France to revise its position on the Islamic wear and
decided to send a delegation to Paris, led by Mauritania's former
justice minister Abdullah bin Baya.
In
a televised speech
in December 2003, Chirac came out in favor of the ban, which he wants
written into law by the start of the next academic year, saying that
“long-established” secularism in the country should be reaffirmed.
The
decision, intended to reflect France's strict separation of religion
and state, has set off a storm of protest by Muslim leaders and
ordinary people around the world.
Qaradawi
considers the French justification as illogical as western secularism
does rather guarantee free expression of religion.
Last
month, Qaradawi asked Chirac to "go back on his decision"
and said in a letter addressed to the French ambassador in Qatar that
he was saddened by the proposed ban.
"This
trend rather launches an unrelenting attack on the percepts of Islam
by France, a country supposed to show respect to of liberty and
tolerance,” he said in a letter sent to
Chirac.
The
prominent scholar had earlier asserted that the French ban on hijab
testifies to the spread of
"extremist" secularism that “we had seen in Marxism with their such slogans as ‘Religion
is the Opium of the People’".
He
echoed the edict of Egypt's Mufti Ali Goma saying that hijab is an
obligation on all Muslim consenting female adults, as firmly
established in the Holy Qur'an and Prophet Muhammad’s hadiths as
well as unanimously agreed upon by Muslim scholars.
Gomaa
cited the noble Qur'anic verse, which reads: "O Prophet! Tell thy
wives and daughters, and the believing women, that they should cast
their outer garments over their persons (when abroad): that is most
convenient, that they should be known (as such) and not molested. And
Allah is Oft- Forgiving, Most Merciful”.
French
Education Minister Luc Ferry said a bill introducing the ban would be
put before the National Assembly in February and should come into
effect by September 2004.
As
both Chirac's governing conservative party, the UMP, and the
opposition Socialists are in favor of a law, reports said it is
unlikely to fail.
But
the planned legislation has sent shockwaves among Muslims in Europe
and abroad.
Syria's
mufti, Sheikh Ahmad Kaftaro wrote to Chirac Wednesday expressing his
"surprise at the ban”.
Lawmakers
in Iran have also sent a letter to their French counterparts, asking
them not to pass the bill.
In
Egypt, at least a thousand Egyptian women, including university
students and young housewives, flocked to the Journalists Syndicate
premises in downtown Cairo Tuesday, January 6, to protest
the mooted French law of banning hijab.
In
Tel Aviv, a group of Arab Israelis staged a protest outside the French
embassy against French President Chirac's approval of the proposed
law.
Dozens
of female Lebanese Muslim students gathered outside the French embassy
to protest against Chirac's "discriminatory" decision to
back a ban on Islamic headscarves.
The
Union of Islamic Organizations in Europe joined the denunciation,
saying the French decision is a blatant infringement on their right to
freedom of religion.
The
Union's chairman, Ahmad Al-Rawi said the French move was evidence that
France had misinterpreted
secularism and tailored it for its own requirements in a sharp
contrast to the situation in other secular European countries, notably
Britain.
