How Civilizations Die: (And Why Islam Is Dying Too)

by David Goldman

Execution for domestic crimes, often called “honor killing,” is not explicitly sanctioned by the Koran, but the practice is so widespread in Islam that it is recognized in the law of most Muslim countries. The United Nations Population Fund estimates that five thousand women and girls are murdered annually in the name of family honor. Writing in the Independent in September 2010, Robert Fisk cited estimates from women’s advocacy groups four times as high.9 Muslim courts either do not prosecute honor killings or prosecute them more leniently than other crimes. Article 340 of Jordan’s penal code reads, “He who discovers his wife or one of his female relatives committing adultery and kills, wounds, or injures one of them, is exempted from any penalty.” Syria imposes only a two-year prison sentence for such killings. Pakistan forbids them but rarely punishes them. Turkish courts regularly reduce sentences for perpetrators. Honor killing, to be sure, is a tribal rather than a Muslim practice, but Muslims are responsible for 84 percent of honor killings in North America and 96 percent in Europe, according to one recent study.10 Hindu honor killings occur, but they number in the dozens per year rather than the thousands in the Muslim world.