(Iraq ) Kurdistan rights body sues cleric over controversial take on female Kurdish fighters
12-01-2026
Rudaw
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A Kurdistan Region human rights organization said on Monday that it is suing an Erbil-based religious cleric over remarks deemed disrespectful toward women, following comments he made in connection with the killing of a Kurdish female fighter in Syria last week.
A video widely circulated on social media showed Damascus-affiliated factions throwing the body of a female member of the Kurdish Internal Security Forces (Asayish) off a building during clashes in Aleppo’s Kurdish-majority neighborhoods, while hurling insults.
Asked about the incident in a recent interview with local media, controversial Kurdish cleric Mazhar Khorasani said that “in Islam, women must sit at their homes” and are meant “to pour tea for their husbands.”
The Independent Human Rights Commission of the Kurdistan Region (IHRCKR), which works closely with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), said in a statement that it is “pursuing the case [of Khorasani] through public prosecution and holding the aforementioned accountable before the law.”
Khorasani’s remarks “show great disrespect toward women and their role and position,” the IHRCKR said, adding that he “portrayed women as servants whose duty is only at home.”
The commission further added that the cleric’s statements were “completely against the foundations of religions” and urged the KRG’s endowment and religious affairs ministry, as well as the scholars’ union, to take action against those who disrespect others “under the name of religion.”
In a similar vein, Sleman Sindi, director of media relations at the IHRCKR, told Rudaw on Monday that Khorasani’s remarks violate Article 14 of the 2005 Iraqi Constitution, which stipulates that “all Iraqis are equal before the law without discrimination based on gender, race, ethnicity, nationality, origin, color, religion, sect, belief or opinion, or economic or social status.”
In a Monday interview with Rudaw, Khorsani said, “I apologize to the great and merciful God if I have had shortcomings toward my country, my [Kurdish] nation, or my religion.”
“To easily give up our cherished and valuable women to the enemy, to be held captive, killed... this made me upset,” he said, adding that, in his view, “women are not [meant] for war.”
The backlash against Khorasani followed deadly clashes that erupted on Tuesday in Aleppo’s Kurdish-majority Ashrafiyeh and Sheikh Maqsood neighborhoods after the Syrian Arab Army and its affiliated armed factions seized the areas from the Kurdish Asayish.
The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported on Sunday that at least 82 people were killed, including 43 civilians, 38 government-aligned fighters, and at least one Asayish member. An estimated 150,000 residents have fled Aleppo’s Kurdish quarters, according to the Erbil-based Barzani Charity Foundation (BCF).
An internationally mediated ceasefire came into effect on Sunday. Despite this, several videos emerged online showing armed militants affiliated with Damascus rounding up, arresting, and verbally abusing dozens of Kurdish civilians. Social media users have also shared images and videos of relatives they say have gone missing amid the violence.
Khorasani told Rudaw, “I support the people of [northeast Syria] Rojava - they are all our family.”
“I did not insult that woman,” the cleric said, referring to the slain female fighter whose body was gruesomely thrown from a building, and extended his condolences “to her family and the families of all the victims.”
Ranja Jamal and Shahyan Tahseen contributed to this report from Erbil.
12-01-2026
Rudaw
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A Kurdistan Region human rights organization said on Monday that it is suing an Erbil-based religious cleric over remarks deemed disrespectful toward women, following comments he made in connection with the killing of a Kurdish female fighter in Syria last week.
A video widely circulated on social media showed Damascus-affiliated factions throwing the body of a female member of the Kurdish Internal Security Forces (Asayish) off a building during clashes in Aleppo’s Kurdish-majority neighborhoods, while hurling insults.
Asked about the incident in a recent interview with local media, controversial Kurdish cleric Mazhar Khorasani said that “in Islam, women must sit at their homes” and are meant “to pour tea for their husbands.”
The Independent Human Rights Commission of the Kurdistan Region (IHRCKR), which works closely with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), said in a statement that it is “pursuing the case [of Khorasani] through public prosecution and holding the aforementioned accountable before the law.”
Khorasani’s remarks “show great disrespect toward women and their role and position,” the IHRCKR said, adding that he “portrayed women as servants whose duty is only at home.”
The commission further added that the cleric’s statements were “completely against the foundations of religions” and urged the KRG’s endowment and religious affairs ministry, as well as the scholars’ union, to take action against those who disrespect others “under the name of religion.”
In a similar vein, Sleman Sindi, director of media relations at the IHRCKR, told Rudaw on Monday that Khorasani’s remarks violate Article 14 of the 2005 Iraqi Constitution, which stipulates that “all Iraqis are equal before the law without discrimination based on gender, race, ethnicity, nationality, origin, color, religion, sect, belief or opinion, or economic or social status.”
In a Monday interview with Rudaw, Khorsani said, “I apologize to the great and merciful God if I have had shortcomings toward my country, my [Kurdish] nation, or my religion.”
“To easily give up our cherished and valuable women to the enemy, to be held captive, killed... this made me upset,” he said, adding that, in his view, “women are not [meant] for war.”
The backlash against Khorasani followed deadly clashes that erupted on Tuesday in Aleppo’s Kurdish-majority Ashrafiyeh and Sheikh Maqsood neighborhoods after the Syrian Arab Army and its affiliated armed factions seized the areas from the Kurdish Asayish.
The UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported on Sunday that at least 82 people were killed, including 43 civilians, 38 government-aligned fighters, and at least one Asayish member. An estimated 150,000 residents have fled Aleppo’s Kurdish quarters, according to the Erbil-based Barzani Charity Foundation (BCF).
An internationally mediated ceasefire came into effect on Sunday. Despite this, several videos emerged online showing armed militants affiliated with Damascus rounding up, arresting, and verbally abusing dozens of Kurdish civilians. Social media users have also shared images and videos of relatives they say have gone missing amid the violence.
Khorasani told Rudaw, “I support the people of [northeast Syria] Rojava - they are all our family.”
“I did not insult that woman,” the cleric said, referring to the slain female fighter whose body was gruesomely thrown from a building, and extended his condolences “to her family and the families of all the victims.”
Ranja Jamal and Shahyan Tahseen contributed to this report from Erbil.
A viral video of a mob attacking a teenage girl in Basra lays bare the devastating decline of women's rights in Iraq over 30 turbulent years
Hadani Ditmars
13 January, 2026
The New Arab
Iraqi women woke up to the new year with horrific images of a mob attack against a teenage girl in Basra, whose only 'crime' was to walk alone along the riverside Corniche on New Year's Eve without a hijab.
The news outraged Iraqis and resulted in the arrest of 17 assailants who grabbed, groped, kicked, punched and beat the girl as someone filmed the entire sequence on their phone. The video, which the girl's mother has pleaded to be removed from social media as her daughter is now suicidal, went viral and outraged Iraqi women.
Veteran Iraqi journalist and activist Nermeen Al Mufti wrote about the incident in Basra, saying, "Let's all demand that the maximum punishment be imposed on these barbaric scoundrels! We demand that the existing laws on harassment, the articles contained in the Iraqi Penal Law (396, 403 and 404), are no longer sufficient to punish such morally degraded criminals."
While there are many harassment incidents in Iraq, she wrote, "This particular incident can serve as a model for a real social and psychological study — for a deep search for solutions that may be a cure for the Iraqi society, which is in decline. Let the cries of this hurt girl be an alarm bell to initiate such studies, and for the legislators to introduce a new law on harassment."
The social decline Nermeen refers to began, she says, during the 12-year embargo.
Even during the UN sanctions, she wrote, men who harassed women were kept in psychiatric hospitals for three months, to make sure they were not a threat to women.
Sadly, none of the 17 men charged in the Basra attack have been sentenced yet, and all remain at large, technically free to harass other women. The governor of Basra has dismissed the incident as "nothing to make a fuss about" and said, "this kind of thing could have happened anywhere in Iraq," denying that it was particularly a Basran issue.
Unfortunately, he was correct. Sadly, this was not the first male mob attack against a young woman in Iraq, with high-profile cases occurring recently in Sulaymaniyah and elsewhere in the country.
When the country protected its women
This latest mob attack is a grim reminder of the decline in the status of Iraqi women, who, before the UN embargo and 2003 invasion, enjoyed one of the highest statuses in the Arab world, on a par with Tunisia.
They once benefited from state-subsidised day-care, education and health care, including reproductive health, at a time when many American women could not even access birth control.
In the early 80s, nearly half the doctors and half the civil service were women, and Iraq was the first country in the Arab world to produce a woman judge, an ambassador, and a government minister.
I remember reporting from Iraq in the 90's, when in spite of social collapse brought on by sanctions, Baghdad was still a safe place to walk alone and un harassed with or without hijab — much better than say, Cairo.
I recall an ominous turning point in 2002, as the regime lost control and the "mama Stata" was replaced by extremist Islam and criminal gangs, when I was interviewing people in a Baghdad market.
Even with my Ministry of Information-appointed "minder" on hand, I was grabbed by a man who disappeared into the crowd. A few minutes later, things turned ugly as the crowd threw rotten fruit at my minder, and we managed to escape in a taxi just in time.
Fast forward two decades, and now, according to the UN index, more than a million Iraqi women and girls are at risk of gender based violence, including honour killing.
According to UN Women, only about half of the legal frameworks that promote, enforce and monitor gender equality under the SDG (Sustainable Development Goals) with a focus on violence against women, are in place.
Even getting accurate statistics is daunting, as state bodies dedicated to women's rights that existed before 2003 have never been fully replicated, so most are underestimates. Still, they are damning evidence of the decline in Iraqi women's status.
As of December 2024, 27.9% of women aged 20–24 years old were married or in a union before age 18. Women and girls aged 10+ spend 24.1% of their time on unpaid care and domestic work, compared with 4.2% for men.
Women of reproductive age (15-49 years) often face barriers with respect to their sexual and reproductive health and rights: despite progress, in 2018, only 53.8% of women had their need for family planning satisfied with modern methods.
According to UN Women, only 41% of indicators needed to monitor the SDGs from a gender perspective were available, with gaps in key areas, in particular: violence against women and key labour market indicators, such as the gender pay gap.
In addition, many areas — such as gender and poverty, physical and sexual harassment, women's access to assets (including land), and gender and the environment — "lack comparable methodologies for regular monitoring. Closing these gender data gaps is essential for achieving gender-related SDG commitments in Iraq."
While the American invaders facilitated the rewriting of the Iraqi constitution along sectarian religious lines, weakening the old civil code that had championed divorce, property and child custody rights, legislation passed last January under Prime Minister Sudani's watch effectively legalised child marriage.
The amendments give Islamic courts increased authority over family matters, including marriage, divorce and inheritance. Activists argue that this undermines Iraq's 1959 Personal Status Law, which unified family law and established safeguards for women.
Iraqi law currently sets 18 as the minimum age of marriage in most cases. The changes passed let clerics rule according to their interpretation of Islamic law, which some interpret to allow marriage of girls in their early teens, or as young as nine, under the Jaafari school of Islamic law, followed by many Shia religious authorities in Iraq.
Proponents of the changes, which were advocated by primarily conservative Shia lawmakers, defend them as a means to align the law with Islamic principles and reduce "Western influence" on Iraqi culture. The "Coalition 188" – a group of women activists and lawyers – continues to advocate for the repeal of this law.
Sudani's Iraq
According to activist Awatef Rasheed, who works in Baghdad as a consultant on gender issues, a de facto ban on using the term "gender" has undermined efforts to advance the cause of Iraqi women
In August 2023, the Iraqi Communications and Media Commission (CMC) issued a directive banning all media outlets and internet providers from using the word "gender". The commission also ordered that the term "homosexuality" be replaced with "sexual deviance".
This was a regulatory directive from the media commission rather than a law passed by the Iraqi parliament at that specific time. However, this directive was part of a broader anti-LGBTQ+ campaign that preceded the passage of an anti-LGBTQ+ law in April 2024, which explicitly criminalised same-sex relations and transgender expression.
"Within the last four years," Awatef told The New Arab, "Since Sudani came to power, gender equality in the larger context of human rights and freedoms has declined. First, he outlawed the term gender and then, even though there is still a huge need for the UN, he asked the UN to leave Iraq."
Now she says, anyone working for gender equality is harassed by the government, including those who worked for UN Women.
While things are difficult for Iraqi women everywhere, Awatef, who advises the Iraqi government on IDPs, says that internally displaced women who face impoverishment after losing their government subsidies and are still often unable to return to their homes for security reasons, are doubly impacted by gender issues.
While some government proponents proudly point to the 25% quota system for women in parliament as a sign of progress, Awatef says it's a "fake system."
"There is no space for liberal women who speak a feminist language. They are effectively voiceless, brought in by heads of political parties who ask them to toe the line. They are totally submissive to the conservative religious parties.”
While Western countries are more concerned with stability and security in Iraq, Awatef feels they have abandoned Iraqi women, just like George W Bush, who paid lip service to feminism in the build-up to an invasion that made life miserable for women.
"There needs to be a firmer statement from the international community," she told The New Arab.
"They need to tell the Iraqi government to give voice to women who seek gender equality and freedom."
The 'darkest period'
According to Iraqi academic Ruba Ali Al-Hassani, SJD Candidate at Osgoode Hall Law School and Research Consultant at King's College London, domestic violence is on the rise throughout Iraq, as are online verbal attacks, character assassination and death threats.
The trend, she says, can be partially attributed to "the militarisation of society since 2003."
Moreover, she says, the latest election saw "a much lower turnout rate for women throughout Iraq, which points to greater female distrust in the political system than in previous election cycles." This is not surprising, she notes, after the Personal Status Law amendments were passed, "as they heavily disadvantage women's and girls' rights."
Women in Iraq, says Ruba, are "gradually being ousted from many public, recreational spaces, where sexual harassment has been gradually growing. Where women and girls expect to feel safest — in their homes — we are witnessing a rise in domestic abuse."
Now, she told The New Arab, "It is the darkest period of time for women in Iraq's history."
As I reflect on Ruba's dire pronouncement, I recall my last trip to Iraq in May. En route to Babylon one morning to visit the temple of Ninmakh, the Sumerian mother goddess, currently being restored to its former glory by the World Monument Fund, I met her contemporary counterpart.
My driver had brought along his mother, a formidable woman only a few years older than me. She turned out to be a treasure. After a week spent dodging gropers and mukhabarat, I relished the opportunity to speak with a lady who, like so many of her generation, had witnessed Iraq's shift from secular to sectarian.
She immediately opened up to me about her past — she studied English at university in the 80s and once ran a tourism agency — and current realities.
"Now," she told me, "the men are taking advantage of the situation, marrying several wives and abandoning them and their children."
Even though her husband was killed by Saddam's forces in 1991, his remains were found in a mass grave near the same potholed highway we were driving on, "things were better before for women," she said.
As we approached the domain of Ninmakh, she embraced me, wished me luck on my journey and smiled, saying, "Don't worry. You are strong – like an Iraqi woman!" And with that, I went to pay my respects to the ancient mother goddess, as my new friend continued down an uncertain highway.
Hadani Ditmars is the author of Dancing in the No Fly Zone and has been writing from and about the MENA since 1992. Her next book, Between Two Rivers, is a travelogue of ancient sites and modern culture in Iraq. www.hadaniditmars.com
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