The first time the hijab was worn on the floor of the US House of Representatives was by a non-Muslim woman named Carolyn Maloney, a New York Democrat. That was in October 2001, when the ruins of the twin towers were still burning. Maloney put on a blue ribbon, the type women wear in Afghanistan, part of a theater appeal to make MPs vote for a war against the Taliban.
In January 2019, Elhan Omar, a member of the elected Congress, will become the fifth constituency in Minnesota to be the first veiled Muslim serving in the legislature. Much has changed in the past 17 years. The myth of rescuing Afghan women by bombarding their country has proved devastating. The Taliban are still there, and there is talk of making peace with them, at a time when the US attempts to achieve any kind of victory failed. Caroline Maloney is also present. She won her 14th term in the midterm elections last week, even when she won her first state. He will not be the only Muslim. There is also Rachida Tlaib, a longtime activist of Palestinian origin, elected in the 13th district of Michigan.
Maloney, Omar and Taleb have different views on women's rights. The Maloney principle is exceptional for American women. If Maloney represents women from the top, where white women lead, Omar and Taleb's advancement represents the feminist movement from below.
Because their Somali and Palestinian backgrounds have been shaped by a long history of failed foreign interventions, it is unlikely to see the age and the pinnacle of the liberation of Afghan women or others as a pretext for war. Yet the three democracies, a fact that raises the question of what women's movement will determine the future of the party Democratic in the end.
Saving America
The election of Omar and Taleb has generated a lot of emotion and joy around the world, compared to the angry US President Donald Trump's rallies. Omar's stories, which lived in a refugee camp, did not know English when she reached the shores of the United States at the age of 12 Years, and Taleb, which was based on government support among 14 of her brothers, offer some sympathy.
Even if in the United States he was a president who described all Muslims as terrorists, in a speech before the 2016 presidential election, Trump insisted that the Somali refugees were a disaster in Minnesota, and that many of them joined the " There is evidence that the country was not too bad, to this extent, if women like Omar and Talib succeed, the US may be saved.
Beyond the haze of victory are enormous challenges. A Pew poll found that attacks on Muslims in 2016 exceeded the 2001 level. Half of American Muslims said they felt it was harder to be Muslim in America, and three in four said there were Much of the discrimination against Muslims in the United States, a view confirmed by about 70% of the general public.
The election of two Muslim women will not necessarily make matters better. One of the latest attacks on a veiled woman in Dearborn, Mich. The incident, monitored by a surveillance camera, shows how a woman wears a headscarf, and suddenly a man approaches her from behind and repeatedly hits her head with the grip of his hand.
Growing fear
The latest incident is part of recent attacks by white men to add to the general fear of Muslim-American society that will be represented by both women. It will be difficult to shed light on such crimes and to protect them in a political environment where fear of Islam is an essential element of public discourse, and defending American Muslims in the Capitol will be a challenge.
Communities that are besieged tend to indulge internally, to the extent that they are not interested in internal reform. Since 2005, when the university professor, Amina Wadud, led a mixed group of both sexes in prayer, which launched a campaign for equal rights in places of worship and mosques.
Twitter and online discussion forums appeared to defend women, to be accepted in places of worship rather than in hidden places. Young activists expect to use the victories of female deputies Taleb and Omar to promote equality within the religion.
Then there is the question of what these victories will mean, especially those achieved by Omar al-Muradidah, outside the borders of the United States. In May, while Omar was struggling in the first competitive elections, the French Minister of Equality condemned the decision of a French student activist to appear in a documentary wearing the headscarf, calling it "a promotion of political Islam."
While Britain may be miles away from France, in accepting the manifestation of religious affiliation in public places, such as veiled baggage inspectors and policemen wearing Hindu mantles, the appearance of Muslim women remains controversial. Weeks before the victory of Omar and Taleb, a public debate broke out over the sale of the headscarf to schoolgirls in the uniforms department of a shop. While British Prime Minister Theresa May expressed support for the right to wear the headscarf, others in the Conservative Party are more reluctant. At present, the disparate visions of women's rights, adopted by MP Maloney, her new colleagues who wear headscarves, and allegiances to the Palestinian cause, will coexist uneasily in the House of Representatives from January.
The hatred of Islam by the American left may be dim in the face of the Republican Party's tumultuous hatred under Trump's presidency. This is often reflected in the deliberate, but malignant, marginalization of Muslim women. Reducing the success of Omar and Taleb will be a waste of their talents and ability to do real work for political and women's transformation.