today

Suicide is justified by a number of clerics, including Doha-based Shaykh Yusuf Qaradawi. Objecting to the term “suicide ” because it is “incorrect and misleading,” he states“when Jihad becomes an Individual Duty, as when the enemy seizes the Muslim territory, a woman becomes entitled to take part in it alongside men,” even if it means taking off her hijab to carry out an operation.

This is definitely tendentious but reminds one of the sufragette movement in England, when women protested for the right to vote, often using suicidal violence. One also thinks of the antifeminist protest song (to the tune of "Mr. Gallaher and Mr. Sheen") : "They got the right to vote, oh it really gets my goat, and pretty soon we'll all be going up in smoke!".

More in "Ready to Detonate: The Diverse Profiles of Female Bombers" by Farhana Ali.

Reasonable people see all this as quite ridiculous and by now there are scads of psychology theories. Probably voting by women is harmless and reasonable, but Muslim clerics to date have apparently begged the question, whilst at the same time often condoning female suicide bombing, using dubious logic in their efforts.

Whether equality for women is really meaningful is one of those Bushism issues "You are either for us or against us". Probably the right answer is that allowing women equality is a fair compromise for the moment whilst bearing in mind that dt-MRI scans suggest a different brain structure for women. The feeling would be that it would be democratic to allow women equal rights but we must remember that democracy often does not throw up the right candidate. Complex issues here.