Tsunami Donations Used to Enforce Sharia

Did you send in your Tsunami relief dollars back in 2004? Millions did and now the Sunday Times is telling us that those dollars (or pounds) are being used to enforce Islamic Sharia. (hat tip Little Green Footballs)

WHEN people around the world sent millions of pounds to help the stricken Indonesian province of Aceh after the Boxing Day tsunami of 2004, few could have
imagined that their money would end up subsidising the lashing of women in public.

But militant Islamists have since imposed sharia law in Aceh and have cornered Indonesian government funds to organise a moral vigilante force that harasses women and stages frequent displays of humiliation and state-sanctioned violence.

Sharia policemen have largely supplanted regular police. These Muslim radicals are bent on imposing their strict brand of Islamic law.

The transgressor can be a man accused of gambling or drinking alcohol. But if it is a woman guilty of wearing “improper” clothing or being caught in proximity to a man, there is a particular ritual to the punishment.

She is dressed in white robes and veiled. Policemen escort her up on to a stage erected before a jeering crowd, which, witnesses say, is usually almost exclusively male.

Forced to kneel, the woman waits while a masked man ascends the platform. He is carrying a cane with a curved handle designed to give the inflictor of God’s punishment a better grip. From the loudspeakers, a man’s voice sonorously recites the appropriate religious chastisement. Then he begins to count. With each number, the cane descends with a vicious lash.

According to witnesses, male onlookers often roar in delight and hurl pious imprecations at the victims, working themselves up to a pitch of excitement.

In one collective punishment last summer, four women denounced for gambling were given between six and 10 lashes. One passed out as she was dragged off the stage.

This is just one more example of the savagery that is radical Islam. When will those practitioners of the "peaceful religion" that we keep hearing about begin to stand up to savages that bring shame upon their faith? We'll keep waiting.