An aspect of sharia law that does not receive much notice in the Western press are the rules governing child custody. If there is a divorce, the children are usually given to the mother until they reach age 7, after which custody transfers to the father. (For a first person account of how this works, read Unveiled by Deborah Kanafani, an American who divorced one of Yasser Arafat's lieutenants and lost custody of her children on this ground.)
A Lebanese woman is currently appealing her deportation from the UK, arguing that if she returns home, she will automatically lose custody of her children to an abusive ex-spouse. The UK Law Lords must decide her case. Will they make human rights their highest priority, as the UK Court of Appeal did when it rejected the government's request to deport Abu Qatada, considered Al Qaeda's chief ideologue in Europe? Or will they follow the guidance of Lord Chief Justice Lord Nicholas Phillips, who favors introducing sharia law for family matters?
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This is nasty stuff. A friend of ours in Rutland had a daughter who married a Muslim from Lebenan or some such. When the marriage fell apart he bolted and in the dead of night, before the police could close the escape route, he absconded to the Middle East - with the two children. After protracted (several years)legal wrangling, her lawyers, with the help of the State Department, got a legal ruling over there agreeing that the children should be returned to the mother. However, the father has dropped off the radar and no one there is willing to look for him. So the kids are gone. This may go back almost 10 years. The kids might now be in their teens...
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