Islamic law

TEL AVIV – Iranian police have shut down 547 restaurants and cafes in the capital Tehran for not observing “Islamic principles” including modesty, the city’s police chief announced Saturday.

Iranian hijab protester Vida Movahed, who in 2017 removed her obligatory Islamic headscarf in a public protest, has been sentenced to one year in prison for her act of defiance.

Actor George Clooney is calling for a boycott of hotels in Brunei over new laws making homosexuality and adultery crimes punishable by death.

A group of unmarried couples were publicly whipped in Indonesia’s religiously conservative Aceh province after they were caught behaving amorously — a crime under the region’s strict application of Islamic law.

Six couples were publicly whipped in Indonesia’s conservative Aceh province Monday for relations outside marriage, with at least two women unable to walk after the painful punishment.

Saudi Arabia defended a smartphone app Saturday which allows men to track women’s movements and potentially “stop them leaving the country.”

BANGKOK — Thailand’s immigration police chief met Tuesday with officials of the Saudi Embassy in Bangkok, and said the officials told him they are satisfied with how the case of a young Saudi woman who claims to be fleeing her abusive family has been handled.

A Saudi Arabian Airlines (Saudia) flight denied entry to a man because he was wearing shorts and might offend the sensibilities of observant Muslim passengers.

KUWAIT CITY – In 2014, the Kuwaiti press hailed Gabriel Garcia Marquez as a literary “giant”. But since his death, the Colombian writer and a slew of others have been banned as censorship takes root in the Gulf state.

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — Saudi Arabia on Tuesday executed seven death row inmates, who had been convicted of murder and drug trafficking, state media reported.

ISTANBUL, Turkey — Gay rights groups and activists pressed ahead with the Istanbul Pride parade on Sunday despite Turkish authorities banning the event for a fourth year in a row.

NEW DELHI – One of India’s top women chess players has pulled out of an upcoming championship in Iran in protest at having to wear an Islamic headscarf.

Saudi Arabia has arrested seven women’s rights campaigners, accusing them of working with “foreign entities” as the kingdom prepares to lift its controversial ban on female drivers.

Saudi women, start your engines. The General Department of Traffic Director General Mohammed al-Bassami said on Tuesday that female drivers will be allowed the freedom of the road in the deeply conservative kingdom from June 24.

A 32-year-old Syrian man appeared on German media this week thanking German Chancellor Angela Merkel for allowing him to reunite with his other wife and children despite polygamy being illegal in Germany.

An Iranian woman who became the public face of protest after defiantly taking off her headscarf and holding it on a stick in Tehran has been freed, a human rights lawyer says.

CAIRO – Egypt’s ultra-conservative Islamist Al-Nour party has decided to support President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi in his bid to be re-elected in March, the party said on Sunday.

A lawyer in Iran expressed concern over the fate of the “Girl of Enghelab Street,” a woman arrested for removing her white headscarf and waving it in the air in a sign of protest to the Islamic Republic of Iran’s compulsory hijab law

A football match scheduled for this Friday in Saudi Arabia will mark the first time women in the Gulf kingdom have been allowed to venture to a sporting event.

Another Egyptian singer was arrested on charges of “inciting debauchery” after releasing a sexually suggestive music video, it has emerged.

ISTANBUL — Turkish officials have banned all events by lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans and intersex rights groups in the country’s capital.

TEL AVIV — Saudi officials who were arrested in recent days in a corruption crackdown are expected to receive prison sentences of 3-10 years, Saudi news outlet Al Watan has reported.

“It is not possible to subject our country to a jurisdiction marked by religious radicalism,” said Italian Interior Minister Marco Minniti on Sunday, stressing that there can be no question of allowing sharia law a foothold in Italy.

A Scottish man holidaying in Dubai is facing up to three years in jail for allegedly putting his hand on another man’s hip to avoid spilling his drink.

TEL AVIV — Saudi Arabia’s Information Ministry has reprimanded a Saudi journalist for writing that the slaughter of animals during the Muslim holiday of Eid ad-Adha isn’t an obligation under Islamic law.

For a brief moment, Iran’s female football fans thought they were finally allowed to attend a match, but their hopes were dashed on Monday when authorities said their tickets were sold by mistake.

Claire Lopez, Center for Security Policy vice president for research and analysis spoke with Breitbart News Daily SiriusXM host Alex Marlow on Tuesday in reaction to President Trump’s Afghanistan announcement.

A Malaysian lawmaker came under fire Wednesday for saying that women who deny their husbands sex were subjecting them to “psychological and emotional abuse”.

A young woman in Saudi Arabia was arrested on Monday for wearing “suggestive clothing” after a Snapchat video emerged of her wearing a miniskirt, state media confirmed.

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — Six people convicted of drug trafficking and homicide were executed in Saudi Arabia on Monday, the government said, the highest number of executions in a single day this year.