GENDER JUSTICE

Islamic Relief released its Gender Justice Policy in 2015. It created bold commitments for ending gender injustice in humanitarian and development contexts. This includes campaigns on combating gender based violence (GBV) – with a particular focus on:

Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C): Female genital mutilation (FGM) affects more than 200 million girls and women alive today in 30 countries.
Domestic violence: One in three women worldwide have experienced either intimate partner violence or non-partner sexual violence in their lifetime.
Early and forced marriages: Over 700 million women alive today were married when they were under 18, and of those some 250 million were married before they were 15.

Policies and Publications

This background paper explores the issues of early and forced marriage from an Islamic faith perspective and dismantles some potential misconceptions. It provides a case that early and forced marriage is not Islamic and promotes the protection of children and the sanctity of marriage.

This policy briefing provides an introduction to Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting, its effects and underlying causes. It provides an Islamic faith perspective and explains why this harmful practice has no basis in Islam. It promotes the organisational approach to tackling FGM/C and key recommendations.

This policy briefing presents Islamic Relief’s position on issues of early and forced marriage, the key definitions, causes and impact of these practices. It presents briefly our strategy to end EFM and provides a summary of an Islamic human rights perspective on these issues.