Eyes opened by Islamic chauvinism

WHEN Shakira Hussein moved from Gympie in country Queensland to London in the early 1990s she thought she would find adventure and excitement and perhaps forge new bonds with her distant relatives.

WHEN Shakira Hussein moved from Gympie in country Queensland to London in the early 1990s she thought she would find adventure and excitement and perhaps forge new bonds with her distant relatives.

Instead, she found herself caught in a clash of cultures as her London-born Muslim family - in particular, a half-brother, Mustafa - tried to drag her under their control in the name of Islam. Her experience reflects the collision between conservative Islam and Western life, an issue triggered by Taj Din al-Hilali.

Ms Hussein, 37, now studying for her PhD in the Faculty of Asian Studies at the Australian National University, said she had envisioned a relationship where she occasionally had coffee with Mustafa, while enjoying all London had to offer, but "he had very different ideas".

"As soon as we made contact, he said I should be living under my father's roof, or with my grandmother, or an aunt.

"I didn't realise how serious he was. I just told him that I wasn't interested."

Ms Hussein had gone to London on a working holiday. She was living with an elderly Jewish woman, working as a companion and housekeeper.

"He (Mustafa) would berate me about that, in part because she was Jewish, but also because I was living out of home," she said.

"Eventually I told him to get lost, mind his own business. But he would come to the house, knocking on the door, to insist I come home with him, to live under our father's roof."

Ms Hussein said her half-brother's behaviour was frightening. "I had never experienced this, where a young man, a relative, would decide how I should live, or dress, or behave."

Ms Hussein said the harassment came to a head about a year after she arrived in London, when Mustafa turned up at her home "with these two enormous Iranian guys from the Islamic centre. They basically did all the talking. They said I should not be living away from home, that I should go with them, because I was bringing shame on to my family."

Police were called and Mustafa was arrested.

Ms Hussein fled London but, to her shock, her half-brother followed her to Gympie to press her to return. For months, he also wrote her letters.

As a Muslim and a mother, Ms Hussein tried to put the experience behind her but Sheik Hilali's sermon has left her reeling.

"I am Muslim, so I know that Islam does not preach this nonsense," she said. "But I was enraged to hear that Muslim leaders are preaching something so obnoxious.

"We should know from London that young Muslim men are feeling disenfranchised - they do not fit into their own cultures, or into Western cultures - and we should not have leaders encouraging them toward this frightening, controlling behaviour.

"Young men who receive these messages will try to extert that influence wherever they can, generally over sisters and other women, and finally their wives. Islam is not the motivation, but it's certainly used as the excuse."