British Muslims lean toward Islamic courts

LONDON -- Two years ago, Mahmood Khawel, a 34-year-old financial consultant and devout Muslim from the Midlands city of Peterborough, wanted a quickie divorce.

So he went to an Islamic court in London where he performed the divorce ritual known as talaq. Standing before a judge, he declared three times in succession that he was repudiating his wife. Judge Omar Bakri Muhammad, an expert in Shariah, the sacred law of Islam, granted the divorce on the spot.

But now Khawel and his wife have changed their minds. They want to reconcile. Last week, Khawel was back in Muhammad's courtroom, asking for an annulment of the talaq.

"OK, brother, don't worry," Muhammad told him. The judge explained that while some schools of Islamic law accepted a triple repudiation performed all at once, most preferred that the repudiations be spread over two or three menstrual periods. On that technicality, Muhammad said he could release Khawel from the original talaq.

None of this would be recognized in any British civil court, according to legal experts, but for growing numbers of Britain's 1.6 million Muslims, Shariah is the law.

During the past decade, a parallel universe of Islamic jurisprudence has sprouted across Britain. Shariah courts can be found in almost every large city. In London, different Muslim immigrant groups--the Somalis in Woolwich, for example--have established ad hoc courts that cater to their community's needs.

Most operate quietly

No one knows how many of these courts are operating in Britain. Because of their informal nature, reliable statistics do not exist.

Most of the Shariah courts go about their business quietly. But Muhammad, 44, a native of Syria who studied Islamic law in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, does not shy from controversy.

His outspoken support for Osama bin Laden and his praise for the Sept. 11 hijackers--"the magnificent 19," he calls them--have landed him in trouble with British anti-terrorism authorities. Earlier this year, police closed his north London office, and last month they seized all his legal files.

But the faithful who fill the makeshift courtroom above a North London sweatshop care little about Muhammad's politics. They come here because they believe he is uniquely qualified to settle their marital disputes, sort out their business partnerships and decide the amount of blood money that should be paid to compensate the victim of a crime.

In his white gown, white skullcap and beard, Muhammad is an imposing figure behind the cluttered table that serves as his bench. Justice is rendered with swift certainty, and many pleadings are handled via the Internet.

Divorces form the bulk of his caseload. For men, getting a divorce is simple. For women, it can be more problematic. Usually, women have to buy their way out of an unhappy marriage. They also have to give up custody of their children and forfeit their property rights.

Muhammad said he tries to be lenient with women who are the victims of physical or psychological abuse by their husbands. These women are not required to pay off their husbands, and they also get to keep their jewelry and dowry, which are considered the bride's property under Islamic law.

He also said he gives the benefit of the doubt to women in cases where they married against their will. In these instances, he said, he simply annuls the marriage contract.

But if a woman wants a divorce "because her husband is impotent or he smells bad or he is ugly," the woman has to pay her husband double the value of her dowry, he said. In all cases, community property and custody of the children go to the husband. In the case of very young children, there is joint custody until age 7. Then the father gets full custody.

The custody laws are "quite logical," Muhammad said. "A child comes from the seed of a man. The woman is the soil in which the seed is planted. A man is fully entitled to the fruit of his seed."

British civil law would disagree, but Muhammad shrugs.

"I can't change God's law," he said.

As a qadi--judge--Muhammad in theory would have authority to order the amputation of a thief's hand or the stoning of an adulterer. He indicated that he has imposed sentences of this type but that they were "suspended" until such time as Britain embraces Shariah.

Separate realms

Anjem Choudary, a lawyer with a degree from a British university, represents clients in Shariah court as well as in Britain's civil court system. He often hears the argument that when Muslims choose to live in Britain, they should obey British law.

"They do obey British law," he said. "But the Shariah is God's law. It is a fundamental part of being a Muslim. If you call yourself a Muslim you must put God's law ahead of man's law."

When the two are in conflict, as in the case of child custody laws, God's law prevails, he said. But why would a woman give up custody and surrender her property rights when she could easily obtain a no-fault civil divorce? The answer is usually family pressure.

A Muslim woman who ignored Islamic strictures and obtained a civil divorce would immediately be declared an apostate. In the insular and tightly knit immigrant communities of Britain, this would disgrace her entire family.

"The Shariah is what we live and die by," said Khawel, the man who was seeking to annul his divorce. Khawel and many others in the Muslim community have little faith in Britain's "manmade laws." This is especially true when their main source of information about it is the tabloid press, which tends to highlight cases of rapists escaping punishment while homeowners go to jail for defending their property against burglars.

There also is a belief--heightened since the attacks of Sept. 11 and the war in Iraq--that there is little justice for Muslims in Britain's judicial system.

"I came here when I was 8 years old," said Khawel, a native of Pakistan. "I have a good job and I consider myself completely acclimated to Western culture.

"But let's face it, in this country, at the end of the day, I am just another Paki."