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| Editorial staff, May 23, 2006 |
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| Not less full than its previous one in the United States, Nadia Yassine’s agenda in Spain, May 8-11, 2006, included a series of meetings, conferences and interviews through which she reaffirmed the principles of opening and dialog of the Justice and Spirituality Movement (hereinafter the JSM). |
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| Invited by Professor Emilio García Gómez, Head of the Department of Sciences and Arts, the University of Grenade, in collaboration with the Euro-Arab Foundation, Nadia Yassine took part, on Wednesday May 10 beside Professor Carmelo Perez Beltran, in a conference on “The Arab Women Today” held at the head offices of the Foundation. |
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| The eminent Doctor in Semitic Philology, Carmelo Perez Beltran, is an expert in the Maghrebi (North-African) societies and the status of women in these societies, particularly in Algeria, and is also known for his research work in progress on: “The Civil Society and Democratic Transition in Morocco: women and human rights.”His talk on “Arab Women and Social Change” was an occasion to draw up a fairly objective academic report on the status of women in Morocco, as he supported his arguments with official statistics. |  |
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| Nadia Yassine’s talk on “Islamist Women and Political Dissidence: the case of Morocco” was an occasion to clarify certain key concepts, often badly defined and subject to many a confusion, such as Islamism, the position of women within Islamist movements, political dissidence…etc. |
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| She put into relief the very particular case of the Feminine Section within the JSM, which by a continuous ijtihad has successfully surmounted certain obstructing and resisting factors inherent to the history of the Muslim societies. This movement, by means of a spiritual education drawing on the Prophet’s Tradition, has successfully created a dynamic favorable to upgrading the women’s conditions. |  |
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| Nadia Yassine then raised the tricky question of dissidence. First of all, she made it clear that the women’s membership in the movement is in itself an act of opposition against all forms of injustice. She then stated that the movement’s dissidence takes place in connection with the following triptych: • Autocracy • Patriarchy • Tribalism |
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| She stressed in particular the inextricable and interdependent nature of the three components of this trilogy, since any locking at the political level is inevitably reflected in the family and societal levels. |
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| It is therefore not a petty political dissidence motivated by parochial party interests, but rather a spiritual opposition committed to defend its principles with non-violent means, as the speaker emphasized. It is an opposition that is deeply-rooted in Muslim history, not a sudden outgrowth linked to imported feminism. |
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| The conference was led by Professor Carmen Egea Jiménez, a specialist in research work on “evolution of technologies and geography of populations.” |
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| The Spanish Islamic Council seized the opportunity of Nadia Yassine’s presence in Spain to invite her to its head offices in Almodovar Del Rio (Cordova), where she was interviewed by Mansur Escudero, the Head of the Council. |
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| During that meeting, several delicate questions were raised none of which Nadia Yassine, outspoken and straightforward as is her wont, shunned. Thus, she explained the nature of the JSM’s opposition to the Moroccan political system and stated how, in her opinion, the Republic is an adequate system for the development of “shura” as a democratic institution. |
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| As foreign observers, the Council members definitely recognized, as Mansûr Escudero declared later to Europe Presse, the JSM’s growing impact, namely in the educational, cultural and social fields, and stressed the movement’s pacifist nature and respect of the values of democracy and the basic principles of human rights, declaring thus as unjustified the repression of a regime that claims to be democratic against the movement and in particular the latest legal proceedings instituted against Nadia Yassine for voicing out her convictions. The meeting was ended in a convivial atmosphere of Muslim brotherhood. |
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| Nadia Yassine ended her passage in Spain by giving two interviews, the first on May 10, 2006 to Canal Sur Andalousia, and the second on May 12, 2006 to Domingo Del Pino for a research center on the Middle East. Here again the thinking of the movement and its political vision were on the agenda. |
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| It was then another trip of Nadia Yassine whose major objective was to circulate a better comprehension of Islam and Muslims by a West whose opinions are increasingly influenced by the pervading Islamophobia. |
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