Ifa Hanifah Misbach was 19 when her father died – and  her family told her he would not go to heaven because she refused to wear the hijab, a Muslim head covering.

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 Misbach now works as a psychologist in Bandung, West Java, where she has counselled dozens of Indonesian girls who have been ostracized, bullied and threatened with expulsion from school because they too declined to wear the veil.

"The impact of religious pressures, especially to wear the jilbab, when you're young, makes it feel like you have no breathing room," Misbach said, using the word for hijab more commonly used in Indonesia, in a report by Human Rights Watch. "I wanted to run away."

The 45-year-old's experience is one of many shared by women and girls in the world's largest Muslim-majority nation, including cases of girls being expelled from school.

Indonesia's ideology enshrines religious diversity and the country has significant Christian, Hindu, Buddhist and other minorities, but religious conservatism and growing intolerance of beliefs other than Islam has been rising over the past two decades.

Women and girls across the country can face "intense and constant" pressure to wear the hijab, said Human Rights Watch Indonesia researcher Andreas Harsono, which the rights body described as an assault on basic rights to freedom of religion, expression and privacy.

"Wearing a jilbab should be a choice, it should not be a mandatory regulation," Harsono told Reuters. "There is a growing belief all over Indonesia that if you are a Muslim woman and you don't wear the hijab you are less pious; you are morally less."

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Human Rights Watch identified more than 60 discriminatory local, provincial bylaws issued since 2001 to enforce female dress codes. A 2014 national government regulation has been widely interpreted as requiring all female Muslim students in the country of around 270 million people to wear a jilbab at school.

"Indonesian state schools use a combination of psychological pressure, public humiliation, and sanctions to persuade girls to wear the hijab," said the report.

One Muslim highschooler, who asked to remain anonymous, recalled being told at age 12 by two of her classmates that she should wear the hijab as "one strand of hair that is shown is equal to one step closer towards hell."

There has been some pushback. The case of a Christian schoolgirl in West Sumatra who was forced to wear the hijab sparked a national outcry last month, leading the education and religious affairs ministry to issue a decree banning public schools from making religious attire mandatory.

Indonesia's main rights body, Komnas HAM, said the decree supported the right to religious choice, but it remains unclear how strictly it will be enforced.

Human Rights Watch found the problems extended well beyond school, reporting cases of female civil servants and lecturers who resigned from their jobs due to pressure to wear the hijab, and others who were unable to access government services because they chose not to veil.

A spokesman for the Education Ministry did not respond specifically to questions about the report, referring Reuters to its recent decree. The religious affairs ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The post 'Indonesian girls traumatized by push to wear hijab' appeared first on www.israelhayom.com.

Shlomo Galster, a Chabad Hassid from northern Israel, contracted COVID-19 more than a month ago and was hospitalized at Ha'emek Medical Center in Afula. On Thursday morning, his family was informed that he was on his deathbed and it was time for them to say goodbye.

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Medical workers on the medical center's COVID unit realized that time was short, and it was unlikely that his family would arrive in time to recite the traditional "Shema Yisrael" prayer.

Then head nurse on the COVID unit, Ibrahim Maher, who had been treating Galster since he was hospitalized, stepped in and recited the Shema for him, without knowing by heart the precise wording of the Hebrew prayer.

"I knew he was a religious man and it was important to him that his family pray with him," Maher told Israel Hayom. "I don't know the entire prayer exactly, but I knew how important it was that he hear the words 'Shema Yisrael.' We knew him and his family. We were fond of him. We prayed with him, for his own sake and his family."

"It was clear to me that he wanted us to recite the Shema prayer for him. We have one God," Maher continued.

Maher said that when Galster's family arrived at the hospital, they already knew that he had passed.

"It was important to me that his daughter would know, and maybe it would console her and the family a bit that at least we managed to recite the Shema," he added.

Galster's daughter told Israel Hayom: "It was a difficult, sad day. My father never stopped talking about the devoted care he received and how thankful he was to Maher and the entire team."

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The justices said Monday they would not get involved in the case.

The Texas-based American Freedom Defense Initiative in 2015 submitted an ad that depicted a sword-wielding Prophet Muhammad saying: "You can't draw me!" Muslims generally believe any physical depiction of the Prophet Muhammad is blasphemous. The cartoon won a contest the group sponsored.

After the ad was submitted, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority's board of directors voted to temporarily suspend all issue-oriented advertisements on the region's rail and bus system.

The American Freedom Defense Initiative sued.

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The Muslim Council of Sri Lanka says it mourns the loss of innocent people in the blasts by extremists who seek to divide religious and ethnic groups.

The All Ceylon Jammiyyathul Ulama, a body of Muslim clerics, says targeting Christian places of worship cannot be accepted.

Muslims make up about 10% of Sri Lanka's population of 23 million.

No one has claimed responsibility for what Sri Lankan officials have described as a terrorist attack by religious extremists.

Meanwhile, the United Nations secretary-general says he is "outraged by the terrorist attacks" in Sri Lanka.

A statement by the spokesman for António Guterres notes the "sanctity of all places of worship" and hopes the perpetrators will be quickly brought to justice.

He also commends the unity of the Sri Lankan people after the attacks.

As the casualty numbers continued to rise, authorities confirmed the deaths of a number of foreigners in Sunday's bombings: They include three Indians, one Portuguese national, two Turkish nationals, three British nationals and two holding U.S. and British citizenship.

A Dutch national and a Chinese national also have been reported among the victims.

A statement from the Sri Lankan Foreign Ministry also said nine foreigners were reported missing.

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