In Texas last year, a horrible 911 call came from two sisters.
“Oh my god! I’m dying. What’s wrong ma’am? I’m bleeding everywhere,” one of them is heard screaming.
The father is the accused killer. His reason? They were dating boys.
“Most Westerners wouldn’t understand that and wouldn’t even believe that people think that way,” says Robert Spencer, founder of JihadWatch.org.
His website attempts to raise awareness about the activities of global jihadists. One of those activities is what’s called honor killings, a practice which has its roots in the Middle East, and is now happening in the West.
“What they’re concerned about is restoring the purity of the family in this world, and they do that by eradicating the member that is stained,” says Spencer.
Marriage infidelity, divorce, rejecting an arranged marriage, refusing to wear headscarves and homosexuality have all been reasons for which women and men have been killed.
Even victims of rape have been victims of honor killings.
“That is a stain on the family’s honor. Based on the assumption that the sullying of the purity of the girl, of the daughter in the family, is something that brings shame to the whole family, even though she had no responsibility for the action. It was something done to her. And to cleanse that stain, she has to be killed,” says Spencer.
And the consequences in certain countries?
“If you can convince a judge that you were committing an honor killing, then you will receive a substantially reduced sentence, or no time at all in prison,” says Spencer.
The United Nations estimates that every year, 5,000 people become victims of honor killings. Just last year, in Georgia, a father strangled his daughter to death because she was planning a divorce from her husband.
“I don’t have any doubt there will be more honor killings in the United States. That is a certainty. A 100% certainty about that because neither law enforcement authorities, nor government authorities, nor the Islamic community are doing anything to challenge the foundational assumptions that give rise to honor killings in the first place,” says Spencer.
Spencer also believes that most people remain on the sidelines of the honor killing battlefield for fear of being labeled a racist or Islamophobe.