Imposing Western identity politics onto the Middle East is a formula for moral insanity.
Islamic homophobia is an issue that goes beyond terrorist groups like Hamas. While the Quran’s language regarding homosexual and bisexual behavior is somewhat ambiguous, the hadith, the canonical sayings and teachings of the Prophet Muhammad, contain many straightforward prohibitions. In practice, this results in the persecution of LGBT people in both official and extrajudicial ways throughout the Muslim world. LGBT Palestinians face extreme ostracism, sometimes fleeing as refugees or even being kidnapped and beheaded. The authorities also ban the activities of LGBT rights groups. And it isn’t just LGBT Palestinians being oppressed by Hamas in Gaza. Institutional sexism is also part and parcel of Sharia Law. Human rights researchers rank the Palestinian territories among the worst places in the world to be a woman. For Western activists ostensibly concerned about the oppression of marginalized groups to effectively support the continued rule of Hamas over Gaza (to the point that they would even deny Israel the right to self-defense against the terrorist organization) is hypocritical in the extreme.
Right. I’m one of those “deluded” queers for Palestine, but even in peacetime, I wouldn’t sashay into Gaza City in assless chaps and hope for the best. There’s plenty of homophobia in the world, especially wherever there is Islam, and the British obviously did not invent it.
I would still rather try to defeat homophobia with words than watch homophobes (and their innocent children) get murdered by an army which has its own homophobes, for reasons unrelated to homophobia.