Women’s rights

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Culture

Lebanon’s first lady Nehmat Aoun takes center stage during Pope's visit

Lebanon’s first lady, Nehmat Aoun, attended nearly all gatherings and visits of Pope Leo during his three-day trip to Beirut, highlighting her active involvement in social and humanitarian issues.

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Lebanon’s citizenship offer for FIFA head sparks debate over equal rights

Lebanon’s president has announced he will grant citizenship to FIFA President Gianni Infantino, sparking a wave of outrage.

A couple sits facing the skyline of Tehran from Bam-e Tehran in Tehran, Iran on October 24, 2025. (Photo by Bahram / Middle East Images via AFP) (Photo by BAHRAM/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images)

Iran judicial chief orders crackdown on women defying hijab law: What to know

Chief Justice Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei also called for legal action against the United States over the June strikes on Iranian nuclear sites.

Iranian women without wearing hijab shout slogans while gathering around a burning dumpster during a protest near Punak square, on Oct. 1, 2022

Culture

Rape case against movie star Pejman Jamshidi rocks Iran: What to know

The accusations against Jamshidi, one of Iran’s most famous celebrities, come amid ongoing discussions about women’s lack of rights in the country.

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Leaked video shows Khamenei aide's daughter in Western wedding gown amid Iran's hijab crackdown

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Iran adding 80,000 personnel to enforce hijab in Tehran province

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As Syria finalizes candidates for parliament, women make up 14% of list

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Turkey's Erdogan acknowledges 'alarming' rise in violence against women

Women's rights activists and relatives of victims of feminicide wait outside the Istanbul court ahead of a hearing on June 1, 2022.

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Breaking | Last Updated: January 19, 2023, 2:08 pm

European Parliament slaps sanctions on Iran's IRGC

The European Parliament adopted a resolution calling on the European Union to blacklist Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and to sanction the Iranian leadership.

Europe parliament

European Parliament overwhelmingly urges EU to designate Iran's IRGC as terrorist

Members of the European Parliament called today on European leadership to add the Iranian revolutionary Guards to the list of terror organizations.

A Yemeni woman shops at a market in Yemen's third city of Taiz, on December 15, 2022. - Yemeni society, although deeply conservative, has traditionally allowed space for individual freedoms. But this is changing under the Huthi movement, which was founded with the aim of pushing for a theocracy. (Photo by AHMAD AL-BASHA/AFP via Getty Images)

Culture

Women's campaign in Yemen protests Houthi dress code rules

Houthi forces require women to wear a black abaya that covers their entire bodies.

Members of the Taliban security forces arrive as Afghan women march during a demonstration they call Stop Hazara genocide a day after a suicide bomb attack at Dasht-e-Barchi learning centre, in Kabul on October 1, 2022. - (Photo by -/AFP via Getty Images)

Afghanistan's Hazara minority increasingly fearful under Taliban

Al-Monitor spoke to members of the long-persecuted Hazara Shiite minority group in Afghanistan as restrictions on women increase and verifiable information becomes scarcer.

Shelly Kittleson

By Shelly Kittleson

In Baghdad, reporting on Iraqi politics

YASIN AKGUL/AFP via Getty Images

Fury in Turkey as convicted wife killer murders third victim

The story of a two-time wife killer who killed a third woman after his conditional release from prison speaks volumes about why femicide remains rampant in Turkey.

Maoz

Israeli mayors stand against anti-gay legislator on education

Mayors of liberal cities in Israel have joied the protest of outgoing Prime Minister Yair Lapid against anti-LGBTQ Knesset member Avi Maoz controlling the unit that decides on external education programs.

Egyptian women wear full-face veils in al-Montazah district of Egypt's second city of Alexandria on March 26, 2018.

Culture

More Egyptian women reject hijab

The hijab in Egypt has always been a matter of controversy.

25th Knesset sworn in

Israel’s most religious, furthest right Knesset sworn in

The 25th Knesset includes more far-right legislators, more ultra-Orthodox, fewer women, fewer Arabs and no Druze representatives at all.

Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian looks on during a press conference in Tehran on July 20, 2022.

Iran warns Germany over crackdown criticism

The Islamic Republic was unsettled by international criticism over its suppression of nearly two months of protests, with its security forces now attacking people dancing in defiance of theocratic rules.

Afghan women hold placards as they take part in a protest in front of the Iranian Embassy in Kabul on Sept. 29, 2022.

As Iran protests enter sixth week, women take to Afghanistan's streets

Some of the largest protests led by women started after a Sept. 30 suicide attack on an educational center in Kabul in which 53 Hazara girls were killed.

A picture obtained by AFP outside Iran, reportedly shows a motorcycle on fire in Tehran, on Oct. 8, 2022.

Iran protests continue in universities

Protests in Iran have continued to spread to universities, presenting a new challenge to the Islamic Republic.

A Tunisian prostitute works in a brothel in the district of Abdallah Guech in Tunis on Feb. 19, 2011.

Tunisia's sex workers want their brothels back

The crackdown on legal brothels in Tunisia puts its sex workers at risk of further harm.