As the world gets ready to celebrate sport and the best athletes and coaches in the world, there is a push by Olympic organizers to emphasize gender equality at the Paris 2024 Olympics.

On March 8, 2024 (not coincidentally International Women’s Day), the International Olympic Committee announced there would be complete gender parity on the field at this summer’s Games.

“We are about to celebrate one of the most important moments in the history of women at the Olympic Games, and in sport overall,” IOC president Thomas Bach said in a statement.

But the reality is that gender parity doesn’t necessarily mean open to all women. There are a number of women who have been dreadfully left behind in all the excitement about women athletes and by the hosts who claim to be celebrating their existence.

France bans women in hijab (an Islamic headscarf) from participating in sport. As the Olympic host, France could not ban athletes from all around the world from wearing a headscarf, so they banned their own athletes instead. When this was announced last September, a spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said: “No one should impose on a woman what she needs to wear, or not wear.”

How can France claim to champion women when it is stripping them away from sport in a move that is blatantly opposed to the IOC’s own human rights framework? The Olympic Charter states clearly: “The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in this Olympic Charter shall be secured without discrimination of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, sexual orientation, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.”

France claims that secularism, which is at the heart of French identity, is at risk of being compromised by Muslim women in headscarves on the field of play. And because the country has determined that athletes representing France are technically public servants, then a strict regime of secularism is required. Recreational leagues and teams are not permitted to allow hijabs anywhere near the court, field or gym.

Why is a hijab-clad woman sprinting down the sideline and scoring a goal for France considered a threat to identity? How including women in sport, and showing solidarity with them as they choose to act on their personal rights of religious expression, is bad? Why not grow sport in different communities in France and let Black and brown women who are deeply connected to sport play and enjoy life? Apparently there’s no joie de vivre allowed for you in sports if you are a Muslim woman who chooses to cover.

Earlier this week, Amnesty International released a report about the violations of Muslim women’s and girls’ rights because of the hijab sports ban in France.

It’s baffling and enraging to read the testimonies of many of the athletes from Muslim communities who are not permitted to play. The groups like Sports & Rights Alliance, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch sent a letter to the IOC objecting to the ban and demanded that they “publicly call on sporting authorities in France to overturn all bans on athletes wearing the hijab in French sport, both at Paris 2024 and at all times and all levels of sport.”

There are groups like Les Hijabeuses and Basket Pour Toutes that continue to play and advocate publicly for hijab-wearing athletes. They hold festivals and tournaments but they are not included in any recognized type of sport in France and have no possibility of further opportunities.

On the same day that the IOC released its own statement about gender parity, more than 80 athletes, including WNBA stars Natasha Cloud, Layshia Clarendon, USA Olympian Breanna Stewart and Olympic medallist fencer Ibtihaj Muhammad signed an open letter to urge the French Federation of Basketball (FFBB) and the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) to immediately overturn the hijab ban and uphold international human rights laws and standards in sports.

The IOC replied that discrimination of this kind is against the Olympic Charter, but added, “freedom of religion is interpreted in many different ways by sovereign states. This is reflected in national approaches to sport, too. In practice, the wearing of the hijab, veil or headscarf is highly debated in many countries.”

The letter then asserted that competing for French national teams meant those athletes are civil servants and must adhere to te “principles of secularism and neutrality.” Basically, athletes and participants have to adhere to principles of the Olympic host nation even if those principles are against the actual Olympic Charter.

This ban on hijab that is meant to uphold French identity isolates and marginalizes French Muslim women even more. It seems almost surreal that the Olympics are being hosted by a country that actively and ruthlessly excludes women from sport.

Source: CBC News

“If I think of basketball in England, there isn’t anybody else that I’ve seen who’s from a South Asian background, is Pakistani, is Muslim and wears a hijab,”

Hailing from Manchester, she not only plays and coaches for the Manchester Mystics but also competes in the Women’s National Basketball League Division 1.

She also represents Great Britain’s over-35s team, set to compete in the European Championship this summer in Italy.

Despite her successes might make the journey look easy, her path through the sport has come with its own challenges.

“There was a time where within basketball, you weren’t allowed to wear a hijab and that obviously changed,” Khalil added.

Taking the decision to wear a hijab in early 2010s, she was shocked to discover she wasn’t allowed to play while wearing the Islamic attire which was banned by the International Basketball Federation (FIBA).

In 2017 FIBA lifted the ban, meaning players did not have to decide between faith and sport.

“People just want to be able to participate comfortably. I potentially would have come back earlier if that rule wasn’t in place,” she said.

Joe Forber, Manchester Mystics co-founder and former Sports Personality of the Year Unsung Hero award-winner, described Khalil as a “role model”.

Source: AboutIslam.net

Muslim women basketball players have won their battle to wear hijab while playing the sport after basketball’s governing authority today approved a proposal to allow headgear to be worn by players.

The long-awaited decision came today, two and a half years after FIBA first started looking at revising its ban on headgear in September 2014.

The International Basketball Federation (FIBA) said in a statement: “the Central Board approved a proposal put forward by the Technical Commission for a new rule that will allow headgear to be worn by players. The new rule was developed in order to minimize the risk of injuries and preserve consistency of the color of the uniform.” Article 4.4.2 of FIBA rules, which campaigners fought to get overturned, had said: “Players shall not wear equipment (objects) that may cause injury to other players.” It says “headgear, hair accessories and jewelry” are not permitted. Today’s historic rule change will come into effect on 1 October 2017 and means basketball players will be now able to wear headgear including hijab.

Over the last two years there has been a growing number of Muslim female basketball players from around the world – from California in the US, to Gaborone in Botswana – demanding that FIBA allow head coverings to be worn for religious reasons in competition, with a Change.org petition that received 132,444 signatures and a social media campaign with the hashtag #FIBAAllowHijab.

Source: buzzfeed.com

“It’s time that every single person in this world is allowed to play regardless of their religion, where they come from and who they are,” Indira Kaljo, a hijab-wearing Bosnian-American professional basketball player, says in a video thanking the 70,000 people who signed her petition supporting the change. “Sport is for everyone; let’s not exclude anyone.”

The Council on American-Islamic Relations is also calling on FIBA to lift the ban. “The only determining factors for athletic participation should be skill and hard work, not what is worn on one’s head,” said Ibrahim Hooper, CAIR’s national communications director.

FIBA’s rules prohibit the wearing of “equipment (objects) that may cause injury to other players” and explicitly rule out “headgear, hair accessories, and jewelry.” As a result, the headscarves that many Muslim women wear are banned, as well as Jewish yarmulkes and Sikh turbans. A two-year trial period that started in 2014, allowing national federations to relax the rule, has been criticized as insufficient.

Some players, such as the NCAA’s Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir, have given up the sport rather than the hijab. Entire teams have been banned from playing, including Qatar’s women’s team at the 2014 Asian Games in Incheon, South Korea.

Continue reading at: Religious News Service (RNS)