This may be an indication that French authorities are taking these allegations seriously, but remember: Ramadan’s first accuser, Henda Ayari, wrote: “I have been silent for several years for fear of reprisals, because by threatening to file a complaint for the rape of which I was a victim, he did not hesitate to threaten me and also tell me that we could ‘take it to my children.’ I was afraid and I kept silent all this time.”
Tariq Ramadan, hailed as a Muslim reformer despite not rejecting any tenet of Qur’anic Islam, is the grandson of Muslim Brotherhood founder Hasan al-Banna, and has the might of the Brotherhood behind him. He hasn’t struck back yet, but he could, quite hard, and may well do so soon. Meanwhile, these allegations illustrate the fact that Tariq Ramadan believes in the same tenets of Islam that are taught everywhere, sectarian divisions aside, and those include the directive that women have no right to refuse sex. A hadith depicts Muhammad saying: “If a husband calls his wife to his bed [i.e. to have sexual relation] and she refuses and causes him to sleep in anger, the angels will curse her till morning” (Bukhari 4.54.460).
Another hadith attributes this to Muhammad: “By him in whose Hand lies my life, a woman can not carry out the right of her Lord, till she carries out the right of her husband. And if he asks her to surrender herself [to him for sexual intercourse] she should not refuse him even if she is on a camel’s saddle” (Ibn Majah 1854).
“Tariq Ramadan has custody extended by French police after Oxford professor accused of rape,” by Romina McGuinness, Express, February 1, 2018:
A UNIVERSITY of Oxford professor remains in custody following his arrest in Paris after two women accused him of rape and sexual harassment.
French police have been granted an extra 48 hours to question Tariq Ramadan without charge.
The Professor of Islamic Studies at the university was arrested on Wednesday during a preliminary investigation after two women accused him of rape and sexual assault last October.
A judicial source confirmed this morning Prof Ramadan’s custody had been extended for a further 48 hours in order to give Paris police more time to question the suspect, after which he should either be freed, formally charged, or made an “assistant witness”, meaning police do not believe he committed an offence.
Prof Ramadan took a leave of absence from Oxford after the allegations came to light but the Swiss professor vehemently denied raping the two women.
He has since filed a complaint for slander against feminist author and former Salafist Henda Ayari, one of his accusers.
Mrs Ayari said the academic raped her in a Paris hotel room in 2012, while his second accuser – a 42-year-old Islam convert whose identity has not been revealed – claimed he raped her in a Hilton hotel in Lyon in 2009.
Mrs Ayari, who waived her right to anonymity last year, first mentioned the rape in a book she published in 2016 – in which Prof Ramadan’s name was not mentioned.
She later told French media the sex scandal involving Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein had encouraged her to “name and shame” her alleged abuser and file an official complaint with police.
The Islam expert took to Facebook to deny the accusations, saying the rape claims were nothing but a “campaign of lies” launched by his “adversaries”….
Following the interview, Prof Ramadan tweeted: “Anonymous allegations have been made against me in Geneva, accusing me of the abuse of students who were minors nearly 25 years ago.
“I categorically deny all these allegations and am today filing a complaint against X for libel.”