ISLAMIC LAW IN THE NEWS
- In India, “the All India Muslim Personal Law Board (AIMPLB) has urged the Supreme Court to dilute or reconsider its proposed rules on the use of artificial intelligence in courts, saying that AI could undermine constitutional rights, harm marginalised communities and reinforce social inequalities.”
- “Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick is pushing to expand the footprint of religious liberty in Texas while simultaneously directing state lawmakers to find ways to prevent the implementation of Sharia law.”
- In Qatar, the “General Directorate of Endowments at the Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs has registered a new charitable will from a benefactor allocating one-third of her estate to the Waqf Fund for Righteousness and Piety,… highlighting growing public awareness of the importance of endowments and wills as mechanisms for sustaining charitable giving and extending its impact beyond an individual’s lifetime.”
- “The issue of Islamic endowments, known as waqf, has moved to the forefront of public debate and media analysis in Syria, as officials at the Syrian Ministry of Endowments announce plans to recover and reorganize endowment properties.”
CASES AND FATWĀS
- “At least 137 people, including 25 women, were publicly flogged across Afghanistan between April 1 and June 30, the United Nations said on Tuesday, warning that corporal punishment and other human rights violations continue despite growing international criticism.” For more content and context on the recent developments in Afghanistan, consult our Editor-in-Chief Professor Intisar Rabb’s “Resource Roundup: Afghanistan, the Taliban, and Islamic Law.” For more news blurbs relating to harsh applications of Islamic criminal law, consult our “Islamic Criminal Law in the News Roundup.”
- “Pakistan’s Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) on Friday (July 24) agreed to revisit its controversial ruling that upheld the marriage of a Muslim to a 13-year-old Christian girl allegedly abducted, forcibly converted to Islam and married against her will.”
- In Nigeria, the “Kano State Sharia Commission has banned the practice popularly known as ‘attachment,’ in which commercial tricycle (keke napep) riders carry female passengers on the sides of their tricycles, describing it as contrary to Islamic teachings due to the close physical contact involved.”
- In Egypt, “Al-Azhar said the draft [Family] Law had not yet been referred to it and that it had not taken part in drafting it. In a statement, the institution said it had submitted its own proposal for a personal status law in April 2019, reflecting its Islamic legal perspective on the issue, and that it would issue its religious opinion once the draft was formally referred to it by parliament.”
- “Under Nigerian law, a Muslim man who contracted a marriage under the Marriage Act could still marry another Muslim woman under Islamic law.”
UPCOMING EVENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES
Events:
- Workshop: Association for Gulf and Arabian Peninsula Studies Graduate Student Workshop, July 25–26, 2026
- Workshop: Archival Abundances and Silences in Islamic Studies, Princeton University, October 2–3, 2026
- Conference: Middle East Studies Association Annual Meeting, Boston, MA, November 21–24, 2026
- Conference: The Institutional Embedding of Shiʿi Imams: Kinship, Caliphs, Courts and Companions (700-900), University of Leiden, January 13–15, 2027
- Conference: Rupture or Continuity in Sharīʿa: (De)Colonizing Sharīʿa? International Conference, Centre for Islamic Studies (ISAM), Istanbul, Turkey, June 9–11, 2027
Opportunities:
- Award: Student Travel Award, Association for Gulf and Arabian Peninsula Studies, September 1, 2026
- Call for Papers: Legal Research & Analysis, September 29, 2026
- Call for Papers: Trends in Intellectual Property Research, September 30, 2026