(AhlulBayt News Agency) - Like most Jersey girls, Sara and Sondos Elnakib loved to go to the Shore. As observant Muslims, they covered up as much as possible, improvising with yoga pants and long-sleeve shirts.
“A lot of people think the burkini is a symbol of religiosity, but it isn’t,” said Sara Elnakib, daughter of a Paterson imam. “I just want to go out to the beach and have fun.”
North Jersey is home to one of the largest Muslim populations in the United States, and the controversy over the Islamic swimwear that has roiled Europe has left many here mystified.
At a “pop-up shop” in Clifton on Sunday, the Elnakib sisters showcased the line of burkinis they designed — with names like The Hepburn, after the elegant actress Audrey Hepburn — to appeal to a decidedly Westernized customer.
“Being American, we have a strong sense of religious freedom,” Sara Elnakib said. “I don’t think it’s the same in France.”
Last week, a high court in France issued a ruling that likely will overturn burkini bans in 30 towns — mostly on the Riviera — but officials continue to enforce the prohibition. They have argued that the swimsuits represent radical Islam, and some feminists have said they are symbols of oppression.
France has also banned other Islamic garb, like headscarves, in schools.
Aheda Zanetti, the Lebanese-Australian woman credited with inventing the burkini in 2004, told The New York Times last week that the swimwear was never meant to be a political statement, but rather just a way for women to swim comfortably.
Muslim women interviewed in North Jersey said the “radical” characterization was ridiculous; they are just trying to dress modestly, as do other groups, like Orthodox Jews and Roman Catholic nuns. They said the coverings were freeing, not repressive.
“If people can walk around with thongs and string bikinis and express themselves, why can’t others do so by covering up?” said Badria Mohamed of Clifton, who teaches water aerobics at Fit Female gym in Fairfield.
“Nobody is making me do this; it’s my choice,” said Mohamed, who went snorkeling in her burkini on a vacation to Aruba and wore it during her certification exercises to be an aquasize instructor.
Many were especially upset by recent viral photos of armed police in France surrounding a Muslim woman on a beach and forcing her to remove her burkini.
“There is an audacity now about dictating what women have to wear, and it’s something that we collectively have to stop and it’s not fair,” said Amanny Khattab of Wayne, principal of the Noble Leadership Academy, an Islamic school in Passaic.
Khattab, who recently returned from a vacation in Spain, said she thought it was strange that burkinis could spark such an uproar in Europe, where topless sunbathers don’t get a second look. On Sunday, she took her daughters to Point Pleasant Beach, where they wore burkinis while swimming in the ocean.
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source : North Jersey
Monday
29 August 2016
9:12:47 AM
775309
Like most Jersey girls, Sara and Sondos Elnakib loved to go to the Shore. As observant Muslims, they covered up as much as possible, improvising with yoga pants and long-sleeve shirts.