A conservative Islamic charity is opening three women-only homeless shelters in the UK.
There are no official figures on how many Muslim women have been forced to leave their homes, but the National Zakat Foundation (NZF) has seen a demand for temporary shelter that meets religious and cultural needs.
The first of three of the hostels will open in London at the end of October and will cater for 14 women.
The other two will open in Birmingham and in Manchester over the next few months.
Muslim females are expected to follow a strict code of conduct, which includes not mixing with males who are not family members and not entering an environment where alcohol is being consumed.
So Muslim women who aren’t fanatically conservative won’t want to go there.
The temporary accommodation offered by the charity will provide an environment which complies with the Islamic way of life.
Nusrat is now in her early 30s but at the age of 19 she was forced to leave home.
She was disowned by her family for wanting to go to university. She initially stayed in the university’s halls of residence but after getting into financial difficulty she ended up on the streets of London.
She said: “I was leading a double life. I’d stay at university for as long as I could during the day and then at night I’d be on the streets pretending to be a tourist. I saw things that I never wanted to see.
“There was prostitution, people tried to pimp girls. The younger and more innocent you looked, the more they were out to get you.”
She said pride stopped her from returning to her family because she wanted to show them that she could be independent.
The hostels which were available to her did not comply with her Muslim faith so living on the streets was the only option.
No, it wasn’t the only option. Another option would have been to live at a hostel that didn’t “comply with her Muslim faith.” That seems to mean there were men and alcohol around…but surely that applies at least as much to living on the streets, along with all sorts of other disadvantages.