Extracts from the australian law council on Female mutilation
Female genital mutilation is not a religious practice.
It is generally accepted as having pre-dated Islam,Christianity and other major religions. It is sometimes incorrectly thought that female genital
mutilation has its origins in Islam. Some groups which practice female genital mutilation consider incorrectly that the practice is endorsed by Islam. However,
there is no Islamic religious basis for the practice. Both Muslim and non-Muslim
religious leaders overseas and in Australia have emphasised the absence of a religious foundation for the custom. The Al-Azhar University of Cairo, the principal
authority ruling on Islamic practice, re-stated in 1986 that female genital mutilation is not an Islamic practice or teaching.
In Australia some Muslim religious leaders have come out strongly against female genital mutilation. Al Naggar
13points out the status afforded to women in
the Koran and asks how, in the light of this high status, parents could harm their
female children “by removing parts of their body without this being necessitated by sickness or bad health, namely by performing excision?”