While the niqab (this word as published has been corrected here and in subsequent references in this text) has spurred debates on multiculturalism in Britain and elsewhere (“Peering beyond Muslim veil in Britain,” News, Nov. 5), it has also created controversy in Muslim countries such as Egypt. Helwan University in a Cairo suburb has banned the niqab from women’s residence halls for fear that males may try to enter using it as a disguise. This policy has created considerable tension between fundamentalist and other Muslims in Egypt and complicates the debate over the niqab in other countries.
We Americans are left with many questions. What is this debate really about? Religion, ethnocentrism or gender? Security? And who is served by news stories that present the controversy solely in terms of countries at war with Iraq?
