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The Chador as a Symbol of Fear during Khomeini's Insurrection
- Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies & Gender Issues
- Indiana University Press
- Number 18, Fall 5770/2009
- pp. 125-139
- Article
- Additional Information
During Ayatollah Khomeini's insurrection against the Shah in the fall of 1979, educated Muslim women protestors wore the chador as a political symbol in support of Khomeini. This article explores the reactions of middle-class, educated Jews in Shiraz to the resurgence of the chador. For the Jews, the chador represented a return to their debased status as a najes (unclean, polluted) religious minority. They feared that an impending Islamic regime would revive the Shi'ite regulations against them that the Shah and his father had overturned.