BERLIN: Court Fines Family For Trying To Force 15 Year-Old Gay Boy Into Marriage

Via the Associated Press:

A Berlin court has fined three Lebanese men on allegations they seized a 15-year-old relative against his will in what he says was an attempt to force him into marriage because he’s gay. State Court spokesman Tobias Kaehne said Thursday the boy’s father and two uncles were each fined 1,350 euros ($1,430), or 90 days in jail, if they don’t pay. According to the complaint, in 2012 they took the boy, now 18, and forced him into a car and set off for Turkey. They were stopped at the Romania-Bulgaria border, and the boy was returned to Germany. There are few other details in the complaint, but the boy told Berlin’s Tagesspiegel newspaper he had come out as gay and his father decided to force him into marriage.

The report doesn't say why the story took three years to come to light.

UPDATE: More on the story from Pink News:

The father of then 15-year-old Nasser El-Ahmed beat him, poured boiling water on him and threatened to ram a knife into his throat after he came out. One of the uncles also doused him in petrol and threatened to set him on fire. The boy told the Tagesspiegel newspaper that he had come out as gay, and as a result his father had decided to try and force him to marry a woman. He said he hoped his case would draw attention to issues faced by gay Muslim men.

LEBANON: Activists Hail "Landmark Ruling" On Criminalization Of Gay Sex

Via the Lebanon Daily Star:

A judge presiding over a case prosecuting homosexuality has ruled that a notorious piece of legislation criminalizing gay sex is not valid, a decision that has been hailed as a major achievement by activists in Lebanon. The latest edition of The Legal Agenda, a quarterly magazine published by the non-governmental organization of the same name, reported Tuesday that, in January, Judge Naji al-Dahdah cleared a transsexual woman of having a same-sex relationship with a man, an act criminalized under Article 534 of Lebanon’s penal code. “It’s a big step; it shows we’re moving in the right direction,” said Georges Azzi, a prominent activist for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender rights who is also the co-founder of Helem, a Lebanese group that has long been campaigning to change the law.

The judge declared that the ban on "unnatural sexual intercourse" is unclear as the meaning of "unnatural." It's not yet clear if the above-cited ruling is the final word on the issue.

BBC: Gay Rights Threatened In Lebanon

LEBANON: Rioters Destroy US Businesses

More photos here.

Beirut, New Gay Hotspot?

For about as long as I can remember, Beirut has been the go-to comparison for describing another place as desolate and dangerous. As in "the Bronx is the Beirut of America." But according to a lengthy travel piece in yesterday's New York Times, Beirut is now the "Provincetown of the Middle East."

While homosexual activity (technically, sexual relations that officials deem “unnatural”) is illegal in Lebanon, as in most of the Arab world, Beirut’s vitality as a Mediterranean capital of night life has fueled a flourishing gay scene — albeit one where men can be nervous about public displays of affection and where security guards at clubs can intercede if the good times turn too frisky on the dance floor. But even more than the partying, Beirut represents a different Middle East for some gay and lesbian Arabs: the only place in the region where they can openly enjoy a social life denied them at home.

Security guards putting a stop to dance floor "friskiness" doesn't sound very P-Town-ish to me, but the article does raise Beirut out of my "Top Ten Places I'll Never Go" list.

Gays Protest Police Brutality In Beirut

In what at an Arab gay blogger calls a first of its kind for the region, last week Lebanese gays protested recent beatings by local police. The protest was organized by Lebanese LGBT rights group Helem, which reports:

Nearly two hundred people gathered yesterday afternoon at the crossroads of Sodeco in Beirut to protest against violations of the rights of social minorities in Lebanon. The defense of the homosexual community clearly dominated the event, organized at the initiative of the association Helem. The sit-in got the a big media coverage, most of them were positive, except for a few.

(Tipped by JMG reader Sheepy)