A woman watches a prayer service for Hajj, the annual pilgrimage to Mecca. About 2.5 million Muslims are traveling to the city this year. View 5 Photos › Photo 1 Photo 2 Photo 3 Photo 4 Photo 5 Read more

I don't know if I'd call it a trend, but the Daily Mail reports at least seven white, educated women have converted to Islam. Since we really don't know just how popular it is, let's consider the why of it all. According to the Daily Mail, most women get their feet in the mosque through a very unempowering door: a boyfriend. But what makes converting to Islam for love more meaningful, and Read more

We're thrilled to present our favorite Double X story here on TrèsSugar. Last year, I lived and reported from Yemen and grew to loathe the niqab (the face veil) on the grounds that it's an oppressive and anti-feminist tool to keep women both fearful and subservient. In speaking with both educated and illiterate Yemeni women, as well as Muslim women's rights activists, I learned that many of them Read more

Islamic women pray on the eve of Ramadan today in Indonesia. For the next month, Muslims around the world will abstain from all that is intoxicating — eating, drinking, and sex — between sunrise and sunset. Read more

Saudi Arabia may be a fundamentalist-Islamic state with rules for women that are stricter than a Christian Summer camp, but that doesn't mean no swimming. Women just need to cover up, but with more hijab and less sunscreen. Writer Maureen Dowd hired herself a male escort — not that kind, but one that allows women out in the Saudi Arabian public — and scheduled her Summer vacation. In August's Read more

"One decides to veil, the other decides to flaunt. But both have internalized the idea of being sex objects as central to their identity." —Stanford educated Shiite Amal Ghandour tells Newsweek that Muslim women like the new Miss USA don't differ that much from those who decide to wear the veil. She reasons that many women who wear the full-covering veil see themselves as prizes for the men Read more

Nicolas Sarkozy favors a ban on the full Islamic veil in France — The Guardian There might be a Lindsay Lohan sex tape — PopSugar Obama says Tiger Woods can "absolutely" recover from scandal — The Daily Beast Nicholas Kristof is proud of Google's free speech stand in China — New York Times Rachel Maddow blasts Pat Robertson for saying God is punishing Haiti — Mediaite VH1 has a new Read more

Cheese. Wine. Baguettes. These are all seemingly welcomed signifiers of French identity. Burqas? Not so welcome. France has been debating a ban on the head-to-toe garment for some time now. Most recently, the country's immigration minister Eric Besson said yesterday that burqas should not be worn on French streets because they are not part of the country's "national identity." Besson wants the Read more

President Obama hosted a Ramadan dinner at the White House last night, where he stressed that "Islam is part of America." — AP Donald Trump fixes the Miss Universe pageant to make sure the prettiest women make it through, according to the pageant's choreographer. — Huffington Post Tribal leaders are alleging that Afghanistan's Hamid Karzai forged 23,900 votes in the recent election. — Read more

Not every woman around the world can enjoy the simple pleasures of life, like sipping a cold beer on vacation, without fear of physical punishment. Recently, 32-year-old Malaysian model Kartika Sari Dewi Shukarno was sentenced to be caned for drinking a beer in a hotel nightclub. After being taken into custody and transported to a prison for her punishment today, Kartika was prepared to endure Read more