Djemila Benhabib was born in Ukraine in 1972 to an Algerian father and a Greek Cypriot mother. She grew up in Algeria, where she became aware of the inequality of women in that society at an early age. In 1994, the atheist Benhabib family was sentenced to death by the armed Islamic Front for Armed Jihad because of their political activism. The family fled to France. Three years later, Djemila travelled alone to Quebec to study political science. There she began her writing career. Disillusioned with the Canadian “cancel culture” that accused her of Islamophobia, she moved again. This time to Belgium, where she continues her fight against Islamism.
Laureate Difference Day Honorary Title for Freedom of Expression 2016
Djemila Benhabib was born in Ukraine in 1972. Her Algerian father and Greek Cypriot mother chose the then Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic to study at university. She grew up in Algeria, where she became aware of the inequality of women in that society at an early age. In 1994, the atheist Benhabib family was sentenced to death by the armed Islamic Front for Armed Jihad because of their political activism for the Socialist Avant-Garde Party. The Benhabibs fled to France. Three years later, Djemila travelled alone to Quebec to study political science.
She began her writing career there with Ma vie à contre-Coran, an essay that won her the Ecrivains francophones d'Amérique prize in 2009. After Les soldats d'Allah à l'assaut de l'Occident, published in 2012, Charb (then editor-in-chief of Charlie Hebdo) awarded Djemila the Prix international de la laïcité. In 2013, she received the Prix humaniste du Quebec for L’automne des femmes arabes. Après Charlie was published in 2016. In it, she writes that the fall of the great ideologies of the twentieth century caused religion to return to our society. This poses a threat to freedom of thought and expression, as well as to women's rights and education.
Her commitment to the cause has regularly made her the target of physical threats, intimidation and legal action by Islamic groups and their supporters, mainly in Canada. When she ran for parliament, the Collectif québécois contre l'islamophobie accused her of Islamophobia and started a petition to keep her out of parliament. She was not elected. Disillusioned with Canadian “cancel culture”, she moved again, this time to Belgium, where she continues her fight.
In 2016, the VUB and the ULB honoured Benhabib for her efforts with an Honorary Title. She works in Belgium for the liberal Centre d'Action Laïque, where she calls for a secular uprising against the rise of political Islam. Benhabib also founded her own movement, Collectif Laïcité Yallah, through which she aims to give the group a voice in the public debate. She calls the fight against Islamism, which is slowly but surely creeping into our society, institutions and schools, the struggle of her life. In her view, it is time for politicians to stop turning a blind eye to political Islam. This also applies to our schools, where the neutrality of education is being called into question, ultimately putting the whole of society on a slippery slope. Because whoever rules the schools rules tomorrow's society. Benhabib sees mainly wrong choices, such as the political handling of the headscarf. Veiled alderwomen and members of parliament are a thorn in her side because the neutrality of the state is a constitutional principle. Either you adhere to that, or you don't. According to her, there is no middle ground. She emphasises that a headscarf is a symbol of certain values and of the Islamist lobby that has succeeded in convincing people that women must cover their heads in order to be respected. ‘Forty years ago, female migrants threw off their headscarves when they arrived in Belgium, but today their daughters and granddaughters walk around veiled.’
In 2025, she does not feel that the pressure exerted by religious circles on our freedoms has diminished. In conversation with the VUB, she stated that religious extremism has never been so powerful in the world. In various parts of the world, freedom of conscience is under threat and freedom of expression has declined. There is the censorship exercised by bloodthirsty regimes and groups, but there is also the self-censorship exercised on our conscience, which prevents us from thinking, saying, hoping and dreaming. Paradoxically, whenever tyrannies plunge humanity into barbarism, there is a deep-rooted survival reflex that makes us fight and revolt. Djemila herself experienced this when she lived in Algeria in the early 1990s, when the Islamic Liberation Front wanted to establish an Islamic republic with extreme violence. At that time, she saw a people in motion, refusing to accept their fate. She wants to believe in this capacity for resistance that lies deep within every human being.
Sources: De Tijd 27 october 2023, VUB Today, Amnesty International.
