The Daily Beast’s Women in the World Summit

Debate: Is Europe Stigmatizing the Veil

The women of the AHA Foundation were truly inspired by and honored to attend this year’s Women in the World Summit hosted by The Daily Beast. Ayaan was joined at the summit by both the Executive Director and Communications Director of the foundation.

Marc Bryan-Brown for The Daily Beast

In a timely and heated debate, Ayaan discussed with Isobel Coleman of the Council on Foreign Relations and Liesl Gerntholz of Human Rights Watch, the French law banning the burqa. Ayaan argued that a law’s job is to protect citizens, and that the result of the ban on veils is the protection of women from subjugation by their families. Additionally, she welcomed the controversy as a gateway to conversations about honor violence and other rights abuses suffered in the West in the name of religion.

In addition to Ayaan’s debate and many other engaging panels, the ladies of the AHA Foundation enjoyed listening to Hillary Clinton, who spoke about the full emancipation and equality of women, calling it history’s “unfinished business.”