Muslim Non-Fasters Face Pressure During Ramadan in Belgium

"Stopping fasting for Ramadan was the last act of my apostasy," confides to RTBF Samir*, a 35-year-old Belgian-Moroccan living in Molenbeek and working in Brussels in a company where the employees are mostly Muslim. A choice he will have a hard time assuming at work, at the gym or in the neighborhood. "At first, I wanted to openly assume just being myself, but after getting into it with people I don’t even know, I changed my mind," he says. At the gym, the thirty-something faces reproaches. "Why don’t you respect Ramadan, are you playing the European or what?" men throw at him after seeing him hydrating. Samir finds himself forced to pretend and hide to eat and drink. In the evening, he participates in the Iftar (the breaking of the fast) at his parents’ house. "They wouldn’t understand, I don’t want to hurt them."

"I asked myself a lot of questions about this patriarchal religion that didn’t suit me, it took years. I stopped fasting for Ramadan around 34-35 years old. The price to pay is also that of rejection by the community. I haven’t had any contact with my family for 15 years, but I wanted my children to be free," confides Najlae*, a 49-year-old woman, born in Morocco and arrived in Brussels at the age of 14 after a forced marriage. She has definitively renounced Islam. "Today, I am an atheist and my children, who are young adults, are too. I show myself as I am." The almost fifty-year-old no longer lives in Molenbeek. She has settled in another Brussels municipality, where community control exists much less.

Ramadan is a period of prayer and fasting, which is one of the pillars of Islam. Throughout its duration, believers - with the exception of the most fragile people - must abstain from eating, drinking, smoking and having sexual relations from sunrise to sunset. Exceptions exist for children who have not reached puberty, pregnant women, the sick or the elderly. In Belgium, the Muslim population is estimated between 7 and 9% of the total population. The majority of Muslims are of Moroccan and Turkish origin.

*Names changed