Palestinian women’s struggle goes on

Palestinians are the largest single group of refugees in the world. One in three refugees worldwide is a Palestinian. It is estimated that there are about 6.5 million Palestinian refugees worldwide. The majority of Palestinian refugees live within 100 miles of the borders of Israel in neighbouring Arab host states. More than half the refugee population lives in Jordan. Approximately 37.7% live in the West Bank and Gaza strip, comprising about 50% of the population in the occupied territories. 15% lives in almost equal numbers in Syria and Lebanon. 2,60,000 internally displaced Palestinians reside in Israel. The remaining refugee population lives throughout the world including the rest of the Arab world, from Gulf states to Egypt. Palestinians have no rights as citizens or as refugees. Even the inalienable right of refugees to return to their land is denied to Palestinians. Thus Palestinians have been people who have been uprooted from their native soil ,dispersed, hounded and who in turn have been waging a relentless war against its aggressors Israel and US. While something may be known of Palestinian uprising, and papers are constantly filled with Israeli attacks on Palestinian homes and massacre of people, much less is said about the role of Palestinian women in struggle, their status, the problems they encounter and the multifaceted war that they have to wage. In the words of a woman from the Palestine women’s association, "Really it is time more was investigated into Palestinian women’s lives. Strong traditions are keeping the women down, although all the time we are the ones to make the greatest sacrifices, and suffer the most. The woman carries two-thirds of the social responsibility, the man carries the rest". An attempt therefore is hereby made to trace the lives of Palestinian women in struggle.

Palestine society has been fundamentally feudal and patriarchal. The birth of a boy was normally more welcome and celebrated than that of a girl who was considered a burden on the family. There would be constant watch and worry over her. If she was late in returning home whatever be the reason, she would be punished. Male honour was not based on personal achievements, but mainly depended on the man’s ability to control the behaviour of the women in the family. Men were considered responsible for women’s actions with women having no independent say in most matters of concern. Right since childhood she is taught to be obedient, control herself in word and deed, and be wellversed in rules of moral behaviour. They are compelled to accept and endure their ‘inferior status’. Higher education is not permitted if the girl has to travel long distances for the same. The woman’s primary function is considered to be as wife and mother and her space restricted to the home. Marriages are arranged by the parents. The groom and the bride would see each other only on the wedding day. The bride cannot refuse the match her parents have fixed for her. The wife is obliged to concede to every demand of the husband. The husband even holds the right to physically punish his wife. Wife-battering is not rejected on principle but only the degree of beatings is at times questioned. In Islamic law marriage is not a sacrament but a contract. Hence divorce is possible. But while a divorced man is socially accepted and can comfortably remarry, the woman is usually blamed for the termination of her marriage. She loses the privileges of a married woman who has some freedom of movement. If the woman seeks divorce she loses her Mehr. For divorce she needs the consent of her husband who is too willing to give it if she foregoes her right to financial support and custody of children. Polygamy acts as yet another source of suffering with the constant threat of being neglected and dumped. The right to custody of children also ends when the boys reach the age of 9 and girls 11.

Umleila, one of the many women in the struggle was pregnant, when the war started in 1976. Her daughter was only four months old when the Syrians came and bombarded their camps in Beirut. Umleila ran around from shelter to shelter, to various posts carrying news, carrying reports . She came home at 1.00 am in the morning and left at 6.00 am, that is if she could come at all. It was natural for women to do so in times of crisis. The collective task was placed before children, husband,……before every thing. It came before one’s own family. "During bomb attacks ,during war all ones everyday problems,all the normal values in life disappear completely. Every thing changes" says Umleila.

A woman’s right of inheritance is guaranteed under Islamic law. But she is entitled to only half of that received by men . But women in Palestine society are always in the custody of men, father, brother, husband, son or expected to be . Hence most women are under pressure to renounce their inheritance rights in favour of their brothers. Afraid of the stigma of having ruined the family if she makes any claims, women generally yield.

Thus women who are regarded as the conservators of tradition and culture are its principal victims. Religious fundamentalist concepts hold sway over secular and democratic notions which have gained fervour along with the struggle for national liberation. There have been changes in women’s lives necessitated by circumstances and assertion of women.

The ongoing war for liberation, a perennial position living as refugees or under occupation has brought a host of social and economic changes in Palestinian society. The need for educating girls so they can support the family is highly recognized. Hence there is an increasing number of educated women. Girls are permitted to sit next to boys in classes. They struggle side by side in the student movement and against the occupation authorities. Women have entered most of the traditionally male domains. An increasing number of them not only engage in hard agricultural tasks, but also labour in factories and function as professionals, teachers, doctors and such others. Men and women meet, work together and even love marriages have come to vogue. The participation in social and political movements have altered the status and made them visible in the public sphere. Their role and accomplishment are accepted and appreciated though after much delay and with difficulty.

Yet women still find themselves at a disadvantage on several levels both in education, employment and even in struggle and organization. Despite economic pressures, resistance to the notion of women having careers or even jobs outside the homes, tend to linger. Due to their lowered status women often have to take poorly paid jobs with few or no rights. They have no union protection. Many employed women remain unmarried. And despite holding jobs outside they continue to be solely responsible for house work and child care even in refugee camps. Even little girls are entrusted with taking care of the younger siblings in camps while the boys are left free. Thus feelings of superiority continue to be reinforced in boys, even as women have emerged strong in struggle. Domestic violence is hardly ever discussed.

Her picture can be seen every where, in homes, in guerilla offices, in schools and on the windshields of the commando jeeps. It is one of the most wellknown faces to the camp population. She was completely unknown until 11th March 1978 when a blurred picture of a dead woman who had been badly shot was flashed around the world. The woman in the picture was DALAL , twenty one, a Palestinian woman from Lebanon, one of the champions of liberation. She led a group to infiltrate and hit Tel Aviv, the heart of the enemy and the largest Zionist city. It was condemned quickly as ‘mindless action’ by the West and condolences went streaming in to the Israeli government. But in the Palestinian camps, people were ecstatic. When thousands of Palestinians are forced to flee and hundreds are killed by Israeli aggressors with machine guns, bombs and tanks they call it retaliation, why is’nt that terrorism? they said. The Tel Aviv action was to provoke the Israelis into action before they had completed preparations and it worked.

The action was also an important milestone for Palestinian women because for the first time in the history of the Palestine liberation struggle, a woman had led a guerilla action inside the occupied home country. All the other members in the group were men too. ‘I want to be like Dalal’, young women often said with admiration. Dalal is a martyr, a legend, an idol — She means a great strength to all women in struggle.

Dalal gave up her studies to work as a nurse for the commandos. Then she joined Fateh and became a telegraph operator. ‘I must work for my people, I must contribute to the revolution. It is the duty of all Palestinians, she said. When the Syrians arrived in Lebanon in 1976, she fought them in the mountains. In 1977 she underwent military training and emerged as a lieutenant.

Dalal was confident and politically aware. She was a strong support and a source of encouragement during the preparation for the Tel Aviv operation. She, like many others involved in struggle, believed that death should have a meaning. Their death was to be the way to real life, a better life in Palestine. They knowingly plunged into action, sacrificing their lives for the sake of their people, their children, their country, the future.

The last thing Dalal wrote in blood before going down to the waiting boat was, ‘I, Dalal, am prepared to die for my country. Don’t cry, my mother’

But the Intifada has not only altered the role of the women but also their consciousness. An inner struggle is taking place between men and women due to contradictions between their present roles and traditional norms and values. Many are taking up the fight against Israeli occupation and also against the restrictive practices in their own society, trying to overcome their limitations owing to growing up in a conservative set up as well, in the process. It is an uphill task as struggle has to be waged on many fronts.

Intifada in itself cannot liberate women. It is no magic force that can wage the struggle for women’s liberation. Experiences of women in struggle in Algeria and elsewhere who were relegated to the backyard once again after the struggle was concluded, have made Palestinian women sharply aware of this fact. With the weakening of Marxist forces like the PFLP/DFLP, both politically and organizationally, there are fundamentalist forces resisting Zionism which continuously attempt to curtail their rights to struggle and to be liberated. Palestinian women continue to struggle creatively against all odds trying to make it clear that women’s liberation is invariably connected with national liberation and a free society and vice versa.

Despite growing literature on the subject a great disparity exists between the rich history of Palestinian women’s involvement in their people’s struggle and the recording of that history. There are fragmented pieces of information, without adequate material on the historical roots of activism and more of such are produced by the NGO circles present in the occupied territories and in the West who tend to turn a blind eye to the militant role of women in the Intifada. Activist women have anyway received scant recognition even in the Arab world where only the names of a few militants and martyrs are widely known. Yet an attempt is made to outline the glorious role of Palestinian women in struggle.

In the 1960s, a small number of women began to be engaged in Fedayyin liberation operations. For some future activists a catalyst was Laila Khaled , the woman who gained international attention by hijacking a civilian aircraft in the early 1970s. She hijacked the aircraft, evacuated the passengers and then simply blew it up. It was an exceptional action by a woman. It grabbed the attention of the world media and was one that placed the Palestinian Liberation question firmly in the international political arena.

Laila Khaled was a member of the leadership council of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a delegate of the Palestinian national council (PNC) and a leader of the Palestinian women’s union. She has dedicated the last three decades of her life for the cause. Her opinions on the question of Palestine liberation and women’s movement are noteworthy.

There is evidence that as early as 1884, even before any organized women’s movement had emerged in Palestine, women in rural areas were already struggling alongside their menfolk to resist the first Zionist settlements. Research into the subject has also shown that Palestinian women were politically active from the 1920s. For example in 1921 the first Arab Palestinian women’s union was set up in Jerusalem, and in subsequent years various committees and groups were created to respond to emerging social and national concerns. Women’s activism on behalf of the national cause was also expressed through the first Arab women’s congress of Palestine that was held in 1929. This was a bold step to take in view of the traditional restrictions against women. While rural women were more directly active, women activism in general from 1920 to 1950 was primarily philanthropic. Many middle-class women were mainly involved in charitable and welfare work, which did not challenge the entrenched patriarchal attitudes about women’s role in society. Once Zionist enterprises culminated into Israeli statehood in 1948 and Palestinians had been expelled from and dispossessed altogether of their homeland, these women were active organizing many support services. These efforts in a way acted as a barrier to more extensive mobilization of women in active political resistance against Israel, along with a counter to patriarchal structure. But the continued process of Israeli colonization dramatically transformed and heightened the political consciousness among women.

Initially a minority of young educated women joined the Ba’ath party, the Jordonian Communist party and the Arab Nationalist movement. The Palestinian Arab women’s Union (PAWV) survived the uprooting of 1948 in the west bank and Gaza strip. A small remnant became active in the refugee camps of Syria, Lebanon and Egypt. In the 1960s a small section of women began to engage in Fedayyin liberation operations. For some activists inspiration came from Laila Khaled who shot to fame hijacking a civilian aircraft in the early 1970s. Women’s leadership struggle developed in conjunction with the developments in the history of Palestinian struggle since 1948. Following the 1967 June war , the remaining territories of what had formerly been Palestine were captured and occupied by Israel.

Women started resisting the occupation strongly after the 1967 June war . In July 1967, women began compiling memoranda on torture, mass arrests, and administrative detentions to send to foreign diplomats and the International Redcross. They led strikes and demonstrations. Women’s individual and collective acts of resistance encouraged others . In Feb 1969 Muslim and Christian women staged a hunger strike in the church in Jerusalem to protest the murder in Gaza of three women and the wounding of thirteen others. Women have been beaten up , shot and killed in their attempts to rescue young stone throwing Palestinian boys from being manhandled by Israeli soldiers. They marched in silent protest to road blocks during the first Intifada. Women of all ages threw stones with children, in protest against Israeli soldiers, protected militants, suffered imprisonment, torture, rape and tear gas attacks. Some have been under house arrest for months and years , many have had their travel documents confiscated. Women of varied social backgrounds participated in the struggle.

The first Intifada came to epitomise the political consciousness of Palestinian women and their ability to organize and mobilize. It was facilitated and sustained by the resourcefulness of women as well. Women were active in many aspects of society, in popular committees and showed exemplary courage in resisting the Israeli forces and in protecting and rescuing their homes, children and men. They resorted to novel ways of protest and adopted creative methods to survive the continuous onslaught.

For instance, Palestinian women took a leading role in the 1987 boycott campaign against Israeli products in the Gaza strip and West bank. This boycott initiative was incredibly hard to achieve due to the lack of indigenous Palestinian industry. In order to convince the Palestinian families to boycott Israeli products, it was necessary to provide them with alternative sources of income and products. Hence Palestinian women began establishing their own industries such as cheese making, jam making, bread baking and community gardens. They thereby not only encouraged the boycott campaign but also developed the base for a self-sustaining Palestinian economy for daily needs.

It was early 80’s. Mouna an active member in the struggle for liberation was the first one to wake up and the last to fall asleep. She was active and at night she would sit reading political papers, pamphlets and books. Mouna’s adult life had been a struggle to change the customs. A refugee’s life with its constant decampments and fighting , shakes the feudal patriarchal tradition. Old customs are challenged by women in particular but they die slowly. When Mouna first began her active work in the women’s committee in the camp she had to lie to her parents and sneak off to the meetings with her friend. They would hide the papers in school books. But after a while she started explaining carefully and patiently to her mother, who was an illiterate, that it was important for women too, to take part in the struggle. ‘How can the movement grow strong if half of us- the women- only stay at home’ she asked. Mouna’s mother Um Immad listened reluctantly but with mounting interest. She tried to understand and accept that times had changed. Later Um Immad grew to be very supportive and put her foot down if neighbours or relations made critical remarks about her daughter who had chosen the liberation struggle instead of marriage and raising a family.

Mouna’s father, Abu Immad, however, refused to listen initially. He was very critical and resentful of Mouna’s involvement, even though he worked for Fateh and delivered food to the guerilla bases, coming home only once in a fortnight. He did not altogether mind if other women got involved, but not his own daughter. And it was Mouna’s mother who convinced him otherwise. As days went by Abu Immad’s respect for Mouna’s work grew. She was the only woman member of the local Fateh council in Rashidiyeh camp at that time. She would help make decisions on the management of the camps and in organizing military activities. But the most memorable of her activities is as a messenger, when she would run alone through the alleys while shells fell all around, and hurry back to the shelters to report on the events. Mouna’s life is only a typical example of hundreds of young Palestinian women who without an iota of hesitation bounced into the liberation struggle.

Also during the 1st Intifada Palestinian women led a campaign to reopen schools closed by the Israeli army. During the campaign, Palestinian mothers established underground community schools that their children could attend. When the Israeli soldiers would arrest a child, Palestinian women would come out enmasse and demands that the child be released. Every one would claim that the child was their own. With dozens of women demanding the return of their ‘own child’. The soldiers were often pressurized into releasing the child.

Building on the experience they had gained during the previous decade in the women’s committees, Palestinian women were able to extend their activism and organizational skills in the service of the uprising. They helped mobilize people in different communities to perform strategically important functions. They set up units to collect and store food. They established vigils to warn their community in the event of the enemy approach. They would team up with medical relief committees to provide health care. They worked with agricultural relief committees to reclaim small plots of land for the ‘home economies’. All this apart from directly engaging in confrontation with the Israeli army at the cost of their own lives.

The military occupation has been retained only through an indiscriminate use of violence against Palestinians as a whole, including women and children. The worst possible oppressive practices against Palestinians in the West bank and Gaza strip, especially since the outbreak of the Intifada in 1987, has had serious implications on women’s lives. Palestinian women have had to confront violence both as members of the Palestinian community and as women. Not only their homes but their bodies have also become the battle fields with repeated ravage and rape. Ruquyya was the first among both the men and women of her community to mobilize resistance in response to the demolition of the family homes by the Israeli military in Nov 1988. She served as one of the many women who had forged a new chapter in the history of the Palestinian Women’s Movement.

Women protest in black

In January 1988 ten Israeli jewish women stood in the sidewalk of the main city square in Jerusalem, dressed in black, in protest against the Israeli occupation, in solidarity with the Palestinian people .They were frequently subjected to outbursts of animosity and certain violent sexist remarks, for making an open political statement of that sort in the street.

But they were determined to continue even if the venue changed. Soon demonstrations of women dressed in black, spread to various towns and villages in Israel. By july 1990,there were not less than 30 such groups involving both jews and Palestinians from Israel, demonstrating in black against occupation, every Friday in same places and times .

They were decried as ‘whores ‘ and ‘traitors’ by some passers by. And yet the movement spread throughout Israel and became a popular method of protest. Within a short span of time of the movement women in the USA, Italy, Australia, Germany, Netherlands and England organised similar solidarity vigils. European women adopted this form, for demonstration against Gulf war, In Yugoslavia women organized and protested in black against civil war and wide spread phenomenon of rape, and in Italy to protest against violence by the mafia . Even in India some women’s groups have followed this form of demonstration to protest against violence on women and communal atrocities on women etc.

The Israeli military has used multiple strategies to suppress the unprecedented political mobilization of Palestinian women. During the first two years of the Intifada, the Israeli military used tear gas which was found to cause miscarriages, to suppress demonstrations and to deter women from future participation in public political events. They declared the Palestinian women’s working committees and any other form of social and political organizing by women illegal, thereby creating a pretext for massive arrests of women. Women were arrested and interrogated not only due to their political activities but also in order to exert pressure on their families and to get incriminating evidence against family members. Sexual harassment and sexual violence, in addition to other means of torture and humiliation, have been used as weapons against women. To live under military occupation is to live in a permanent state of war. Palestinians have lived with the oppressive and violent reality of occupation since 1967. Women are subjected to sexual violence even during street patrols and as a means to suppress demonstrations. Only with the outbreak of the Intifada in 1987 did these violence and torture began to be exposed, subject to public scrutiny and protests held against the same by women’s rights and human rights groups. Yet the Israeli army, backed by the US has persisted in inflicting pain and untold miseries, in indulging in torture, rape and murders for years now. And women young and old have continued to resist it with all their might declaring that resistance, armed and unarmed, is both their right and duty.

There have been a spate of suicide bombings by women in recent times. AyatAkhras, a 17 year old college student from the West bank killed two Israelis in the Jerusalem market place in March 2004. But the women’s movement as such has been suffering from many obstacles. It has been a hard and bitter struggle for women in many fronts. And they march on. Their undaunted struggles in the face of inhuman atrocities even prompted Israeli women to strike a solidarity with the Palestinian cause.

The Palestinian Intifada which began in Dec 1987 promoted the political movement of women in Israel against the occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza strip Israel. Just a month after the Intifada began non-Zionist, radical, Jewish women in Israel began demonstrating in support of the Palestinian struggle against the occupation. Gradually more and more women both Jewish and Palestinian, from Israel joined protest and solidarity activities, including meetings with Palestinian women from the occupied territories. Until the Gulf crisis in Aug 1990 the women’s peace movement was steadily developing. It mounted a significant and widespread opposition to the occupation and made attempts to create an alternative political culture. In Dec 1990, some 6000 Israeli and Palestinian women, and women from Europe and the USA participated in a march for peace in Jeruselam and demanded that the Israeli government hold peace talks with the PLO , and permit the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel. It was organized by the Israeli women and peace coalition, together with three Palestinian women’s groups. But in the Gulf war of Jan 1991, Jewish and Palestinian women found themselves on opposite sides. The difference in responses to the war occurred as most Israeli Jewish women identify themselves with the West in general and with the US in particular while Palestinian women’s point of reference usually is the third world, particularly the Arab world. This marked difference in political perspective and direction gradually diminished Israeli women’s participation in such demonstrations. Added to it was the fact that just meetings, demonstrations in black alone, with lack of any political breakthrough became frustrating for many. But many Israeli women continue to experience anguish and express their protest against the ongoing aggression on Palestinians in occupied territories, where their own children’s live as Israeli army men, were constantly in great risk. The Israeli army men who have been indulging in terrible violence in the occupied territories also brought a part of it back home. Thus the life of Israeli women as such is also prone to more violence making it an added factor for them to despise and resist occupation and unjust war on Palestinians.

Palestinian women played a pivotal role in the Intifada. The widespread participation of women in the struggle against Israeli rule shook the patriarchal Palestinian society. Women defied traditional restrictions to participate in the popular resistance. But they were constantly challenged and harassed on account of the same. Before Dalal Moghrabi proved herself as a lead fighter, many people would laugh at the idea of having a female commando. Women were ridiculed when they tried to form a women’s brigade. When women asked for weapons they were refused. After military training girls were sent back home. This made many women unsure of themselves when it came to military action. Their confidence was constantly eroded by the belief that the men were better at everything and they were always told so but the growing military participation of women brought sea changes in the scenario.

Demour, is a small ruined town ,clinging to the mountainside south of Beirut. It is ghostly,with blown up houses and gaping windows. The walls are covered with slogans such as ‘Down with Imperialism’, ‘Palestine, your people are coming’, ‘Revolution to victory’ which are widely found even elsewhere. Everywhere there are pictures of Palestinian liberation heroes killed in action. There are Palestinians living in such ruins. Demour is called the widows’ town because 70% of the adult population are widows. Their husbands died in the battle of Tel al Zaaher, a refugee camp in east Beirut. The active women’s union in Tel al Zaaher with its various committees, day nurseries, literacy and sewing classes etc., built with years of hard labour were all destroyed, levelled to the ground by the occupation forces. All such projects are under constant threat. So are the people uprooted any number of times.

Intifada was a higher calling, a national upheaval that demanded commitment and sacrifice, and a break of traditional customs and values. It brought in a spirit of rejuvenation in Palestinian society. Many people began talking about the democratization of Palestinian society and hoped to combine strategies for national liberation. At the forefront of these struggles for equality, democracy and freedom were many Palestinian women.

Yet many serious factors have endangered the Palestinian women’s status and role in struggle. Primarily they have to continuously struggle on two fronts. While fighting against the Israeli occupation Palestinian women face serious conflicts within their own patriarchal family and society. Even eminent women who emerged as leading figures in struggle such as Hanan Ashrawi, bowed down before family pressures against her more active role in politics. PLO policies with its compromised stand on struggle for liberation as such has not been favourable to women. Demands for female representation at executive, legislative and judicial levels in the transitional government have continued.. Secondly the decline of the PFLP and DFLP, revolutionary movements which were partly funded by the Soviet union virtually collapsed in later years and with it a class based nationality struggle with gender concerns also took a back seat. Thirdly and most importantly is the rise of fundamentalism that has sought to destroy the advances made by the Palestinian women in the last 40 years. Fourthly, and definitely a dangerous trend, is the proliferation of International NGOs which have brought internal divisions within the women’s movement. The role of fundamentalism and NGOs in curbing and diverting the women’s movement need some elaboration to understand the present situation.

The national liberation struggle on the one hand contained the seeds of a growing consciousness among women about women’s issues. It forced women out of the domestic sphere and offered them a new political role outside the home, raising their awareness to their own oppression as women. At the same time the struggle did not take any serious cognition of women’s issues, pushing it to the back, on the grounds that the liberation of the land came first. The complex nature of the women’s question in the Palestinian context and the necessity and the role of women in the ongoing struggle were not adequately addressed despite women’s active and militant participation.

And Israeli occupation on the other has sharpened and deepened Palestinian patriarchy. A response to the Israeli denial of Palestinian identity, was an upsurge in cultural heritage and traditions which worked against women for the most part. There has been an increase in men’s sense of identity and self esteem through control on women’s sexuality and ‘honour’. Where women were dressing more freely before the 1967 occupation, the intrusion of Israeli soldiers into homes have caused men to insist that women cover themselves with burkhas. Male unemployment in rural and urban areas have resulted in more stringent controls on women, while doubling up their responsibilities. Men try to assert lost economic authority over women and family typically through physical violence, greater surveillance of women’s behaviour and dress, by confining them to home, by negatively responding to their education and employment even as circumstances compel to yield with a vengeance. All priorities in the family are generally tilted towards boys. Many long fought women’s rights are denounced. Israeli occupation has also impeded the development of an independent Palestinian occupation by undermining their right to self determination. Thus Palestinian women are governed by foreign archaic laws. The personal status law in the Palestinian occupied territories is a combination of repressive and outdated Ottoman, Jordanian and British laws which in no way defend women’s right.

Also is the fact that the Palestinian women from the occupied territories are the lowest paid and worst exploited labour force in Israeli factories.

Political despair among Palestinians in general and in the occupied territories specifically, combined with poverty and grave deprivation all owing to Israeli aggression have steadily led to an increase in the violence.

In recent years depolitisation and distrac of the women’s movement from its avowed path of liberation is occurring on account of two forceful groups, the religious fundamentalists and the NGOs and International agencies. While the former is attempting to impose a backward and reactionary role on women , the latter are trying to fill the women’s movement agenda with western Feminist concerns, bereft of any notion of struggle for political liberation which is a part and parcel of the Palestinian existence.

Palestinian women, post Intifada are experiencing a backlash for continuing with their political activities. They are considered to be too western and anti-Muslim. Women who challenge traditional definitions of morality are threatened and pressurised to conform. It is very much prevalent in the Gaza strip where Hamas has its strongest base

During the Intifada the pressures and conflicts in Palestinian society on the role of women grew. There were many changes but they remained superficial and not internalised. Fundamentalist forces which since 1982 gained influence in Gaza, are growing in strength. They propagate traditional Islamic values and seek to resolve the contradictions concerning the status of women in Palestinian society by reverting them back to the traditional female roles of wife and mother. The fundamentalists use the weakness of the secular political organizations which pay inadequate attention to such social conflicts. To speak about the important role of women fighters and martyrs, their strength and glory, without mentioning the negative developments on account of the same, has become dangerous in some regions.

Hamas is one of the most powerful religious and national movements that upholds anti-secular traditional values whilst at the same time mounting a determined resistance to Israeli aggression. It has thereby gained popularity as men and women relate to it as a remedy to their battered Palestinian identity.

PLO ,which has become a mainstream political organisation has little to object to Hamas demands that Shariat (Islamic law) be the basis of all personal law. Hamas has also called for codification of the primary role for women as that of ‘mother’ and ‘producer of muslims’. The role of many women are constrained by the expectations and demands to conform to traditional cultural values which are based upon notions of sexual segregation and family honour. It is a definite handicap in the struggle for liberation.

Not just the PLO but even other organizations have decided to risk alienating women and marginalizing them within the struggle rather than incur the wrath of the powerful religious movements. They are afraid of accusations of being traitors to the national cause and enemies of tradition.

Such a policy of trying to steer clear of the issue of women and religion has openly backfired. Fundamentalist backlash against women became overt and severe. There were even cases of women in the Gaza Strip who were beaten or who had acid thrown at their legs for daring to walk in the streets unveiled. With mounting pressures to address the issue of fundamentalism publicly some national leaders such as Faisal Husseini did respond. The whole event shocked women irrevocably into an awareness of discrimination and oppression they could possibly face in a future Palestinian state. The situation is very tricky with Hamas being the major active resistance movement and NGOs trying to utilize the women’s state of affairs to their benefit thereby attempting to dilute the national liberation movement overall.

Palestinian women are thus confronted by serious dilemmas for which there are no simple solutions. On the one hand they don’t want to alienate from their male co-patriots in struggle, at the same time they find the patriarchal norms too restrictive for their full participation in struggle. They know that they have to be free of Israeli rule and they also want to be free and equal citizens of their own state.

Social liberation will never be complete until the national conflict and Israeli occupation have ended and the national liberation will never be complete without incorporating programs which seek to liberate women and ensure justice for all. The two must necessarily go hand in hand.

The experiences of Algerian women and Iranian women who were relegated back to traditional roles following the revolution have sent a strong message to Palestinian women in struggle. Despite many predicaments unlike their sisters Palestinian women have already traversed far in their struggle. There can’t be a retreat into invisibility now.

All they need is strength and self confidence to continue their work amongst women and people. Strength to resist patriarchal tradition, strength not to break down and become paralysed when the camps are bombed, strength to give support to others and strength to go on fighting for their liberation beyond all obstacles. It is not easy but it is possible for a people defying destruction and death on a day to day basis. A rebirth of proletarian revolution thinking and ideology in the society is the best catalyst to, not only to gain such strength, but also to create the atmosphere amongst the entire population that will help facilitate it.

The occupied territories are a small place. Hence stopping at Israeli check points has become a daily routine for Palestinians going to work, visiting family, doctor or even running errands . Harassment of Palestinian citizens at check points include detention, shackling, blindfolding and stripping. Incidents of firing is also common. At the Qualandia check point on 28th March 2003, a group of children were throwing stones at the fence when Israeli forces resorted to firing without warning, targeting the children, killing one of them on the spot. Military check points have been the cause for major medical problems and death of many young ones, sick and the old. Even when one is visibly ill, entry is prohibited or unduly delayed by the Israeli military. Pregnant women have harrowing experiences traversing the check points. Unable to obtain required medical facility in time and compounded by fear of check points result in a number of still births. Many women are compelled to give birth at check points under terrible conditions. Check points also restrict access by Palestinians to Israel for education and jobs. As if this is not enough, there are also internal check points restricting Palestinian’s movement even within occupied territories. A number of people have been injured and killed while attempting to cross check points for work. Such gross violations of International laws continue unabated with the blessings of the US. While the UN and other such International forums watch on. Unless all check points are completely dismantled chances of any normal life are impossible.

Frequent border closures and constant restrictions and confrontations have imposed enormous losses on the economy. As per World Bank estimates the physical damage inflicted on the Palestinian public infrastructure and private property had reached $ 305 million by the end of 2001, owing to border closures and restrictions on movement alone. Moreover large scale incursions have been repeatedly shattering all hard efforts to knit some life together from shambles. Any time, anyday , anything and anybody could be blown to pieces by Israeli bullets and bombs, whether in occupied territories or refugee camps. There is no limit, no end. According to Amnesty International, Israel has destroyed 3000 Palestinian homes in the occupied territories in the past three and a half years alone including 1000 in the Rafah camp. Recently there was massive wanton destruction caused in Rafah killing many women and children and wounding hundreds and leaving thousands homeless. The Israeli state even opens fire on unarmed protests. Deadly crimes were committed over a week long siege in Rafah on the pretext of unearthing arms smuggling, following the footsteps of the US with its war launch on Iraq on the pretext of Saddam’s nonexistent weapons of mass destruction(WMD).

"And for Palestinian woman, the persecution is compounded, not just cumulative. They are oppressed nationally as Palestinians under occupation or in exile. This is the primary facet and cruelest form of their oppression. The second facet is their socio-economic exploitation as members of the social class they belong to . The third facet is their oppression as women in a sexist patriarchal society. Therefore their struggle have to be multifaceted and complex too. In the struggle for liberation they are indeed fighting on several fronts. The national , socio-economic and social. This means that for liberation to really take place for Palestinian women, it has to take place in all these three dimensions simultaneously, not successively" — Laila Khaled in an interview with Free Arab Voice.

There has been a constant interruption and destruction of basic municipal services including water, electricity, sewage and telephone etc. Due to curfews, food availability is also often affected and panic-buying further reduces their availability in the market. All these have enormously overloaded women in particular with unending heavy work both at home and outside.

Forced violent entry into houses, physical and mental abuse, widespread looting of hard-earned money and other valuables, destruction of homes, fields and orchards, constant raids on schools, hospitals, offices and relief organizations, etc causing irreparable damage have all placed Palestinian life as such under a state of siege. As if all this was not sufficient, a gigantic ‘seperation wall’ now is being built in the West Bank by Israel; 347 km of concrete from north to south, 8 metres high and 2 metres thick. When completed this wall will alienate yet another 3,00,000 Palestinians from their farming lands. Israel is bent on building a mammoth prison in the West Bank even as it drags on about the pull out plan from the Gaza strip.

Despite so much uncertainty and anxiety, amidst so much poverty and violence life still continues for the Palestinians. It has to . It is a matter of survival. But it is one that is literally a perennial struggle between life and death. There could be death at any moment which is replaced by new life. And there is life in every action, there is emotion without inhibitions. Palestinians lives have turned revolutionary, they have nothing to lose.

The Israelis have taken their country. They have been hounding them for years. The women’s struggle has a long way to go when there is no structure, no real state to alter or fight, when the whole people are oppressed and without a nation or an economy of their own. Palestinian women have a lot in common with the women of the third world. They suffer from the same grinding poverty, social and religious oppression as many other women do . They share the fight against Imperialism and colonialism. But the difference is that these women have no homes that they could call theirs, no country to reside in, they lie scattered.

What does it mean to be humiliated and hounded at check points and in one’s own home. How does it feel to live on the brink of starvation and destruction. What is it to be children who see their parents, sisters, brothers and friends being kicked around, beaten black and blue, sexually harassed, raped, killed in the middle of the night, what is it to have a volley of bombs pour on , drenching them all in blood, maim-ing them, anytime. It is hard to imagine and yet struggle goes on all the more fiercely.

Um Leila aptly summed it all up saying "In spite of all obstacles, in spite of war and death, in spite of opposition from the men, Palestinian women will participate in the liberation struggle. It is very important. They believe in revolution and will teach their children to believe in it. Without the women the revolution would be without a future. Every day people are killed amongst us, every day produces a martyr. If people don’t understand the situation in which we live, they don’t understand the pain that makes mothers wish, more than anything else, for their sons and daughters to become commondos".

Palestinian women, Palestinian people give us a painful insight into the depth of human suffering and the incredible strength of human endurance and capacity to struggle. Respect and support for their struggle to have a country of their own and build meaningful lives based on equality and justice is a must.