Occupation, Patriarchy, and the Palestinian Women's Movement...

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An interview with Hanadi Loubani
by Hanadi Loubani and Jennifer Plyler
AWID
November 10, 2003



How does the Israeli military occupation of Palestine perpetuate patriarchy within Palestinian society?

Generally speaking, the Israeli occupation of Palestine is not recognized internationally as an important factor in the ongoing existence of patriarchy in Palestinian society. However, numerous studies have shown that the ongoing Israeli occupation is a key factor in the maintenance of patriarchy in Palestinian society.

Israeli occupation has undermined the Palestinian right to self- determination and has thus impeded the development of a Palestinian constitution or legal institutions. In the absence of indigenous legal institutions, Palestinian women have been governed by foreign archaic laws and have been unable to use the legal realm as a means of gaining rights.

For example, the personal status law used in the Palestinian Occupied Territories is a combination of repressive and outdated components of Ottoman law, British Empire law, and pre-suffrage movement Jordanian law. In addition, the components of the Ottoman law that are in use predate the secular movement, and are thus based on sharia (religious) law. Without the establishment of an independent state, it is impossible to develop an indigenous legal framework that can defend Palestinian women’s rights- and this is a direct result of the Israeli occupation.

In terms of labour, Palestinian women have always been very active in the workforce, and are often the sole source of income for their families due to the large numbers of Palestinian men who have been murdered, disabled or imprisoned by the Israeli occupational forces. Like in any colonized nation, Palestinian labour has been solicited and exploited to facilitate the development of the colonial power. In this context, Israeli ‘middle men’ recruit Palestinian women within the Palestinian Occupied Territories to work inside Israel. This work is both seasonal and contractual and thus lends itself to exploitative working conditions. Palestinian women inside the Occupied Territories, although denied the right to return to their homeland to live, are recruited to cross the Green Line on a daily basis to work in Israeli factories. In terms of pay, Palestinian women from the Occupied Territories as a group are the lowest paid with Israeli Jewish men, Israeli Jewish women, Arab Israeli men, Arab Israeli women, and Palestinian men all considered more ‘valuable’ workers. Within this context, Palestinian women have been unable to organize their labour or participate in unions.

Educationally speaking, Palestinian women in the Occupied Territories have always been highly represented in Palestinian universities. However, this number is dropping due to the illegal Israeli checkpoints that female students, along with all other Palestinian civilians, are forced to cross in order to reach their schools. Over the past two years, hundreds of Israeli military checkpoints have been established throughout the West Bank and Gaza Strip, limiting Palestinians’ freedom of movement. Women crossing checkpoints are often subject to sexual harassment and intimidation by Israeli soldiers, and as a result, many families are afraid to allow their daughters to leave the home. Women living in rural areas, who have to cross numerous checkpoints to reach urban areas, have particularly been denied their right to education. For example, when a Palestinian woman is detained or harassed by an Israeli soldier at a checkpoint, not only is she victimized by the occupation soldiers, she also risks getting into trouble with her family for arriving home late. In this way, the intersectionality between occupation and patriarchy is explicitly felt in the bodies of Palestinian women.


http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?SectionID=12&ItemID=4482