Using Social Media to calm tensions in Kashmir

Original Source:http://www.peacedirect.org/using-social-media-to-calm-tensions-in-kashmir/

One morning last February, Kashmiri peacebuilder Ashima Kaul awoke to news that would send the province into turmoil. Mohammad Afzal Guru, a Kashmiri militant, had been sentenced to death in Delhi for his role in the attack on the Indian Parliament back in 2001. On the streets of Kashmir, people were already demonstrating in his favour. Messages glorifying his death sprang up on social network sites. The Government of Jammu and Kashmir had imposed a curfew and locked down public areas. Newspapers were banned for a time and internet services were blocked. “People were literally cut off from all communication. They had no ways or means to express themselves,” says Ashima.

Her organisation, Yakjah, which means ‘together’ in Kashmiri, have worked in Kashmir for 11 years to stop violence and save lives. Afzal Guru’s hanging was a set back to the process of peacebuilding. It had severely impacted the psyche of the people, especially Yakjah youth based in the Kashmir Valley. Yakjah had to deal with the huge problem of angry protests involving hundreds of young people.

The hanging of Azfal Guru unleashed anger, shock and social network outrage. The fact that he had been executed hurriedly and without warning provoked people in the Valley to declare him a martyr. He became the face of a ‘resistance movement’. Social network sites became ablaze with stories and slogans of his martyrdom. The government’s response fuelled this fire further.

What followed was to rock the Kashmir Valley and present Yakjah with a real challenge. Curfews, shutdowns and protests were spreading and youths were being killed in gunfire. Tensions were increased by the unexplained death of a young Kashmiri man, who protestors suspected had been murdered by their political opponents. Rumours started to circulate. Meanwhile a driver who had ignored strike calls was pelted with stones and killed.

Then in March a suicide attack killed five unarmed police, whose weapons had been withdrawn by the authorities to avoid further violence. On national television the police openly accused the government of making them vulnerable to attack.

In a bid to calm tensions, Yakjah reached out to young people with the best tool they had – social network sites. They have a Facebook page where members interact and share their views. It was through this space that they reached out to young people to persuade them towards peace. “If social network sites can be used for inflaming passions,” explains Ashima, “they can also be used for promoting rationality and peace.” While stories of Azfal Guru’s martyrdom and aggressive posts about execution and revenge dominated Facebook, Yakjah sent out alternative messages of peace.

They immediately faced the problem of followers who wanted to celebrate Azfal Guru as a martyr. But as a neutral peacebuilding organisation, they refused to take sides or politicise the dead.

Yakjah’s group had a direct impact on one young member of the organisation. He had posted a slogan glorifying Azfal Guru, which Yakjah could not approve. This created a dilemma, because the student wrote that if his post was not valued, he would leave the group. This move would remove him from their influence and heighten his susceptibility to engage in violence and radicalisation. Ashima decided to persuade him of his valued place in Yakjah as a volunteer for peacebuilding. As a consequence, the boy returned to the group, even sharing his poetry. He is now being encouraged to use his talent to write peace poems.

Yakjah have shown how, in times of extreme chaos, social media and technology can be used to bring people together. In the emotional disorder of Kashmir, they saved one young person who could easily have been influenced by the extremism on other social network sites. Instead, he emerged stronger and more determined to fight for peace. Yakjah proves that, together, people can do more for peace.

Women's Role in Rebuilding Afghanistan: What India can do

Original Source: http://www.claws.in/Women%27s-Role-in-Rebuilding-Afghanistan-What-India-Can-Do-Pratibha-Singh.html

The determination shown by MalalaYousufzai, a young Pakistani girlto receive an education, despite the brutal assault on her by the Taliban has garnered global support for women’s rights. In her recent speech at the UN, Malala’s statement that“one teacher, one book, one pen can change the world” has reverberated across the world and exemplifies the faith that Taliban induced fear cannot suppress the voice of millions of women desirous of seeking an education. Education, especially of women, acts as a counter to the ideologically regressive and conservative policies of radical Islamists who declare that anything to do with women’s rights is un-Islamic. In Afghanistan, as we move closer to the drawdown of US forces in Afghanistan in 2014, perhaps a focus on female literacy along with other initiatives can lead to a diminishing of Taliban influence in the lives of the people and contribute to a more durable peace.

Shukria Barakzai,an Afghan politician, journalist and entrepreneur, and a prominent Muslim feminist labelled as the “woman who the Taliban and NATO Fear”, is currently a Member of Parliament in Afghanistan and a probable contender for President in the 2014 elections.She talks of growing up in a pre-Taliban Afghanistan “playing football,volleyball,writing adolescent fiction and eventually choosing to study physics” and how the situation turned worse during the Taliban occupation where she was flogged on the streets when found without a male escort.“Most people think of Afghani women as victims,” she says, “victims of violence, of forced marriages, of terrible rates of maternal mortality.  Well, this is all very true. But it is also true that countless women, smart and beautiful and brave, will not bow their heads and will not be victims anymore.” This sentiment needs support to ensure a durable peace in war torn Afghanistan.

However, the mindless imposition of “rights” can also prove to be a failure when not in consonance with the cultural fabric of the society. Women's rights have been central to the war in Afghanistan. When Cherie Blair and Laura Bush joined forces to bolster the rationale for invasion back in 2001, the West developed a passionate concern for the position of women in the country.There were films, books and documentaries about the high rates of maternal mortality, girls being married off young and low levels of female literacy. There was an assumption that it only required an invasion for women to spontaneously rise up and throw off their burqas.However, change has proved slower than expected. A major achievement however has been in education where over 2 million girls attend school, although there is still a high dropout rate and the numbers going on to secondary school are small. Nevertheless, the fact is that the conservative nature of rural Afghanistan has not changed fundamentally. Despite the colossal aid to Afghanistan over the past decade, the impact on the entrenched attitudes shaping women's lives has been minimal. More intervention in the field of education is required and could be a potential game changer.

Foreign pressure ensured that the constitution and the country's legal system enshrined women's rights, but the reality is very different. There are only a handful of female judges and even when women do have the courage to take a case to the police, they face entrenched discrimination.While women’s empowerment is the need of the hour, its gender dimensions need to be addressed. Positive change will follow with a gendered inclusive approach considering that many Afghan women still cannot step out of the house without permission from a male member in the family.[1]

India can play a considerable role in providing sustainable solutions to Afghanistan’s growth story by promoting women’s empowerment. An educated, self-sufficient woman goes on to affect her family, community and a nation as a whole in a positive manner. To tap into this field will further enhance India’s standing in Afghanistan as well as strengthen relations between the two countries.So far,India has invested 2 billion dollars in rebuilding Afghanistan’s infrastructure,health, transport, communications, enabled cultural exchanges and so on but investing in human capital, keeping women as the focus could lead to long lasting impact. 

A project scheme containing numerous modules ranging from education, health, governance, skill and capacity building could be proposed to the locals keeping in mind the cultural contours of Afghanistan. A holistic developmental model can only be realised if both men and women are educated about its outcomes. Programmesfor Afghan women, conducted in both Afghanistan and India, and explained through audio-visual training workshops in their own language could prove useful in empowering Afghan women. As a follow up intervention, sponsoring and training of two to three thousand Afghan women in India every year on sponsorship in specific disciplines could help in empowering women and changing attitudes within the country. With respect to the 2 billion dollar aid India has already provided, this would prove to be a low cost investment with a potential to yield better results. Training programmes could cover the following:

Education

Five hundred scholarships are already been given out to Afghan students by the Indian Council of Cultural Relations. At least fifty per cent of these should be reserved for women. An effort to bring awareness about disciplines like women and gender studies, political science, good governance, technology, medicine etc. amongst women will broaden their range of options, which they can apply in their respective fields.A Horyan, an Afghan woman studying zoology at the University of Pune says that Taliban rule subverted women’s education but now some families are encouraging and supporting their choice to go abroad and work. She intends to go back and teach in Afghanistan while citing the dearth of professors in her own country.

Governance

Afghanistan is still to have an Afghan Women’s commission to secure rights of women within the country. The National Commission for women in India could play a pivotal role in lending their expertise and providing training to future women leaders of Afghanistan. Training modules should also be prepared to facilitate interaction with women leaders at the Panchayat level to encourage women’s participation at the local government level in Afghanistan. Fellowships could be organised for women to engage with Parliamentarians, which will sensitise them towards various facets of governance mechanisms.

Health and Sanitation

Under the Small Development Project Scheme, India has built basic health clinics in the border provinces of Badakshan, Balkh, Kandahar, Khost, Nangarhar, Nimroz, Nooristan, Paktia and Paktika. It would perhaps be a more sustainable model if women from the community are imparted training in health care, child nutrition etc. In the last few years, the maternal mortality rate has gone down from nine per cent to two per cent because of better infrastructure and awareness amongst women regarding better health care.One woman impacts the whole community, therefore hygiene and sanitation training for women from the poverty stricken areas will help curb diseases emanating from unhygienic conditions.

Capacity Building

A large number of rural women in Afghanistan rely on informal economic sectors like basket weaving, knitting, food processing, handicrafts and agriculture. These women could be trained to replicate community livelihood projects(self-help groups) on the lines of SEWA[i]. Forums like Dastkaar[ii]can play an instrumental role in expanding the market outreach for women’s artisans establishing a continuous source of income and at the same time providing a platform to enhance their skills in producing handicrafts.

Conclusion

Indian intervention to assist in empowerment of Afghan women, keeping in mind their cultural backgrounds could yield long-term dividends. Women empowerment will have a direct bearing on community life in Afghanistan. One woman has the potential to change many lives.While it is clear that the Pashtun culture is still regressive in its approach towards women’s rights, need based opportunities created for women will definitely lead to positive response. After all, Afghanistan has given to the world several indomitable women, one of them being Malalai Joya, known as the “bravest woman in the world” for her courage to speak up against the warlords in the Afghan Parliament.

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[1] http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/sep/26/afghanistan-women-what-went-wrong

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[i] Self Employed Women’s Association

[ii]http://www.dastkar.org/organisationalmap.htm

Jewish Women battle discrimination in Israel

Original Source-http://www.thestar.com/opinion/commentary/2013/06/23/jewish_women_battle_discrimination_in_israel_siddiqui.html

Researcher- Avantika Lal

Shira Ben-Sasson Furstenberg is an Israeli women’s rights activist. She organizes “freedom rides” to help end gender segregation on public transit buses travelling through ultra-Orthodox neighbourhoods.

Israeli courts have held that women may voluntarily sit at the back of the bus and enter and exit through a back door, but they don’t have to. However, few women have moved up front, and some of them have been harassed by men.

“I am Orthodox and observant but I don’t want to sit separately in a bus,” says Furstenberg, a former officer of the Israeli Defense Forces.

“So, some of us have been conducting freedom rides — inviting tourists and others to sit in the men’s section. I went and sat in the second row. As the men came, they wouldn’t sit next to me or in the seats around me. I was not spoken to by the men. Nobody touched me or hurt me but it was not fun.”

Jewish zealots have cursed and spat at school girls deemed immodestly dressed. Vandals have blacked out faces of women from ads on buses and billboards.

Under pressure to do something, the Benjamin Netanyahu government plans to outlaw gender discrimination on buses, health clinics, cemeteries and radio waves, and make humiliation of women in public spaces a criminal offence.

Furstenberg is involved in another “war zone” — to end gender bias at the Western Wall in Jerusalem.

Since 1988, activists of the Women of the Wall have been turning up on Rosh Hodesh, the first day of the Hebrew month, to worship. Instead of praying quietly in a separate section, they do what only men have done by tradition — chant verses from the Torah and wear the talit, fringed prayer shawl.

Some were arrested for disturbing public order. Last month, thousands of Orthodox women turned up early in the morning to block the Women of the Wall, who were taunted and abused by men in black hats throwing water and plastic chairs.

Furstenberg joined the activists on two occasions. “I got yelled at. I got called names. I was filmed. It’s a real war zone.”

Under a recent court ruling, the arrests have stopped. And the government has promised to allow different ways of praying at the holy site. It has also pledged full participation of women in state ceremonies.

Progress is becoming possible because the ultra-Orthodox, a minority that for years exercised disproportionate power in coalition governments, are no longer part of Netanyahu’s current coalition.

He is under pressure also to reduce military service exemptions and welfare subsidies to the ultra-Orthodox, and ease their control of religious institutions and practices, including marriage, divorce, conversions and burials.

“The majority of Israelis have to bow down to the Orthodox monopoly, even though there’s more than one way of being Jewish,” says Furstenberg. For example, “there’s only one female rabbi on state payroll. There’s only one way to divorce. Under get laws, only the husband can give divorce. And the rabbinical courts go along with the husbands’ demands — he would not pay support or he would dictate on how the kids are to be educated. There’s a lot of blackmail.”

Furstenberg was invited to Canada by the New Israel Fund , and spoke at the Beth Tzedec Congregation Monday and at a Jewish centre in Vancouver later in the week. With her was Yossi Beilin, a former Labor minister, former member of the Israeli Knesset and a long-time advocate of peace with Palestinians. He spoke in Toronto and Montreal.

I interviewed both together.

He said social divisions in Israel — especially over the secular-religious fault line — usually come to the fore when the security issue is less paramount.

To him, the issue of gender equity at the Wall “is not the most important. The need for the separation of church and state is the main issue.”

“The matrimonial law is especially unacceptable. Many Israelis bypass it by opting for civil marriage.

“On the bus issue, the ultra-Orthodox argue that women are sitting separately voluntarily. But not all are doing it voluntarily. They are doing it because they are afraid of family and neighbours. They are frightened of their rabbis.”

But he’s happy that discrimination is being challenged and that change is coming, albeit slowly.

Army Widows: The Battle is yet not over

Original Source: http://www.claws.in/Army-Widows-The-Battle-is-yet-not-over-Pratibha-Singh.html

Mohini Giri, ex president of the National Commission for Women and a devoted worker for the rehabilitation of widows in India has very rightly said, “Widowhood is a condition of social death, even among the higher castes”. Several border conflicts have taken place since Independence and insurgency is rife in many parts of the country, which the Army is combatting. This has led to an increasing number of army widows who need care and rehabilitation.

Socially retrograde practices and customs prevalent in some parts of Indian society see widows as an embodiment of “bad luck and omen”. The laws of Manu declared women as “appendages” to be controlled and protected by men; it is these beliefs that are carried forward and at times, widows are forced to marry their brother in law. Family members take this step to ensure that the land and property remain within the family, as division could occur if she chose to remarry an outsider. Earlier, the Government encouraged levirate marriages through archaic rules, which stated that a widow on remarriage would not be entitled to pension. However, the pension remained admissible if she remarried her late husband’s brother. Prior to 1996, pension benefits were not admissible to widows who remarried outside the family.[1] The widows from the many conflicts fought before 1996 thus remained discriminated against. It is only in the year 2006, that remarrying outside the family was recognised and widows won a tough battle against the mindset that promotes their subordinate and “property-like” status.[2]

There remains a significant knowledge gap that exists between the beneficiaries and the organisations[3],which are responsible for delivering these benefits. Several widows do not receive enough guidance on who to approach to request for pensions. A ninety year old widow, Pushpvanti used to get rupees seventy per month as family pension. It is only when she approached the Supreme Court that her pension has now been raised to Rupees 18,000. The Court expressed that they were flooded with such complaints from serving and retired army personnel as well as widows and that there is an urgent need to set up a single commission to handle their financial assistance requests.

Interstate disparities have been observed in granting pension to the widows. Widows in Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana received better pension than their counter parts in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand. A significant imbalance also exists between the pension granted to Kargil war widows with those from the 1971 and 1965 wars. The latter have been known to receive meager pension with no benefits. As if this is not enough, some politicians, bureaucrats and army officials have been involved in grabbing plots and apartments meant for housing war widows as well as ex-servicemen. The 1971 war widows who are often invited to receive honours and awards on behalf of their husbands feel that their real needs have not been addressed. Some of them need housing, a facility that for widows can be vital to decrease their dependence on their families.[4]

Many widows are not aware of the procedural formalities required to file for pensions and most are even far from knowing the exact amount they are entitled to receive after their husband’s death. “Illiterate Malhori Devi, widow of L/NK Kharak Singh does not even know how many zeroes are there in Rupees 7.5 Lakhs” .Under such circumstances, the families take undue advantage of their ignorance for their own personal gains. “Women in Uttarakhand have to walk several kilometers to the post office to collect their pension, the employees at the post office force them to give some share for the services rendered”.

Research conducted by National Commission for Women showed that there are only few Zilla Sainik Welfare Board (grassroots agency) with modern facilities like computers and updated information of the deceased soldiers to enable them to process the pension formalities. This leaves the majority of such institutions inefficient to address the basic needs of the war widows. Zilla Sainik Welfare Board collude with the families and force the widows to remarry within the same family to settle the financial disputes and at the same time lighten the burden of paper work over their shoulders. According to a survey conducted by National Commission for Women, 68 percent of women had to approach the Sainik Welfare Boards themselves to put up a request for pension. It is a moral duty of these organisations to take the first step and come forward to help these women. This can be achieved through an increased counseling and sensitisation on the matter. War widows and army wives involved in the decision making level at these institutions would prove to be beneficial to cater to the needs of widows and their grievances.  How can one expect the traumatised “ghunghat clad women” to confide in men who have received no training to handle such issues?

Army Wives Welfare Association is currently doing yeoman service in providing psychological help and counseling to the army widows. The grief attached to the stigma and trauma state of widowhood is immeasurable. Most of these widows have confessed that they were forced to marry their brother in law so that the financial disputes could be settled well within the family. Many chose to marry the brother in laws themselves because they had no other choice to sustain themselves and their children. They have cited that the transition to a wife of their own brother in law was an immensely traumatic experience for them. Kalpana, widow of L/Nk Naresh of 4 Jat received a mutilated body of her dead husband after the war. Their psychological trauma is immense and efforts should be directed towards exorcising their grief and rage. Social organizations and women’s groups could also step forward to help these women.

Widows also suffer in their new homes because they often have to give in writing that the pension meant for them should be granted to the parents of the martyr. A widow who was allotted a petrol pump by the Government refused to have it on grounds of constant threats she received from her relatives who were eyeing every single penny from her pension money. Madhuri Dixit, wife of Raghunath Dixit was allotted a gas agency by the Government which is looked after by her relatives. She receives rupees 5000 per month but is never allowed by them to visit the agency.

Effective monitoring mechanisms and performance evaluation mechanisms could prove to be a boon to make the pension-related organisations more accountable and responsive. Organisations like War Widows Association of India have stepped forward to provide skill building and livelihood opportunities to these women. Women’s self help groups have proved to be effective to organize these women to generate income.[5] Since most of these widows come from an agrarian background, it is imperative that the Government makes provisions to grant them land rights. The need of the hour is to pull them out of the social stigma and empower them to lead dignified and economically sound lives.

Amidst all the debates going on for increased defence cooperation, technology and development, let us not forget the families of those who laid their lives for the nation. Adopting a holistic approach to cater to the needs of the families and widows could also prove to be a major strategy to motivate the soldiers who can be assured that their families will be taken care of after them. To achieve that, we have to stop viewing widows as passive recipients of the welfare schemes, but active contributors and authors who can carve out their own destiny. The battle for many of these widows is still ongoing.

Few Recommendations that emerge out of this article are as follows:

• Fifty percent reservations for women in the Zilla Sainik Welfare Boards would enable bringing women’s issues on the forefront
• Zilla Sainik Welfare Boards must liaise with social organisations, which handle aspects like psychological counseling, employment opportunities, skill building and education of women.
• Zilla Sainik Welfare Boards should have information centres to provide guidance to women on the procedural formalities and queries.
• All centres dealing with welfare of army personnel and widows should be sensitised regarding these issues. Controller General of Defence Accounts, Department of Pensioners’ and Pension Welfare, Sainik Welfare Boards are organisations that should be approached for financial assistance.

References-

-Lal Neeta, “ Light and Action Women” ,Grassroots-Reporting Human Condition, October 2006

-Phadtare R.G, “The Rehabilitation of War Widows and Ex Servicemen’s Widows: Problem and Remedies, Women’s Link, April-June 2004

-Rambhau Mhalgi Prabodhini, “Report on the study of War Widows”, National Commission for Women

-Narula Vinita, Anand Sarita, “Life after death: a journey into the lives of war widows” , National Commission for Women, 2002

-Giri Mohini, Khanna Meera, “Widows of the unsung Brave of Kargil” , Living , Death Trauma of Widowhood in India” , Gyan, 2002

-Iqbal Naveed, “Honours but no home for 1971 War Widows” , Indian Express, December, 2011

-Parmar Leena, “ Money Matters”, Manushi Journal, February 2004

-V Narula, S Anand, B Babbar, “Life After Death: Glimpse into the plight of War Widows” , Manushi Journal

-BBC News South Asia, “India Chief Minister resigns amid war widows scam probe”, November 2010

-Shaikh Nermeen, Mohini Giri: India’s Voice for the Voiceless, Asia Society

-Indian Military Info, “ Status of Special Family Pension on remarriage for pre 1996 cases : need to educate” ,August 2010 http://www.indianmilitary.info/2010/08/status-of-special-family-pension-on.html

-Press Trust of India, “War Widow was getting rupees 70 a month as pension”,

February 2011

-India Today, “Top army men, netas grab plot for war widows”, October 2010

-Interview with Ms. J Gurmit Singh, President, War Widows Association of India

-Video interviews of Kailashi Devi and Madhuri Dixit (War Widows) provided by Major Chandrakant Singh, Vrc (Retd).

Women's Empowerment and Peace building under occupation

Original Source:http://www.pij.org/details.php?id=1373

As a contribution to the discussion on women’s empowerment in the Palestine-Israel Journal, this article reflects on the possibilities for women’s empowerment and peace-building under a condition of prolonged occupation. Specifically, it focuses on the near-impossibility of the manifestation of empowerment and peace for those who have been disenfranchised under a paradigm of extreme oppression in the context of Occupied Palestine. If one uses Eileen Kuttab’s contextualization of Palestinian empowerment as historically being embodied in practices of mobilization and resistance, then being allowed neither mobility nor the right to organize resistance to Israeli military violence makes it clear that the prospects for successful peace-building and the realization of Palestinian women’s empowerment face significant obstacles.¹ This is a result of the autocratic imbalance of power that has seeped from external into internal dynamics. The external factors are the architects and participants of the occupation comprised of an illegal Israeli military occupation force of women and men, abetted by an international community that does not adhere to its mandates to the fullest extent and follows an aid praxis that further serves to annihilate mobilization and resistance. The internal obstacles to women’s empowerment are an extension of the external, that is, elements of the Palestinian local governing structure that was meant to be temporary in nature.
Different Manifestations of the Basis of Supremacy
To understand this analysis, it is imperative to pay attention to the overall environment and the multiplicity of factors within it. The existence of an Occupied Palestine is made possible through applying the concept of the “other,” which Edward Said eloquently elaborates in his book Orientalism. Said’s work on Orientalism is related to the notion of the subaltern as he explains the way in which Orientalism produced the silence of the Orientals. The term “subaltern” generally refers to marginalized groups rendered without agency.² Thus, European colonialists defined themselves by defining and presenting the differences of the “other”³ as a guise for colonial exploitation. The shift from standard European colonialism toward a policy-oriented neo-colonialism under various U.S. administrations driven by the military industrial complex has led to different manifestations of this basis of supremacy, which in recent times has been accompanied by the rhetoric of the right to development under occupation.⁴
Annihilation of the “Other’s” Identity and Aspirations
Through the State of Israel, a regime of militarized, patriarchal colonialism has been executed by implementing extreme measures in order to alter, if not eradicate, the sociality of the “other” or the Palestinian.⁵ Colonialism in Occupied Palestine lies in the practice of habituating the population to defeat and constructing normalcy out of that very subjugation. Continuous movement and encroachment on space accompanies this stillness of subjugation, which is necessary to achieve the annihilation of the other’s identity and aspirations. The self of the Palestinian is replaced through the establishment of an ethnocentric state and the deconstruction and construction that the project necessarily entails. This includes building colonial infrastructure such as settlements and settler (Jewish-only) roads and severely restricting mobility and accessibility through checkpoints, soldiers, machine guns and an impenetrable bureaucracy of control that administers every aspect of Palestinians’ lives.⁶ The most visible structure to date has been the Separation Wall, which may be perceived as the attempt to slice the Palestinians’ location and memory from their homeland. Correspondingly, destroying homes and creating a complex network of checkpoint passages which dictate where Palestinians can go, when and for how long, and ensuing expulsion engenders perpetual states of dislocation, insecurity and domination.⁷
Some activists have suggested that a solution for empowerment and peace amidst the mentioned context should emanate from collective initiatives by Israeli and Palestinian women. However, it should be considered that the occupation — its imposition of immobility and the breakdown of Palestinian society that this produces — is sustained by an occupation army formed by forced conscription that also includes Israeli women.⁸ Israeli women may be exempt from serving in the army due to religious, marital or other factors; however, as Rela Mazali has noted, their socialization within a culture of war renders it difficult to break out of a militarized construct.⁹ Militarization has been described by Cynthia Enloe as “the step-by-step process by which something becomes controlled by, dependent on, or derives its value from the military as an institution or militaristic criteria.”¹⁰ This transpires through a subtle process, which includes maneuvering women of diverse groups against one another.¹¹ Being conditioned within a militarized framework affects and incarcerates perceptions, thoughts and behavior within militarized societies. Israeli women’s role in an illegal military apparatus may skew their comprehension of peace-building and empowerment as it relates to the cases of Palestinian women. A high probability exists that they will not have Palestinian national resistance or aspirations of self-determination as primary objectives on their agendas. Moreover, Palestinian women under occupation and the ensuing annexation of East Jerusalem have been excluded from the democratic privileges that Israeli women have enjoyed, further separating these communities.¹² Despite years of the international community’s support for Palestinian/Israeli women’s dialogues for peace, these conditions should be seen to render any such conversations difficult.
Israeli Women Have More Access to Institutions That Can Implement Change
Moreover, it seems delusional to presume that simply being women, due to physiological commonalities, is sufficient to erase differences such as socioeconomic status, freedom and the carte blanche afforded to participants in an illegal occupation to negate and relinquish others’ rights. Simply being a woman does not inherently engender compassion or enable true entry into a struggle for emancipation by a female in her position of a colonizer with regard to her subjects. Nonetheless, forms of peace-building and empowerment have generally taken guidance from those that have the resources to be in a position of greater might. In the context of Israeli and Palestinian women, these have predominantly been the Israeli women. While they are also constrained by a male-dominated environment, Israeli women have more access to institutions that can implement change than Palestinian women and therefore have the ability to wield stronger impacts. It is dubious that genuine empowerment and peace-building between women can transpire amidst such asymmetrical power relations. This is not to deny that empathy and benevolent intentions exist within attempts to reach peace. Rather, the location of Israeli women outside an imposed occupation and the mundane realities that accompany that level of existence removes them from that plight. Thus, we need to understand to what extent peace-building between women can be possible when one party comprises soldiers in an illegal occupation army, actors in the quelling of a civilian population, and the other forms part of a population under occupation.¹³
Nevertheless, initiatives between women seem to proceed regardless of Israel’s on-going violations of international law and have proven insufficient in changing patterns of behavior. Israel continues to consistently violate the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, UN Security Council and General Assembly resolutions, customary international law as reflected in the UN Charter, the Hague Convention, the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; the Convention for the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination, the Convention for the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The overarching frame of legal violations coupled with initiatives towards empowerment and peace building raises the question of these endeavors as mere attempts of “normalization”¹⁴ under occupation, which appear to form part of the development and peace trajectory. The latter falls into the development modus operandi of the international community. Instead of enforcing international law, which would end the occupation, the international community generally has maintained the status quo and cemented power relations with the participation of some of the dispossessed.
Militarized Behavior Seeps into the Psyche and Behavior of Some of the Colonized
If peace-building and empowerment are confronted with obstacles vis-à-vis those who engage as oppressors and a population under that oppression, empowerment between the female segment of a population under occupation also has its fair share of divisions. In the past, diverse discourses and actions were deployed by Palestinian women’s autonomous movements. During the first intifada (1987-1993) — the popular civilian struggle against the Israeli occupation — a significant number of women were activists and leaders of civilian resistance.¹⁵ Women’s committees were established and affiliated with national liberation organizations in towns, villages and refugee camps. Grandmothers and young girls alike were in the protests, constructed barricades and used their own bodies to shield their men from soldiers. Further, they contributed to the reduction of their community’s economic reliance on Israel.¹⁶ Neighborhood committees were established along with home schooling, demonstrating the resilience of the Palestinian community under occupation.¹⁷ Yet women’s extraordinary capacity and contributions to the survival of Palestinian society have been marginalized.
Instead of women being enabled to contribute to new forms of peacemaking, what has ensued has been the extensive militarization of Palestinian society, which is apparent through the vehicle of local governing structures that were intended to be temporary. This has been a result of the occupation as well as the infiltration and purchase of an international development paradigm based on unequal yet intersectional relations of power. In the case of Occupied Palestine militarization may be perceived as being derived from a hegemonic interest, coupled with the practices of the colonial power, which seeps into the psyche and behavior of some of those who are colonized, pitting them against one another, dividing them and ultimately, conquering them.
For example, a local governing women’s entity was established in November 2003 “as a response to the Palestinian women’s struggle to achieve their national political and socio-economic rights.”¹⁸ A glaring issue of contention was Hamas’ landslide elections victory in 2006. Although Hamas overwhelmingly won the democratic parliamentary elections in Occupied Palestine with 76 seats of the 132-member parliament, it was prevented from governing by the international community.¹⁹ Following the insistence that democratic elections be held, the United States and donor countries either discontinued or severely curtailed assistance to any entity that was associated with Hamas. This was significant as the Palestinians were the most foreign-aid dependent nation at the time.²⁰
Domination and Submission
If one reviews women’s empowerment through a postcolonial lens, several immediate questions arise connected to processes of domination and submission. How can women’s empowerment be achieved within Palestinian society when Hamas’ electoral victory — according to the Carter Center, in free and fair elections — was immediately nullified?²¹ Such nullification negated those who supported Hamas, which constituted the majority in Gaza, one of the most densely populated areas in the world. That population, which includes women, was denied any form of participation, decision-making or even presence.²² One may assume that the women envisioned to benefit from plans for women’s empowerment were not supporters, voters or members of Hamas and were not married to men who were associated with Hamas. The women in Gaza were in fact quintessential subalterns due to their absolute erasure by the governing structures that were deemed appropriate by the international community. Indeed, the lives of many women in Gaza were either extinguished or placed under severe hardship with the massacre of people during Operation Cast Lead in 2008-09.²³ The latter is a somber reminder of the difficulties of empowerment and peace-building under the onslaught of occupation, although the ones in power and their supporters may pretend that women’s empowerment and peace can transpire under such conditions.
The local governing structure’s empowerment or gender equality route fits into a model of development that has followed the political sentiment of the international community. The development trajectory of the international community upheld the external suppression of the Palestinian democratic structure and referred to those that were deemed favorable to their interests rather than those who were democratically elected. Emphasis was not placed on addressing and including the entire Palestinian population inside Occupied Palestine. Instead, the focus was on the language of gender, the third Millennium Development Goal, which aims at promoting gender equality and empowering women as well as UNSC Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security, again regardless of the possibilities of implementation under occupation. This is not to underestimate the relevance of these concepts and initiatives. However, it is worth analyzing the local context of struggle, its indigenous characteristics and the rights of the entire Palestinian population. This was replaced with the use of a certain discourse by local governing structures, which at times permitted dominance over the “other” by entering into processes of negotiation that included not only the loss of voice but the acquiescence and adoption of a donor-driven discourse that was once alien.²⁴ Subsequently, various categories of subalternity were created, which entailed the complete exclusion of segments of the population that local governing structures were intended to serve.
Conclusions
To conclude, peace building and empowerment among women cannot take place in the absence of liberation. Asymmetrical power relations where a civilian population is continuously occupied under a colonial state-building process does not lend itself to empowerment or peace for any member of humanity. Instead, the militarization of the societies involved takes hold which confines perception, circumscribes thought and, in turn, determines actions both externally and internally. An ongoing occupation which is a constant condition of violence by Israel renders it challenging for Israeli women to engage in empowerment or peace with the Palestinian women whom they occupy. Indeed, it is patronizing that women who served as conscripts in an occupation army, or are part of a country that engages in an illegal occupation and annexation, should form a partnership of empowerment with those who live under the oppression of colonization. A more realistic option is to seek a new path which facilitates localized empowerment and peace initiatives on the ground, as well as general nonviolent resistance against the occupation by both Israeli and Palestinian women, separately, until the gap in power is minimized.
An in-depth understanding of civil society on the ground may result in more authentic processes of empowerment and peace based on how the people define themselves, their situation and their needs. On the other hand, due to the continuously changing nature of a prolonged occupation and ensuing annexation, Palestinian entities and their plans should serve to facilitate the strengthening of all people and sectors of Palestinian society regardless of political affiliation. This entails the active participation of the people in their self-determination while demanding that the international community and the Palestinian “representatives” comply with their mandates. The fragmentation of the Palestinian nation under occupation renders these initiatives difficult; however, they are not impossible. Fostering belief and cohesion like that which took place in South Africa among anti-Apartheid activists, instead of local divisions, should be a constant objective.²⁵ The only type of empowerment, peace and development that should take place in Occupied Palestine is that which builds on the people’s resilience, sumud (steadfastness)²⁶ and resistance, which challenges the situation of colonialism through occupation. A course of “development” which ignores these elements will only serve to mitigate, rather than eliminate, the root cause that does not allow peace and empowerment to take hold, which is the occupation and current annexation.

Middle East: Israel and Palestinian Women Together for Peace

Original Source-

Researcher- Hansa Rochlani

It was an informal, probably even illegal gathering. In 1988, Israeli and Palestinian women met at a cloister in Jerusalem to talk about peace. Soon after, the meetings became a regular occurrence while officials ignored that they were breaking the rule forbidding political contact between Palestinians and Israelis. They were women, after all.

“For a long time women were left out of the process,” said human rights and peace activist Simone Susskind. “The role of women in the peace negotiation is essential to reaching peaceful solutions.”

And so it is: This informal group of women created a two-state solution years before it became a discussion point in peace negotiations. And the principal they believed in, that women should be, absolute must be, involved in conflict resolution and peace building, was recognized 12 years later when the United Nations adopted the landmark Resolution 1325 on October 31, 2000.
“The most important thing 1325 has done is raise awareness of what has happened to women in conflict situation,” said Pam DeLargy, chief of the Humanitarian Response Group of the United Nations Population Fund. “1325 has made it a standard practice now for women’s groups and feminist getting involved in the decision making process of their countries.”

Capitalizing on the UN resolution and in an effort to strengthen it, Israeli and Palestinian women created the International Women’s Commission (IWC) five years later. In addition to Israeli and Palestinian members, the organization includes international members such as United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) chief Inés Alberdi, Liberia President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and the Finnish President Tarja Halonen, who together direct the IWC.

The main goal of the organization is advancing the role of women in their communities, in order to increase their participation in the paralyzed peace negotiations between Israel and Palestine. It works parallel with the stated goal of UN Resolution 1325: to stop the marginalization of women in the Arab-Israeli conflict.

For 60 years, men of each side – politicians, journalists – have written the narrative of this on-going power struggle. Missiles, suicide bombings, refugee camps, and censorship have taken the prominent role in the battle over territory and historical wrongs. With rare exception, the voices of women on either side have not been heard. However, beneath the public script, women serve as the cultural glue and as healers. They are educators, doctors, politicians, artists, and organization leaders.

Women of each side have forged wisdom out of experience and circumstances. They know what is needed on the ground, and work creatively and tenaciously toward obtaining it. They understand the value of forgiveness in order to progress. They are also educated, articulate, and professionally accomplished. Despite all this, very few women have risen high enough to become involved in the peace negotiation process.

Public discourse between Israelis and Palestinians was considered taboo before the Oslo Accords were signed in 1993 but with the advent of the peace process and a glimmer of hope on the horizon for a just and bloodless resolution, it became acceptable to both parties to hold face-to-face dialogues.

Susskind, who has been with the organization since its inception and serves on its international steering committee, says that the IWC favours a resolution that incorporates gender perspective in addressing not only the outstanding issues – including a full cessation of settlements, the recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of two states, and an equitable solution to the refugee question based on UN Resolution 194 – but also in guaranteeing human security and the right to life with dignity for both peoples.

A rocky path

Despite a seemingly small number of achievements so far, Susskind is proud of the young organization. “The women have a very good working relationship, and they have learned to cooperate together on many levels,” she said.

However, it has been a rocky path over the past few years. During the Gaza War, relationships were severed and Palestinian women refused to engage in dialogue with their Israeli counterparts, making the unity of the groups nearly impossible and endangering the IWC’s progress up to that point.

Advocates say things are slowly getting on track. In June in Madrid, women leaders attending a conference on ” Advancing Women’s Leadership for Sustainable Peace in the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict and Worldwide” hosted by the UNIFEM and the IWC, ended the meeting with a joint call for a just and peaceful resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including an end to the three-year-old blockade of the Gaza Strip.

Mariam Ikermawi, the director of the Jerusalem Centre for Women and a Palestinian living in East Jerusalem, said the IWC gave women a voice and provided a new approach to peace talks. She credits the organization for treating women as agents of change rather than forgotten victims. Still, Ikermawi referred to the IWC as a “high-profiled women’s club,” saying that few Israeli and Palestinian women are aware of its existence.

“It’s mostly popular outside its region, and as there wasn’t real work on the grassroots level, you won’t really find anybody who knows the IWC but the people who are in the same field,” said Ikermawi. “We are speaking about a body that exists but doesn’t really have momentum within its own societies.”

Susskind admits that this is one of the IWC main shortfalls, saying that the organization’s biggest challenge is getting the message out. “I agree with this criticism, I know that the IWC has had little impact in Israel and Palestine because we did not manage to engage women together,” said Susskind. But she also adds that the IWC is learning from its mistakes and intends to address them at the IWC’s next meeting in Jericho.

Anat Saragusti, one of the founders of IWC and the executive director of Agenda – Israeli Centre for Strategic Communications, says that the IWC plays a large role in trying to raise awareness among decision-makers all over the world. “We meet frequently with high level international figures to influence them about the urgency of the situation, about the need to integrate women’s perspectives into the process – about the need to solve the political conflict through political means, and not with arms and power,” said Saragusti, insisting that core issues must be dealt with head on and not avoided. “We talk about a fair solution based on a two-state solution on the borders of June 4, 1967, with Jerusalem as the capital of both states.”

The first female TV correspondent in the Gaza strip, a lawyer by training as well as a human rights activist, Saragusti gives a negative assessment of IWC achievements so far: “We failed, we don’t have peace, and women are not on the negotiating table,” she said. Now that the month-long direct talks between Palestinians and Israelis are deadlocked, the great challenge confronting the IWC is mobilizing the Israeli and Palestinian public in favour of its approach.

But Susskind says the organization is young and needs to time to get on track. She adds that she is sure time will make a difference. “I’m hopeful that after five years of existence we are better prepared,” said Susskind. “We have young women, better working relationships, and we are working better together. I’m not pessimistic – if I was, then I wouldn’t be here working.”

On September 15, IWC circulated a position paper to advance the Israel-Palestine negotiations in which stressed the need to “ensure the meaningful participation of women and the inclusion of women’s perspectives in the negotiations, as mandated by United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 and 1889.” This, it said, was necessary “to adopt a new approach both to avoid past mistakes and to ensure far greater chances for success”. (Oct. 2010)

A Short History of Women in Black

Original Source- http://www.womeninblack.org/en/history

Researcher- Hansa Rochlani

"Women in Black" was inspired by earlier movements of women who demonstrated on the streets, making a public space for women to be heard - particularly Black Sash, in South Africa, and the Madres de la Plaza de Mayo, seeking the "disappeared" in the political repression in Argentina. But WIB also shares a genealogy with groups of women explicitly refusing violence, militarism and war, such as the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom formed in 1918, and the Greenham Common Women's Peace Camp in the UK and related groups around the world opposing the deployment of US missiles in the eighties.
Beginnings in Israel
Women in Black as we know it today began in 1988 in Israel. In 1987, 20 years after Israel occupied the West Bank and Gaza, the Palestinian intifada began. In response Israeli Jewish women began to stand in weekly vigils in public places, usually at busy road junctions. Starting in Jerusalem, the number of vigils in Israel eventually grew to almost forty. In the north of Israel, where the concentration of Arab communities is greatest, Palestinian women who are Israeli citizens were also active in Women in Black groups. Many local WIB groups made contact with women across the Green Line engaged in support work, e.g. visiting Palestinians in Israeli prisons.
Establishing a formula for action
At WIB vigils, women carried placards saying "End the Occupation" and closely related messages. The focus was quite precise, in order to be able to draw in a wide group of women. The vigils were predictable: same site, regular intervals. The women wore black. Although they were not particularly silent in most Israeli locations, as they have become in some countries since, there was no chanting. They were seen by, and provoked reactions from, many passers-by on foot and in vehicles, some of whom heckled and abused them, both in sexualized terms ("whores") and for their politics ("traitors"). Their policy was not to shout back but to maintain silence and dignity.
In other countries, including Canada, the USA, Australia, and many European countries, Women in Black vigils soon began to be organized in support of those in Israel. In Berkeley, California, for example, Women in Black has been standing weekly since 1988. In the UK at this time, women (mainly Jewish, with Palestinians and others) picketed the offices of the Israeli state airline, El Al.
Italian women pick up the theme
In Italy a group of women had started a project they called "Women Visiting Difficult Places" which aimed to promote dialogue between women on different "sides" in countries where there is conflict. They visited Israel and Palestine in 1988, and gave support to Women in Black there. They returned to found their own WIB, Donne in Nero, which soon had weekly vigils in Roma, Milano, Bologna, Torino, Ravenna, Padova and Verona. Large numbers of women from Italy have maintained a programme of visits to Israel/Palestine for more than a decade. In 1989 they helped promote an event "Time for Peace" in Jerusalem, involving a great human chain around the walls, and in 1996 shared with Bat Shalom in organizing the event "Sharing Jerusalem".
The Gulf War
At the time of the Gulf War (in 1991, following Iraq's invasion of Kuwait) it became more difficult for Israeli women openly to support Palestinians because of Arafat's public support for Saddam Hussein. Later (1994) the Oslo Accords between the Israeli government and the PLA suggested progress towards peace, so that protest seemed less necessary. Women in Black vigils ended in all but four locations in Israel. However a number of women's peace conferences in Jerusalem between 1994 and 2001 involved many of the original WIB network, some of whom remained active in this interval in Bat Shalom, TANDI, and other women's peace organizations.
In contrast to the situation in Israel, in many other countries the Gulf War stimulated women to oppose the US-led bombardment of Iraq.For instance, in London a group of women demonstrated as Women Against War in the Gulf. Later some of them would rename themselves Women in Black.
Women in Serbia respond to war
Soon after, when Yugoslavia began to disintegrate and war broke out between the former Yugoslav republics, some of the Italian women visited feminist activists in Belgrade, which led to a similar form of organization and action there. Women in Black in Belgrade (Zene u Crnom) was formed on October 9 1991. Explicitly feminist, they have been actively opposing nationalist aggression and masculine violence ever since.
Zene u Crnom had a strong and challenging street presence, with regular weekly vigils in Republic Square in Belgrade from 1991. They work in partnership with men refusing to serve in the military, and have maintained an extensive programme involving public statements, writing and publishing, educational workshops and seminars, and organizing international visits and meetings.
A strong group in Spain
A Spanish WIB network, Mujeres de Negro, were by now strong and active. They helped find refuge, respite and a public platform in Spain for women from the Yugoslav region. It was with an important input from Mujeres de Negro and Donne in Nero that the women of Zene u Crnom in Belgrade organized a series of ten annual international encounters at different locations in the former Yugoslavia, which have been an important force creating and expanding the international network.
Women in Black spreads to other countries
During the sequence of wars that began in 1992, in Croatia and Bosnia., Women in Black groups sprang up in many more countries, supporting Zene u Crnom Belgrade in their opposition to nationalist aggression. Women got together in Belgium (a French-speaking group Femmes en Noir in Brussels and Flemish-speaking group Vrouwen in het Zwart in Leuven). Women in Black London took its name at this time, starting to hold weekly or monthly vigils in Trafalgar Square, in central London.
It is impossible to name all the separate groups in the various countries that emerged since the middle nineties, but the reader is encouraged to look them up on their individual pages on this website. Some groups adopted the formula of silent vigils, wearing black. Others (for instance the Bay Area WIB in California and WIB in Tokyo) have found it more effective, for instance, to process in single file, silently, through shopping areas, or to use masks, giant puppets and drums. Many women from these groups took up the practices of visiting war zones in support of women there. There were many visits to Belgrade, Zagreb, Sarajevo and other towns and cities of the region.
As always in women's movements, and especially perhaps in groups opposing violence, there are many lesbians active in Women in Black. It has been productive to make connections between violence in war and in everyday life, including the violence of homophobia, misogyny and racism. A particularly strong and supportive relationship was formed between lesbians in the Leuven Vrouwen in het Zwart and Zene u Crnom.
And other continents
Women in Black in India began in 1992. When the Babri Masjid, an ancient mosque, was torn down by Hindu fundamentalists and violence engulfed India, women were the main victims. WIB in the city of Bangalore have stood every Thursday in silent vigils on the streets, in the market squares and in the Gandhi Peace Park, protesting the wars against women.
Women in Black in the Philippines began in 1995. The Asian Women's Human Rights Council and the Lila Pilipina, an organization of former comfort women, gather often in front of the Japanese Embassy in Manila, dressed in black, demanding compensation for the wartime crime of sexual slavery by the Japanese army in World War II.
A landmark occasion in the nineties was a massive Women in Black vigil (an estimated 3000 women) in Beijing on September 4 1995 that was organized by the Women in Black of India and the Asian Women's Human Rights Council, at the time of the UN World Conference on Women. They called for "a world safer for women" and an end to wars and armed conflicts.
From 1996, Women in Black in Nepal have stood in silent vigils around the issues of trafficking and violence against women in public places in Katmandu.
In 1998 and 1999 Women in Black groups everywhere had occasion to demonstrate against a sequence of military engagements by the USA, sometimes partnered by the UK, or in the context of NATO. These included continued sanctions and bombing raids against Iraq, the bombing of Sudan and Afghanistan, and the bombardment of Belgrade and other Serbian cities.
Creating an electronic network
It was the Spanish women of Mujeres de Negro, who first saw how crucially important information technology was going to be in linking WIB groups in antiwar action. They were the ones to take the step of setting up an electronic list-serve for Women in Black, at first in Spanish, eventually in English too. Later, in the year 2000 they set up a system of "country coordinators", thus effectively turning WIB into a worldwide net. The information now circulating by e-mail mainly comes from, and goes to, WIB groups. But women with similar aims though using different names and organizational approaches (for instance in Afghanistan and Colombia) are also linked through the list.
Intensified conflict in Israel/Palestine
The renewal of the Palestinian intifada, in late September 2000, after the Al-Aqsa mosque incident, restimulated WIB in Israel. By mid-November women were standing at six sites (Nazareth, Acre, Haifa, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and the Nachson junction) and this activism continues today in 15 simultaneous vigils, some calling themselves Women in Black and others not.
November 2000 also saw the formation in Israel of the Coalition of Women for a Just Peace, which brings together all the Women in Black vigils in Israel as well as 9 other women's peace organizations. Dressed in black, these women have carried out direct action (e.g., placing a "closure" on the Israeli Defence Ministry by blocking traffic to it), in addition to holding mass Women in Black vigils twice a year, with thousands of women participating.
Groups of women, primarily from Donne in Nero but also from London WIB and elsewhere have been visiting Palestine and Israel since the start of the al-Aqsa intifada to support Palestinians and strengthen links between them and Israeli women peace activists.
The Asian Women's Human Rights Council and El Taller International, two networks of women's human rights organizations in the global south, have held seventeen Courts of Women in different regions and vigils of Women in Black have been held before each Court. There was a very intense and creative demonstration of over 5000 women in Cape Town, South Africa, on the eve of the World Court of Women Against War, For Peace (March 2001). The Women in Black in South Africa stood against war and for peace.
As the Israeli oppression of the West Bank and Gaza intensified, Israeli WIB and the Coalition called, in June and again in December 2001, through the worldwide e-mail coordination, for a day of simultaneous protest. Through this and similar international actions it is estimated that there are more than 150 WIB groups in at least 24 countries.
September 11 2001
After the attacks on US targets on September 11 2001, WIB as an international network speedily agreed and issued a statement. Women in New York and other US locations (as well as other groups worldwide) were quick to stand with an appeal for "Justice not vengeanc". Many groups have subsequently protested against the pursuit by the USA and allies of a "war on terror" in Afghanistan and elsewhere. When the bombing of Afghanistan ended, Italian Donne in Nero went to work with women's groups in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
During 2002 WIB groups everywhere have been actively opposing any extension of military action by the USA and allied governments to attacks on particular states, notably Iraq. But militarism and violence that is less in the international headlines has also been a continuing focus for different Women in Black groups round the world. For instance Mujeres de Negro in Spain coordinated a worldwide action to protest the drug-related war in Colombia, where they have strong connections with women's groups.
The most recent vigil at an all Indian level was held at the Asia Social Forum (in preparation of the World Social Forum at Porto Alegre, Brazil) in Hyderabad on January 4 2003. There were over three thousand women dressed in black protesting Israel's Occupation of Palestine, the war on Iraq and the war crimes of the USA, and other situations of war and armed conflict.
Recognition of WIB's work for peace
Women in Black locally and internationally have received a number of awards in recognition of their work for peace. The worldwide network were awarded the Millennium Women's Peace Prize sponsored by the NGO International Alert and the UN agency UNIFEM, and the following year the network was a nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize. Donne in Nero were awarded the Gold Dove of Peace, an Italian prize, in 2002. The Network was honoured by Church Women United, USA.
Israeli Women in Black won the Aachen Peace Prize (1991); the peace award of the city of San Giovanni d'Asso in Italy (1994); and the Jewish Peace Fellowship's "Peacemaker Award" (2001).
NB: We are painfully aware that this history is far from complete, and is most probably biased due to imbalance in the regions and vigils that have volunteered information. Please help us to build towards a proper history of Women in Black by putting up information on your own web pages.

Against all Odda: FemaleReporters lead in Syria

Original Source

Researcher- Hansa Rochlani

Still audible through the increasingly sectarian cacophony of Syria’s ongoing civil war, a small but influential group of Syrian and foreign women are telling the stories of the country’s destruction in unique and meaningful ways. Present in all aspects of the conflict, women are penning the history of Syria.
From the very beginnings of the initial and peaceful opposition to Bashar al-Assad’s Baathist regime, Syrian women have played a powerful role. Samar Yazbek, a female Syrian writer and journalist—herself an Alawite, a member of a religious group traditionally associated with the regime—was among the women who initiated oppositional activism. Women, she says, were among the first who went out and protested: “They organized these protests, formed coordinations and organizational bodies.”
According to Yazbek, as the peaceful protests turned to armed resistance and then into civil war, the role of women in the conflict changed. “Syrian women didn’t pick up arms, but kept helping the revolution by documenting violations, organizing, writing and in the media.”
Nour Kelze, a young photographer from Aleppo, is one of these women. An English teacher before the revolution, she began documenting the revolution with her cellphone before being given a camera by a professional photographer. She now spends her days on the front lines as photo stringer for Reuters.

A female Kurdish fighter from the Popular Protection Units (YPG) points her weapon as she takes up a position to guard an area in Aleppo in June. (Nour Kelze/Reuters)

The visible role of women in the early stages of the uprising is what drew American reporter Anna Day to the conflict, which she has been covering for two years. She says her involvement was mobilized by her original connections with women in the resistance via social media. “It was exciting, and as a young woman myself, I was incredibly inspired and felt privileged to tell the story of my peers in Syria fighting for their rights.”
Historically, Syria has a reputation for being a more equal society for women than other Arabic-speaking countries. This attitude, combined with the absence of sexual violence like that faced by female reporters covering Egypt and of the inherently male-dominated and militarily embedded reporting of the Afghan and Iraqi wars, means the Syrian conflict has drawn an unprecedented number of female foreign reporters.
For some, like journalist Jenan Moussa, based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, or American reporter Clarissa Ward, the conflict has brought them wide acclaim. Others haven’t been so fortunate. Sunday Times journalist Marie Colvin was killed by shelling in Homs during the early days of the war, and just over a year later, Yara Abbas, a prominent female war reporter for Syrian state-owned Al-Ikhbariyah TV, was murdered by sniper fire in the same province.
Armenian-American journalist Lara Setrakian, founder of the digital media project Syria Deeply, says gender is not a disadvantage in reporting in the dangerous and unforgiving environment. “I think at this point it is a fallacy to assume that women cannot approach rebels or even rebel commanders in the field. I don’t think there is any gender barrier to accessing people involved in this conflict.”
In fact, Setrakian says, women bring a unique approach to the story. She cites female reporters’ unwavering dedication to the ongoing conflict and says those she works with are “extremely patient and diligent.” Comparing the Syrian conflict to a patient to a chronic illness, she says this approach is essential. “You don’t just leave the patient while it’s breathing. You pay attention. The women journalists I’ve seen working in Syria have that kind of consistency and ethic.”
In conflict, women often bear the brunt of tremendous amounts of suffering while attempting to maintain family life—and Syria is no exception. For Yazbek, the most tragic stories are those of women who struggle to preserve a normal home existence despite the violence. “Most important are the women who still live out a normal life under the shelling,” she says. Women reporters are usually those who represent female civilians’ stories. Yazbek and Day try to give these women a voice in their reporting.
The conflict has also brought suffering to the Syrian journalists and activists covering it. Last month Human Rights Watch released a report detailing the torture suffered by 10 female activists in Syria. Accordingly, for Yazbek, Syria is no longer her physical home—she has been living in exile in Paris since 2011. “I don’t live in a place now, I live in the idea of a country and a revolution. My home is my own head, filled with blood, the cries of children, and with the sound of airplane bombs.”

An image grab taken from the Syrian state TV on May 27 shows Yara Abbas, 26, a reporter for Syria's official television station, Al-Ikhbariyah, who was reported killed while covering an Army assault on the rebel stronghold of Qusayr. (Syrian TV/AFP)

For Kelze, the price of war was physical. In February she was hit by shelling and broke her leg. “The shell hit the wall that I was using as a shelter to cover myself. There was half of a second when I felt like all I could see was black.” She said about the incident: “I tried to stand up when I realized that there was a problem with my leg.” Even in the immediate aftermath of her injury, Kelze’s first instinct was to tell the story: “I kept shouting, ‘Where is my camera?’”
For Western journalists, the impact of covering the conflict has been a desire to find creative ways to tell the story. Frustrated by lack of coverage and the limits of mainstream news, Setrakian left a successful reporting job to start Syria Deeply. The online project compiles news, interviews, social media, and background information to provide a detailed picture of the conflict. “I could see that this was a chronic story. It’s hard to follow, and it’s a very complex crisis. I was reporting to television, radio, and Web, and I could see that across those platforms we still weren’t really capturing the essence of what was happening.” She continues to develop the Syria Deeply platform and hopes to expand it to other news subjects in the future.
Day, shocked by apathy from both news outlets and audiences, has used social media to change the way she tells stories. “I did one experiment where I shared Instagram photos that showed snippets of some of the most haunting stories I covered over the course of an assignment.” Her project created a cohesive narrative arc focused on the civilian catastrophe, she says: “I found this brief but personalized way of telling the story to be effective in piquing the interest of people in my networks that may not follow world politics.”
As the conflict drags well into its third year with little sign of resolution, these dedicated women from varied backgrounds and nations all want to keep working to find new ways to get people to listen.
Each has a different hope for Syria and for herself. Yazbek laments the rise in sectarianism, which she blames on regime strategy. She insists she will return to Syria and be involved in the reconstruction of the country she has sacrificed so much for. Of herself, she says: “I have only one dream: the fall of Bashar.”

Take your potion: A victim speaks about Rape in Syria

Original Source- http://www.womenundersiegeproject.org/blog/entry/Take-your-portion-A-victim-speaks-out-about-rape-in-Syria

Alma Abdulrahman is lying gaunt and unable to move anything below her diaphragm in a hospital bed in Amman. Some bedsores have become so deep she’s having surgery tomorrow. Screws hold together her upper vertebrae, and cigarette burns pock her right shoulder. Her voice fades in and out, hoarse from either weakness or morphine.
Six months earlier, she was paralyzed when a regime soldier struck her in the neck with a rifle on a street on the outskirts of Damascus. Now, from a guarded hospital room, she wants to be heard, and what she has to say is deeply disturbing.
Alma Abdulrahman is one of the very few women in the Syrian conflict to speak out about having been raped. While she offered to use her entire name in this story, I’ve used only her first name and a family name because of safety concerns.

Alma Abdulrahman lies paralyzed in a hospital bed in Amman. She says regime forces broke her spine with a rifle.

She has already received severe punishment, she says, as retribution for her role as a battalion commander in the Free Syrian Army. “I served at a very high rank in the army, where I was responsible over men who had to listen to me,” she says.
Unusual for her forthrightness about the rape itself, Abdulrahman is also the rare Syrian woman who has discussed her role in the FSA, which she joined very early in the revolution. Formerly an accountant, she says she rose to the rank of an FSA battalion commander and was in charge of about 15 men at a time. She says she has killed “many, many” men -- at least nine, at her count. With her slim, tall figure, she was sometimes even able to pass as one, she says.
Over the course of a few days in June, Abdulrahman described what she says are the details of her torture via Skype from her hospital bed. It is a series of interviews that almost didn’t happen. Her first, short interview was given to Al-Arabiya on June 6. After this, a person connected to the case told me, a man from the Jordanian government visited her hospital to let the administration know that he was displeased they were treating a “terrorist.” All interviews, including my plans to speak with her, were canceled. Through the cooperation of various medical and social workers in Amman, we were eventually able to connect. While tired, she agreed to speak multiple times through a translator and repeat what she made clear were painful memories.
Her ordeal began on April 29, 2011.
Abdulrahman is from an area in the southern part of Damascus called Al-Midan and had four children at that point. She was living a double life, fighting “during work hours” to hide her FSA world from her husband.
One day in April she had gotten caught up in an incident in which a regime soldier was severely beating a 16-year-old boy at a checkpoint. Sick of the constant brutality, she says, she tried to intervene. This is what led to her own beating and incarceration by the Assad regime.
During dark sessions over a period of 38 days, guards whipped her with a wire, strung her alternatively by her wrists and feet, and injected the crook of her elbow twice a day with a kind of drug that made her feel high, she says. The things Abdulrahman recalls the men saying as they allegedly raped her multiple times were so filthy she is loath to repeat them -- “it’s too dirty and too low” -- although she remembers them saying, “Here is the freedom you wanted” (a phrase similar to ones other women have reported hearing while being raped in Syria). And she can summon up at least one face. And a couple of names.
Within an hour of her arrival at the detention center in Harasta, about 7 miles (12 kilometers) north of Damascus, where she was held in a cell with 20 other women, she says she was roused to consciousness and her torture began. She describes being gang-raped daily by men who smelled strongly of alcohol. Floating in and out of consciousness, she would kick and yell as best she could while lying next to another woman doing the same.
“We were all blindfolded and raped and we would not know who was raping us,” she says, tearing up for the first time in our interview. Before being blindfolded, she could see what she calls the “boss” sit in front of them, teaching them “exactly what to do and say to us.”
“They were ordered to take this one, to take ‘your portion,’” she says. “And they would take it.”
Abdulrahman describes to me how she and one other woman from her colorless cell, college-aged, were usually taken together to another room with no furniture and raped. She remembers clearly the face of one man who tortured her. He was “very, very tan,” she says, “very, very thin,” and balding, she says; he was one of the men who would hit her while she was hung from the ceiling.
Later, her same acquaintance would be afraid to return home after what happened to her. Abdulrahman says she helped arrange for the young women to get surgery that would restore her “virginity” -- a not-uncommon practice or desire for women raped in Syria, from what I’ve learned. In Amman in May, I spoke to a surgeon who had tried to refer a young woman to a gynecologist for similar treatment at her request. (The survivor was too frightened to follow through, the surgeon said.)
Back in the windowless, bare cell with about 20 other women, no one spoke much, Abdulrahman says. They hardly slept. The women “were emotionless,” she says.
Abdulrahman says she knew that at least seven of the other women in her cell were tortured, but doesn’t know about the rest. The women were forcibly folded into tires and beaten, she says. Sometimes they would have salt rubbed into their wounds to maximize the pain, a relatively frequent description of torture in Syria’s war. When asked if she remembers any particular names of the guards in the Harasta center, she says the name “Basel” is one she recalls, and possibly “Mazen.” According to another source, Basel carried out many rapes at the Harasta center. Another name Abdulrahman remembers is Mohamed Rahmoon.
Rahmoon was known to be head of the detention center, according to various Syrian activists I spoke to. Multiple websites have reported that he was kidnapped in April 2012 and found dead in a hospital in July. Abdulrahman has a clear memory of speaking to him the day she was released.
“He reprimanded me,” she says, “for being a part of the revolution.” And with a warning not to repeat what had happened to her, she was released. Whether a bribe was paid this time around, she isn’t sure.
Unlike a man I met recently in Jordan who was held at what appears to be this same Harasta detention center, Abdulrahman was detained clothed. She had on a shirt, jacket, and pants. Mazen, 47, the Syrian refugee I met in Amman in May, said he was held nearly naked in a freezing, underground cell. His detention was in February, he told me, and involved 16 days of being strung by his hands from the ceiling with only his toes touching the floor. He said the 50 men in his cell slept in shifts so a few could sit to sleep at a time. When I met him, he was unable to use his right hand because of the torture. He was willing, however to stand against a wall and demonstrate how he was suspended over a mixture of water and diesel fuel that would make him slip around on his toes.
“I could do this forever,” he joked.
But Abdulrahman isn’t at the point of making jokes yet. What would happen to her after her release would only involve more pain -- it would be just a couple months before her neck bones were broken. First would come a second month-long detention in a government cell in Fir’ Al-Khatib in Damascus in October 2012. The torture continued during this second detention, she says, but not the rape.
The day she nearly died a couple months later, a man -- a friend -- in the FSA using the pseudonym Abu Bakr was shot for having organized an attack at a regime checkpoint. As she was poised over his wounded body, Abdulrahman says, he gave her his prayer beads. It was then that a soldier struck her in the neck with his rifle. She was six or seven months pregnant with her fifth child at the time. (The child would be delivered at nine months in a Syrian hospital via a C-section.)
A series of stays in various hospitals in Syria then Jordan would follow, leading to her eventual rest for now in this particular hospital in Amman, where she recently received the news that her husband, disgusted by her rape and FSA work, was marrying a new wife. Her children, she says, remain with him.
Alma Abdulrahman’s story fits her name -- alma can mean a number of things in Arabic. It can mean “dark” or “black” but it can also refer to a lush kind of tree that is a metaphor for beauty. And the horrors she describes have positioned her to become the face of powerful women survivors in Syria. She says she has fought and killed; she also says she has done it for her country. She says she has endured torture and violation but that she is “capable of standing up against oppression.” Speaking out has been a decision she has made after many months of being told to stay quiet.
“We have to share this with the entire world to show that women are fighters,” she says. “The Arab woman is very strong. All she needs is just a little freedom.”