International Women’s Day in the Palestinian Rural Context
March 7, 2007
On March 8,
global women, women’s groups, some political parties and social
movements celebrate International Women’s Day around the world
to stress support for women’s rights to equality, justice, peace
and development. This day represents the struggle for the
improvement of women’s situations and the demand for ample
opportunities and options that can ensure a real partnership
between men and women to push forward the wheel of human rights
based sustainable development.
For more
than two decades, the Palestinian Agricultural relief Committees
(PARC) has been implementing programs and interventions in
support of rural women. Through PARC’s experience and continuous
interaction with these women, we realize the sizeable
marginalization, exclusion and discrimination facing Palestinian
rural women that persists for ages. Therefore, on the occasion
of the International Women's Day, we wish to highlight the
situations of these women hoping this will encourage
stakeholders and concerned actors to give proper attention to
rural women in the OPT. We attribute the state of
marginalization and exclusion that Palestinian rural women face
to the following factors:
The
Israeli occupation’s bloody and destructive policies and
impact on the rural and agricultural infrastructure and
social fabric additional to the economic, social, political
and mental health ramifications. As the case of all women
being victims of conflicts and occupation around the world,
the Palestinian rural women experience occupation
differently from men and from their urban counterparts. This
is so because they are vulnerable to poverty and
unemployment on one hand. And they have to assume the
burdens of poverty by finding alternative coping strategies
to ensure a subsistence living for their families. It is
true to say that the Palestinian rural women who are victims
of poverty are the ones who lead the battle against poverty.
In the meantime, these women are taken away from the battle
against their exclusion from the development process.
Palestinian rural women have been the direct target of the
Israeli violence. During the years 2000-2006¹,
351
women got killed, most of them were from villages. Thousands
of women were wounded or arrested during the same period. As
such, the basic right to life has been blatantly violated by
the Israeli occupation authorities.
The
construction of the Apartheid wall in the West Bank resulted
in the destruction of the agricultural sector; more than
247,291 dunums of agricultural lands were leveled²,
hundreds
of thousands of trees were uprooted, wells, water networks
and tanks, cisterns, farms and farmers houses were
destroyed. The wall has separated rural women from their
agricultural lands. As such, they lost their basic source of
income. Additionally, it has cut them off urban support
services like education, health, markets and social safety
networks, etc.
The
occupation, political conflicts, civil wars and internal
fighting in the region instigated and inflamed by
international interests, market mechanisms, globalization
and the American hegemony. These situations inflict poverty
and violence on women in our region particularly the
Palestinian women; more restrictions on mobility, less
options for women; more rural women are caught up in acute
poverty; more rural women are killed and wounded, more
losses in their economic initiatives due to their inability
to move around and to access their produce to the market,
less freedoms and personal security, etc.
The
political and economic embargo imposed on the Palestinian
Authority since 2006 leading up to a major deterioration of
the economic situations especially of the weak and
marginalized strata in the rural areas which depend on
agriculture for their living. Rural women are considered the
leading loser under this embargo.
The
Palestinian society and culture identified as masculine and
conservative. Family is still the source of protection for
women particularly rural women. The Palestinian Authority,
as such, has denied its obligations and responsibilities
towards improving the women’s situations. Furthermore, it’s
women who have to make their households the center of their
life. Therefore, their children and husbands come first then
comes their rights, interests and ambitions. The persisting
conservative nature of the Palestinian society is reflected
in the under representation of rural women in political
parties, legislative institutions and NGOs.
Reforms
adopted by the Palestinian Authority in terms of fighting
the structural discrimination are superficial and trivial.
They did not touch the core of the structural
discrimination. Rural women still face legal discrimination
in terms of what is known as the personal laws which govern
marriage, divorce, children custody, inheritance and
violence against women. Additionally, rural women lack the
willful exercising of their civil rights. Until 1976,
women’s civil right to participate in the elections was
denied. Then, an amendment was introduced to the Jordanian
Elections Law of 1955 allowing women to participate in the
local council elections then.
Marginalization and weak support for rural women persists by
the Palestinian Authority which keeps the agricultural and
rural sector at the bottom of its priorities and interests.
In the 2005 official budget, the agricultural sector
received less than 1%. Throughout the years 1990-1999, only
28% of the local councils’ employment went for rural women³,
To date,
the percentage of women in the total Palestinian work force
is still one of the lowest percentages in the region. It
stood at 10.5% in 20054.
The
paralysis of the Palestinian ministries, the Legislative
Council, the police force and the Judiciary system coincided
with the escalation of crime acts, the state of insecurity
and internal fighting. All these led to a state of chaos and
opened the door wide for blatant violations of vulnerable
strata particularly women and children. By the end of
February the Palestinian police disclosed the news of serial
crimes committed against 3 women and a 14 month old baby
girl in Gaza. It was said that these besides many tens of
women murdered during the past years were killed under the
so called protection of “family honor”. Additionally, many
women and children got killed whilst caught in the internal
fighting and arm conflict between Fatah and Hamas, the two
dominant parties in the Palestinian arena.
The situation of the Palestinian rural women can be summarized
as follows:
A
limitation of work opportunities outside the household
domain. This is a "normal" consequence of the limited
development and employment opportunities that the rural
sector in the OPT suffers from due to the following reasons:
(1) the continued occupation; (2) the marginalization and
exclusion policy of the Palestinian Authority; and (3) the
lack of legislations, policies, developmental plans, and
measures that can protect the agricultural products against
the dumping of the Israeli and foreign products in the
Palestinian markets. Except for the educational and health
sectors, rural women have no job opportunities taking into
consideration that both sectors offer limited jobs. The
majority of the rural women work in agriculture and food
processing though it is designated an extension of the
household. Therefore, the Palestinian society does not
recognize this work as a paid job. People believe it is part
of the household duties and responsibilities that women have
to assume. Furthermore, they don’t consider it a skillful
job. Even rural women themselves have the same attitude
towards their work. As such, the agricultural work does not
affect rural women’s status at home. It is not part of the
recognized reimbursement rights that women are entitled to.
This state, if persists, will continue to reproduce the same
imbalance in power relations between men and women in the
rural sector. The image of man being a productive head of
family who plays very important roles and assumes
significant responsibilities is maximized whilst woman’s
image and status stays very low.
An
extremely small role that women are allowed to assume
regarding the planning process of developmental
interventions and programs that NGOs and donors implement in
the rural sector. Most of these interventions match up the
agendas of the donors and the NGOs and respond mainly to the
practical needs of the rural women. They do not meet the
strategic needs and the entitled rights. As such, these
developmental interventions have never succeeded to
challenge the structural discrimination that rural women
face on one hand. They have had a very limited impact on
women’s capacity and ability to confront the exclusion and
imbalance of power relations in the rural sector.
A weak
role in the institutional work. It is worth noting that
implementing planned interventions of urban NGOs that target
rural women and families is not the same as empowering rural
women and enabling them to reach and control the resources.
It is quite essential that rural women run their own
organizations that can protect their interests and rights
besides expressing their own practical and strategic needs.
Rural women need to gain a rich experience of active and
influential participation in the development process.
A weak
role in lobbying and advocacy groups such as women’s
movements, NGOs, trade unions, students’ boards, human
rights organizations and others. Rural women’s role in the
institutionalized political work whether in political
secular parties or religious parties as well as their role
in the local councils and the Legislative Council is still
under expectations. Although rural women have now better
opportunities in politics and paid work, yet they confront
many on ground obstacles; (1) weak programs that support
them, (2) exclusion of women’s priorities from all
organizations’ agendas including ministries, NGOs,
universities and research centers. The fact that a few
hundreds of rural women succeeded to join the local council
through the implementation of the Quota5
or through their active
economic and political engagement did not affect the women’s
access to and control of resources particularly decision
making, budget allocations and priorities setting.
A
limitation of networking and coordination with the external
surroundings due to the imposed restriction on rural women’s
mobility and traveling between villages and cities. This
situation is resulting from the strict closure regime, which
Israel imposes on the Palestinian people through military
check points, blockades and road blocks which cut off their
villages from the other villages and from urban areas.
Besides, the huge risks they have to face on the way from
home to urban markets and centers for vital services. As a
result, rural women are discouraged to leave their over
protective community. This thing limited rural women’s
freedoms and deprived them of accessing a wider space where
they can reinforce networking and coordination efforts for
their own benefits.
Following
this short synopsis and on the occasion of the International
Women’s Day, PARC demands the Palestinian Authority, the
judiciary and legislative authorities, the NGOs, the political
parties and social movements to uphold to their responsibilities
and moral obligations towards the rural women by doing the
following:
Recognize the agricultural work as a paid job and undertake
all the necessary steps to include it in the national
researches and statistics including the GDP and GNP. And to
increase rural women’s know how and skills especially in the
new agricultural techniques. Additionally, all relevant
actors should provide resources and support to women through
developmental projects targeting agriculture, land and water
development, industrial initiatives based on agricultural
produce and infrastructural projects that can generate jobs
for women and men alike.
Empower
rural women collectively through assisting them to establish
their own organizations where they can develop their vision
and aims, and plan their programs and interventions. As
such, they can have and control a wide space that enables
them to improve their skills, build their capacity and
increase their interaction.
Reprioritize the scope of support and budget allocations of
the Palestinian Authority by giving the agricultural and
rural sector proper attention and primacy in terms of
legislations, policies and developmental plans.
Adopt a
quota for increasing rural women’s representation in
decision making centers and the leading assemblies of the
political and religious parties as well as in the senior
managements of the NGOs that work in the rural areas.
Trust
the role of the rural women as equal and active partners in
the human development process. And trust their participation
in the planning, monitoring and evaluation of implemented
interventions and programs.
Provide
protection for personal and collective freedoms, and
introduce societal reform through enacting legislations and
laws based on gender equality. Additional to fighting
violence against women and terminating the security chaos.
[1]
State Information Service, 20 February 2007
[2]
State Information Service, 20 February 2007
[3]
Women and Politics under the PA, Nahla Abdo, 1999
[4]
Palestinian Women under Occupation: Basic Analysis of their
Status, Nadia Moustafa Elrashidi for MIFTAH, July 2005
[5]
In the wake of successful lobbying by the women's groups and
their civil society supporters, the Palestinian Central
Elections Commission allocated two seats per each local council
for women during the last councils' elections which were held in
four rounds in 2004 through 2005
