For families in Israel and Palestine, the ongoing armed conflict and occupation have sustained a great deal of stress and trauma for generations. One of the resulting impacts is an increase in domestic violence and patterns of aggression that victimize women and girls. In a Gaza Strip survey in 2000, a total of 62.5% of the women interviewed reported having experienced some form of domestic violence.
[1]
According to Yakin Ertürk, the Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women for the UN Commission on Human Rights, living under occupation has created an atmosphere of legitimized violence in which women are both the direct and indirect targets. “They may be killed, targeted for arrest, detained and harassed for being related to men suspected of being linked to armed groups; women suffer demolitions of their homes, which are also often accompanied by loss of lives, arrests and harassments. Women are also subjected to heightened violence in the home and stringent patriarchal control by their family, the wider kinship network, local power groups and the community at large.”
[2]
In December 2002, V-Day’s leaders traveled to Israel and Palestine to listen intensively to Israeli and Palestinian women as they discussed their urgent need for women's security, equality, justice and peace. Like previous V-Day visits in other countries, a series of meetings were held with a diverse group of Israeli and Palestinian women politicians, grassroots leaders, artists, doctors, intellectuals and teenagers in a variety of locations and events.
Hosted by Israeli and Palestinian women's groups Bat Shalom, the Jerusalem Center for Women, and Women Refuse, the V-Day delegation consisted of prominent U.S. women artists, activists, and philanthropists.
The V-Day journey was underlined by meeting female members of the Knesset (Israeli Parliament), Palestinians prominent in law, medicine, arts, and NGOs, Israeli survivors of suicide bombings, Palestinian victims of occupation incursions, Israeli teenagers living in refugee shelters, and Palestinians living in refugee camps or facing daily checkpoints. Overall, the visit featured frank discussions, shared dialogue and experiences among the women, and even some surprises. While at lunch in Ramallah, Eve Ensler gave an impromptu reading of
The Vagina Monologues at one of her host's request. A few months later in 2003, V-Day benefits were staged in Tel Aviv with local actresses, singers, politicians and activists, as well as requests from local activists to stage V-Day events in Ramallah and East Jerusalem.
Eve Ensler affirmed, "We came to Israel and Palestine to listen. We saw the amazing, critical, but often invisible work of Israeli and Palestinian women who have dedicated years of their lives toward peace. What we heard most everywhere we went - from political leaders, from women in refugee camps, from the wounded, from artists and academics on both sides - was that the occupation is destroying both Israelis and Palestinians and that any efforts to end violence against women and girls in Israel and Palestine will ultimately work toward ending the occupation and seeking a just peace in the Middle East."
Upon return to the U.S., V-Day convened a high-profile event to amplify Palestinian and Israeli women's voices demanding real security for women and girls and a just peace. In December 2003, “Palestinian and Israeli Women Uninterrupted: An Evening of Compassionate Listening” was held in New York City, featuring Eve Ensler interviewing five women writers and artists: Suad Amiry of Ramallah, author of “War Diaries: Sharon and My Mother-in-Law”; Yvonne Deutsch of west Jerusalem, founding director of Kol Ha Isha (Women’s Voice); Liane Badr of Ramallah, director of arts at the Palestinian Ministry of Culture; Rema Hammami, chairperson of Gender Studies at Birzeit University; and Rela Mazali, founder of the New Profile Movement and credited with the call for “A Just Peace for Israel.”
Bat Shalom
Bat Shalom is an Israeli national feminist grassroots organization of Jewish and Palestinian Israeli women working together for a genuine peace grounded in a just resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict, respect for human rights, and an equal voice for Jewish and Arab women within Israeli society.
The Jerusalem Women's Action Center
Info at Bat Shalom (email)
www.batshalom.org
Jerusalem Center for Women
Established in March 1994, the Jerusalem Center for Women (JCW) is a Palestinian non-governmental women’s center located in East Jerusalem. The Jerusalem Center for Women was founded simultaneously with the Israeli women's center Bat Shalom in West Jerusalem. The Jerusalem Center for Women envisions Palestinian women as central players in the process of nation and state building and in all aspects of Palestinian civil society and development.
JCW (email)
www.j-c-w.org
We refuse to raise children for war. We refuse to deny the pain, suffering and injustice in the continuation of the occupation. We call on all mothers who don't want their children to serve in the territories, all the women who want to end the occupation and want peace with mutual recognition and respect to join us.
Women Refuse (email)
1 Women’s Empowerment Project of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program: “The highest rate of abuse was found among divorced women (100%), and the lowest among single women (34%). The rate was higher in cities than in refugee camps and villages, and tended to decrease with age and level of education.” Published by the International Development Research Centre, File No. 98-8603.
2 Yakin Ertürk, the Special Rapporteur for Violence against Women, “Occupation Main Cause of Violence Against Women,” United Nations Commission on Human Rights Press Release, June 25, 2004.
