In Gaza können Frauen jetzt auch Polizistinnen werden. Wer diese Nachricht als Indiz für die Beförderung der Frauenrechte verstehen will, sollte den Bericht der Herald Tribune von heute lesen. Wie im Iran werden die Frauen in Gaza Teil des Unterdrückungsapparates, der die islamistische Lebensweise durchdrückt.
Gaza ist das größte Freiluftgefängnis der Welt. Für die Frauen wiederum ist dort oft nur das Gefängnis ein Ort der Freiheit:
Rania had been working on the case of an unmarried female university student who had been photographed having sex. It was unclear whether she was engaged in prostitution, which is a crime. Either way, she had put herself in a compromising position that, in Rania’s view, could harm the Palestinian cause. Drugs and prostitution lead to „collaboration with Israel,“ she said.
Rania took the pictures to the woman’s family and told them of their daughter’s „wrongdoing.“
Ramli said that the police usually aim for reconciliation, but Rania acknowledged that in cases of „family honor,“ the women often end up dead at the hands of male relatives or are sometimes married off to those they slept with or were raped by.
„Women are the victims,“ said Zainab Ghonaimi, a women’s rights activist in Gaza.
With Gaza’s court system still barely functioning, justice has become mostly a family affair. As a result, Gaza’s central jail serves in part as a kind of shelter for women at risk.
Recent inmates included a 15-year-old girl, Yosra, whose family said she had been raped by her 22-year-old cousin. Four female relatives were in the jail with her – endangered by accusations that they failed to promptly inform the head of the family of the rape and subsequent pregnancy – while the male cousin was free.
Yosra gave birth to a baby girl after the rape, but her brother „threw away“ the newborn, according to the women, and nobody knew where to find the baby. Yosra’s father had agreed to marry her to the cousin, but the cousin’s father was objecting.
In a separate room, five women from a poor family in central Gaza were taking refuge. Accused by male cousins of prostitution, the five said their lives had been threatened. „We’re protected here,“ one said.