Feminism, rape, and Israel. Content warning.

[ArthurbellaScott]

https://unherd.com/2023/11/metoo-unless-youre-a-jew/

I skipped parts of this article, specifically the first person account.

The rest of it I think is an important read.

And one thing that seems to be missing is the acknowledgement that of the thousands of Palestinians dying, for many of them this is the case because of Hamas's clear policy of using them as human shields and / or housing their weapons and military bases in amongst the civilian population.

Israel has in some cases warned of attacks several days in advance and airdropped fliers asking people to evacuate, and Hamas has set up roadblocks to prevent Palestinians who wanted to from evacuating. It's not the Israelis who've put up the roadblocks.

It does need to be recognised that not only are the IDF killing Palestinians, but Hamas are too.

Of course, that recognition makes it a much more difficult problem to solve and not a 'good vs evil' situation, but it's the truth.

I did actually watch one news report where a man was interviewed among a pile of rubble in Gaza and he actually said something along the lines that Hamas were as bad as the IDF and equally responsible for civilian deaths. I felt it was very brave of him to say and worried who may have overhead, although the interview was in English. He was an elderly gentleman.

Both sides may not be doing what Hamas did in terms of women but one side has broken many UN resolutions and under the parameters of international law caused displacement of civilians and done other things which constituted war crimes - so on this basis I can say one side is worse than the other historically….
Does that change anything in terms of where we are no.
Both sides need to take ownership of their actions, when I say both sides I do not mean the Palestinian people as they are not Hamas. I mean Hamas and Qatari and Iranian state supporters and the Israeli government.

BBC Verify did a study on the warnings the IDF gave. The evidence showed that IDF told Palestinians to evacuate to safe zones, and then a few days later did air strikes (with no warning) within or close to those safe areas.

”To better understand the risk to civilians in south Gaza, BBC Verify has identified and analysed four specific instances of strikes in that region. We also looked at some of the warnings and evacuation instructions that were issued to Gazan civilians, including some advising them to move to certain areas in the south.

Some of these warnings were accompanied by maps with arrows pointing to vaguely defined areas to move towards. Three strikes we examined hit within, or close to, those areas in the days after the warnings were issued.”
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67264703

Hamas has set up roadblocks to prevent Palestinians who wanted to from evacuating. I have only seen reports of IDF checkpoints, no Hamas roadblocks. Where have you see this reported?

What on earth do you watch??? I follow many accounts of female journalists in Gaza, many of the women that were killed were doctors, dentists, artists, teachers, and yes, mothers! They had names, they had stories, they had jobs. Do you realise how ignorant and racist you sound? One of the most famous activists in the West Bank is Ahed Tamimi, one of the most followed and loved journalists was Shireen Abo- Akleh. There are evidently women everywhere in Palestine, working in every field, and being killed everywhere because nowhere is safe, not even the West Bank. I have a dear Palestinian friend who holds a PhD in a scientific field, and all her family are highly educated. How dare you reduce these women to submissive breeders? What kind of feminism is that?

I saw an interview with a Hamas leader on an Arabic programme. (Can't find it at the moment)

He was being questioned about the tunnels and was waxing lyrical about how they needed them to protect themselves against Israeli attacks. The interviewer then asked why they hadn't built bomb shelters for civilians. He was speechless till he managed to come up with 'that's the UN's responsibility'

Hamas are using civilians as human shields- a war crime.

Of course the stupidity of many in the West who are supposedly supporting Palestine really doesn't help the situation. I'm guessing most Palestinians would rather they didn't really as it's not helping and whilst Westerners may wish to irrationally lump together a load of supposed social justice movements, the assumption that Palestinians would agree is a bit - well - racist.

This is my favourite sign so far.

https://twitter.com/MarcusBlimi/status/1716812551986798762

Quite breathtaking and more likely I think to undermine both causes than anything else. The sign behind 'lesbians 4 liberation' too.... yeah, Hamas doesn't like lesbians either. You can get a jail term in Gaza for sex acts with someone of the same biological sex. It's illegal.

I agree, I have been cringing at the ignorance on display insofar as the status of Palestinian women.

So you’re saying that Israel are ‘worse’ than Hamas? Odd.

And at the same time dismissing that pesky ‘women’ issue - thank you for illustrating the point of the thread at least.

@itto @BabaBarrio
Some Palestinian women are clearly well educated. Yet overall, under Hamas, their status isn't one I'd like for myself or my DDs.

From the article linked at the start of the thread:
Even beforehand, its feminist credentials were hardly glowing: it mandates the hijab, has made it illegal to travel without a male guardian, and refused to ban physical or sexual abuse within the family.
Sounds a bit like the Taliban really...

@PorcelinaV

What have Israel done to try and minimise civilian casualties? And don't say 'they warn them before they bomb them' because WHERE ARE THEY SUPPOSED TO GO?

Gaza as blockaded by land, air and sea because the Israeli government want a land ethnically cleansed of Arabs and Christians.

If you try to ethnically cleanse a territory held sacred to multiple religions and ethnic groups there will be resistance. If you also starve and cut off power to those people, undermining the value of life, that resistance is likely to be terrorist. Terrorists do awful awful things like what we saw on Oct 7th.

It's just heartbreaking that this will continue indefinitely for as long as the Israeli government is unable to value the life or Arabs as equal to that of Jews, and Arab women as equal to Jewish women.

Hamas are terrorists, Israel need to do better.

The West Bank is not the same as Gaza, and is generally recognised as more progressive when it comes to women's rights. Hamas is against women's rights, that's just a fact. Hamas are in charge in Gaza. I'm not saying anything about individual women, I'm talking about the Hamas stated position on women, which is not good. I am sure there are many wonderful women in Gaza. It would not be good for them if Hamas becomes the undisputed political leader in this region and enacts their preferred position on women.

Yes, but in the same respect numerous experts in the field have stated that the use of human shields doesn’t give an army complete freedom to attack with high explosives. I watch a human rights lawyer say that if a group of Hamas fighters were stood on top of a school full of children shooting at an army, their war crime of using human shields doesn’t mean the army then gets to blow up the whole school full of children to get to the Hamas fighters. He said there has to be porportionality and tactics used, as in say, snipers to either avoid entirely or minimise the deaths of human shields.

He said it is clear from the actions of the IDF that they are maximising civilian deaths, they are not even trying to avoid them and that is also a war crime. Nethanyu even admitted the IDF had failed to minimise civilian casualties.

So is it untrue that women need to travel to Israel to obtain an abortion?

Is it untrue that having sex with someone of the same biological sex in Gaza is illegal and punishable by time in prison?

Which of these things are untrue?

I am saying you are wrong to go into the game of one side is worse than the other because it doesn’t lead anywhere …. You say Hamas and the terrible murder of the Israelis and the unknown plight of the hostages and the turmoil that their loved ones are in and then others can come along and say the displacement of people, the eradication of their rights and roots, the fact that UN laws are broken and under this description Israel is far worse …
ultimately what I am saying is both Hamas and its foreign government supporters and the Israeli government need to be put under external pressure to put a stop to the way things are….otherwise we go in circles and nothing changes another October incident another round of bombing and more death and hate.

No-one is saying that Israel are blameless, just that they're not wholly to blame and that there is not a level playing field.

Israel are not putting their military operations next to hospitals, or near civilians.

The article has so many errors. Women in Gaza do not have to wear hijab or travel with a male guardian although it was correct that domestic violence is a serious issue for all women in the region, including Israeli women.

https://time.com/6329776/hamas-isis-gaza/
“Hamas is religiously conservative, but it does not ruthlessly harass or kill non-Muslims in Gaza simply because of their faith or religious comportment. It tolerates women who don’t wear the hijab, people who sport tattoos, and teenagers who listen to American music. Christians and churches also coexist with Muslims in the Hamas-run enclave.”

This thread has gone in an entirely predictable direction:
OP: Hamas did horrendous things to Israeli women and many feminist organisations have failed to criticise this.
Thread: ends up with the usual argument about the IDF, Israel etc.

Can we just, for once, concentrate on how fucking evil Hamas is? And how bizarre it is that raped, mutilated and murdered Israeli women can be ignored by so many feminist groups?

Life under Hamas being unpleasant and restrictive does not mean that Palestinian women view themselves or their families being blown to bits by the IDF as some kind of liberation.

I am amazed this needs to be spelled out. Such dehumanising rhetoric against women on this thread.

Bravo @itto for pointing out that Palestinian women, despite many hardships managed to have careers and dreams and lives too. They not better off dead and the world is a worse place for their loss.* *

Let's get back to the hostages, especially the young girls and toddlers. What do you think their condition is?
Please explain to me why people especially women are tearing down the hostage flyers, because to me it just looks like they hate Jews.

Responding to the OP: I've just started reading Baddiel's 'Jews don't count', and the first chapter opens with example after example of how Jews don't count. Your post is another example. And his book is directly aimed at 'progressives' on the left of politics.

It makes me think that Jews, aware on so many levels that they really 'don't count', probably feel they have no choice but to defend themselves with everything they have, because they know no one else ever will. I do blame Hamas massively for all of this, and I wish the focus was more on them. But I also think the rest of us in the whole wide world have some serious questions to ask ourselves too. I'm not Jewish, but if I was I don't think I'd ever really believe other nations would have my back if push came to shove.

@LimeLimeLime

'Life under Hamas being unpleasant and restrictive does not mean that Palestinian women view themselves or their families being blown to bits by the IDF as some kind of liberation.'

This. 100%. It is baffling to me they people are so willing to dehumanise women this way.

I'm sure you have heard anti Israel lawyers opining. You've already posted the BBC who have been forced to apologise for their reporting and a web site selling anti Israel slogans.
Hamas started this war deliberately and planned the precise timing of the attack and the tactics. They deliberately attacked a music festival and deliberately raped and murdered women and children.
Nobody made them do it, they have zero justification. If they were decent human beings they'd give themselves up and release the hostages but they care nothing for the martyrs they're creating, actually they're probably proud.

@BabaBarrio
Fair enough, note to self to fact check.
Even so, from Wiki, it does sound as if there is at least considerable pressure to wear hijab:
Following the takeover of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, Hamas has attempted to implement Islamic law in the Gaza Strip, mainly at schools, institutions and courts by imposing the Islamic dress or hijab on women.

It’s not a level playing field, Gaza has a big wall around it and nothing military can be built on the ground inside it. Israel has most of the land and could build anywhere. They often seize Palestinian land to create military training grounds and new settler villages.

But their Fortress of Zion, is underneath the centre of Tel Aviv. It’s an high tech underground bunker and their equivalent of the US Pentagon and is under an entire city of civilians. See photo….
https://www.israel365news.com/327413/idf-fortress-zion-command-center/

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/22/world/middleeast/israel-fortress-of-zion.html

There are also above ground Army military base HaKirya and Rabin Air Force Base both in the urban areas of Tel Aviv.

So yes, they do put military operations right in the middle of millions of civilians too.