Upon initiative from civil society organizations, the 'Women's Call: One Country, One People, One Flag' conference demanding the immediate restoration of national unity and popular action to end the political division”, was held simultaneously in Ramallah and Gaza on Monday, June 25, 2015. The conference was held in light of the continued political division, which has lasted for over eight years, and the popular fear that this will turn into a complete separation, thus threatening the Palestinian national project. Furthermore, there is the dead end of political prospects and the escalating crimes of the Israeli occupation and its racist plans to uproot the Palestinians, all which require consolidated national efforts to confront the dangers facing the fate of the Palestinian people and its national cause.
This conference is a confirmation of the importance of the Palestinian women movement participation in political and social life and the embodiment of their historical and pioneer role in actively participating in the national liberation struggle against Israeli colonization of the occupied Palestinian territory. It is a reaffirmation of Palestinian women’s humanitarian and civic role in line with international agreements to which the state of Palestine in bound, including the CEDAW Agreement of 1979.
The conference included four panels discussion, where the participants discussed the dangers of the continued division on Palestinian society and on its national struggle against the Israeli occupation. They also reconfirmed the unity of the PLO’s representation of the Palestinian people everywhere. They stressed on the need for a structural framework to organize dialogue among all factions, in order to confront these challenges and to unify national efforts to continue the battle for national liberation and freedom from the Israeli occupation.
The conference particularly focused on the impact of the division on Palestinian women and the most pressing challenges and hindrances to their efforts to end this division. The participants stressed on women’s ability and readiness to create pressure, and advocate on the rivaling parties in order to seriously move forward in implementing the reconciliation agreement without further delay. They also called for reviving the committees for ending the division, including the social reconciliation committee and involving women in all of them.
Following the participants’ presentations and discussions, the conference closed with the following recommendations:
- Achieving Palestinian national reconciliation through the complete and immediate implementation of the Cairo Agreement in accordance with the Shati’ Declaration. Also, setting a date for presidential, legislative and PNC elections.
- Restoration of national unity as a priority and basis for continuing the struggle to end the occupation; also considering it the shorter path to reconstructing the Gaza Strip and breaking the Israeli siege, which requires enabling the national unity government to operate in the Gaza Strip and assume its responsibilities and duties; also to remove the obstacles facing the government‘s efforts in taking its responsibilities, and to address the employees issue according to the Cairo agreement.
- Seeking to achieve a social contract based on the concept of citizenship; ratifying women’s rights in political participation based on the declaration of independence and declaration for Palestinian women’s rights, approved by all parties in the women’s movement in Palestine.
- Halting all actions that harm the social fabric, including summons, political arrests, torture and the closure of associations and unions.
- An initiative from the women’s movement including all of its popular and civil organizations , to organize and support a peaceful, popular movement entitled: “Women are capable of restoring unity, reorganizing the Palestinian internal system ( house) and ensuring and securing freedoms”.
- Investing in the prisoners’ lobbying role and forming a national body of key figures to contribute to social lobbying towards ending the division.
- The General Union of Palestinian Women is to formulate a plan to mobilize Palestinian women and educate them on civic peace in order to develop peaceful action in confronting the division.
- Demanding from women’s and rights groups to provide legal support to protect women from all forms of violence and targeting, which women are subjected to because of their activities.
- Ensuring that the interests of the homeland prevail; achieving real national unity that will end all current disputes on the backdrop of the division; unifying civil and security institutions.
- Reaffirming the necessity of political pluralism in society; the participation of everyone, first and foremost Palestinian women in the construction and development process so that everyone can live in freedom and dignity according to the law and in a manner befitting of the people’s struggle and sacrifices.
- Ending the negative media exchanges and adopting a responsible media discourse that calls for national unity; reaffirming the role of the local media in promoting the values of tolerance and freedom of opinion and expression; forming a lobbying public opinion to end the division and investing in interactive methods for change and expression of national and social issues; renouncing factionalism, discrimination and fragmentation.
- Women’s groups and civil society institutions are called on to organize a campaign to influence figures or institutions that feed into the culture of division and intolerance.
- Spreading the concepts of tolerance and civic peace in school curricula; training the education sector on introducing concepts of reconciliation and tolerance in the educational process to create generations who believe in pluralism and acceptance of the other.
- A call for forming a national dialogue forum that includes all political factions and organizations and social forces in addition to the women’s movement.
- The organizers will form a committee as a result of the conference to follow up on the implementation of its recommendations.
مؤتمر رفع صوت النساء لإنهاء الانقسام وتحقيق المصالحة
'النساء يُردن.. وطن واحد، شعب واحد، علم واحد'
تاريخ النشر: 15/06/2015
بقلم: مفتاح
بمبادرة عددٍ من مؤسسات المجتمع المدني، التأم مؤتمر رفع صوت النساء لإنهاء الانقسام وتحقيق المصالحة تحت شعار "النساء يُردن... وطن واحد، شعب واحد، علم واحد" في مدينتي رام الله وغزة معاً، اليوم الاثنين، الموافق الخامس عشر من حزيران 2015، في ظل استمرار حالة الانقسام السياسي لأكثرِ من ثماني سنوات، والتخوُّفِ الشعبيِّ من تحوُّلِهِ إلى انفصالٍ تامّ، ما يهدد المشروع الوطني الفلسطيني. وكذلك في ظل انسداد الأفق السياسي، وتصاعد جرائم الاحتلال الإسرائيلي ومخططات الاقتلاع العنصرية، وما يتطلبه ذلك من توحيد جميع الجهود والمساعي لمواجهة الأخطار المحدقة بمصير الشعب الفلسطيني وقضيته الوطنية.
ويأتي هذا المؤتمر في إطار تأكيد مشاركة النساء في الحياة العامة، السياسية والمجتمعية، وتجسيم دورها الريادي والتاريخي في المشاركة الفاعلة بالنضال الوطني التحرري ضد الاستعمار الاستيطاني الإسرائيلي للأراضي الفلسطينية المحتلة، وكذلك تجسيد دورها الوطني في الحفاظ على وحدة الشعب العربي الفلسطيني، وتأكيد دور المرأة الفلسطينية الحضاري والإنساني انسجاماً مع الاتفاقيات الدولية التي التزمت بها دولة فلسطين، بما فيها اتفاقية إنهاء كافة أشكال التمييز ضد النساء (سيداو 1979).
ناقش المشاركون والمشاركات في المؤتمر، على مدى أربع جلسات، مخاطر استمرار الانقسام على المجتمع الفلسطيني ونضاله الوطني، مؤكدين في الوقت ذاته وحدانية تمثيل منظمة التحرير الفلسطينية للشعب الفلسطيني في كافة أماكن تواجده، وضرورة إيجاد إطار منظم للحوار على مستوى جميع القوى والفصائل، ضمن الإطار القيادي المؤقت، لمواجهة هذه التحديات، ولتوحيد الجهد الوطني لمواصلة معركة التحرر الوطني والانعتاق من الاحتلال.
وتوقف المؤتمر عند أثر الانقسام على المجتمع الفلسطيني، وعلى المرأة تحديداً، وكذلك أبرز التحديات والمعيقات التي تحد من جهودها في إنهاء الانقسام، مشددين على قدرتها- أينما تواجدت- على إحداث الضغط والتأثير على الفرقاء للمضيِّ الجديِّ في تنفيذ اتفاق المصالحة دون إبطاء، وتفعيل لجان إنهاء الانقسام، بما فيها لجنة المصالحة المجتمعية، وإشراك النساء في سائر هذه اللجان.
وعلى ضوء مداخلات المشاركات والمشاركين ونقاشاتهم، خلص المؤتمر إلى التوصيات التالية:
- تحقيق المصالحة الوطنية الفلسطينية عبر التنفيذ الكامل والفوري لاتفاق القاهرة، وفق بيان الشاطئ بكافة بنوده، وتحديد موعد لإجراء الانتخابات الرئاسية والتشريعية وانتخابات المجلس الوطني.
- أولوية استعادة الوحدة الوطنية كأساس لمواصلة معركة إنهاء الاحتلال، وكذلك باعتبارها الطريق الأقصر لإعادة إعمار قطاع غزة وكسر الحصار الإسرائيلي، ما يتطلب تمكين حكومة التوافق الوطني في قطاع غزة، واضطلاعها بمسؤولياتها وواجباتها، وإزالة العقبات التي تعترض طريقها، ومعالجة قضية الموظفين، وفقاً لنصوص اتفاق القاهرة.
- السعي للوصول إلى عقدٍ اجتماعيٍ يستند إلى فكرة المواطَنة، وإقرار حقوق المرأة في المشاركة السياسية، استناداً إلى وثيقة الاستقلال ووثيقة حقوق المرأة الفلسطينية المُقَرة من جميع أطياف الحركة النسوية في فلسطين.
- وقف كامل المظاهر والممارسات التي أضرت بالنسيج الاجتماعي، من استدعاءات واعتقالات سياسية وتعذيب وإغلاق مقار جمعيات ونقابات، وضرورة الكف عن هذه الممارسات، وإزالة آثارها وتداعياتها.
- مبادرة الحركة النسوية، بأُطرها ومنظماتها الشعبية والأهلية، إلى تنظيم حراك شعبي سلمي ضاغط ودعمه، تحت عنوان النساء قادرات على استعادة الوحدة وترتيب البيت الفلسطيني الداخلي وضمان الحريات.
- استثمار الدور الضاغط للأسيرات والأسرى، وتشكيل جسم وطني للمحرَّرين للمساهمة في الضغط المجتمعي على كافة الأطراف من أجل إنهاء الانقسام.
- وضع الاتحاد العام للمرأة الفلسطينية والمؤسسات النسوية خططاً لتعبئة النساء الفلسطينيات وتثقيفهن بطرق حل النزاعات الداخلية بشكل سلمي، لتطوير العمل السلمي في مواجهة حالة الانقسام.
- مطالبة المؤسسات الحقوقية والنسوية بالعمل على توفير المساندة القانونية لتحصين المرأة ضدّ جميع أشكال الاستهداف والعنف المُوجَّهة التي تتعرض لها المرأة على خلفية نشاطها العام.
- تغليب مصلحة الوطن، وتحقيق وحدة وطنية حقيقية تُنهي جميع الخلافات السائدة في المجتمع على خلفية الانقسام، وتوحيد المؤسسات السيادية المدنية والأمنية.
- تأكيد ضرورة التعددية السياسية في المجتمع، ومشاركة الجميع، وفي مقدمتهم المرأة الفلسطينية، في عملية البناء والتمنية، وأن يعيش الجميع بحرية وكرامة وفق القانون، بما يليق بنضالات الشعب الفلسطيني وتضحياته.
- وقف التراشق الإعلامي، وتبني خطابٍ إعلاميٍّ مسؤول يدعو إلى الوحدة الوطنية، والتأكيد على دور الإعلام المحلي في تعزيز قِيَم التسامح وحرية الرأي والتعبير، وتشكيل رأيٍ عامٍّ ضاغطٍ لإنهاء الانقسام، والاستثمار الكامل للوسائل التفاعلية في التغيير والتعبير عن القضايا الوطنية والمجتمعية، ونبذ التشرذم والتمييز والفئوية.
- قيام الأُطر النسوية ومؤسسات المجتمع المدني بتنظيم حملة تأثير ضد الشخصيات أو المؤسسات التي تُغذي ثقافة الانقسام والتعصّب.
- نشر مفاهيم التسامح والمحبة في مناهج التعليم، وتدريب أُسرةِ التربية والتعليم على إدخال مفاهيم المصالحة والتسامح في العملية التعليمية لخلق أجيالٍ مؤمنةٍ بالتعددية وقبولِ الآخر.
- الدعوة إلى تشكيل منتدى حوار وطني، يضم جميع الفصائل والتنظيمات السياسية، والقوى الاجتماعية، ومكونات الحركة النسوية.
- يُشكل المنظمون لجنةً تنبثق عن المؤتمر لمتابعة تنفيذ توصياته.
Palestinian civil society condemns Poland’s double standards and failure to uphold international law by granting immunity to Israeli leadership
Date posted: January 15, 2025
By MIFTAH
The undersigned Palestinian civil society organizations condemn the resolution passed by the Polish government and signed by Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk stating that the highest level of the Israeli leadership, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, can enter Poland freely. This comes despite the fact that the International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued an arrest warrant for Prime Minister Netanyahu (another arrest warrant has been issued for the former Minister of Defence, Yoav Gallant).
Being a signatory to the Rome Statute, the founding document of the International Criminal Court, Poland is legally obligated to respect and abide by the Court’s decisions, including to carry out the arrest warrants for Israeli officials on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. The double standards with respect to the ongoing genocide in Gaza are clear as Poland recently protested Mongolia’s decision not to arrest Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Respect and ensuring respect of international law and treaties is not a matter of political will. Adherence to the Rome Statute concerns fundamental obligations that must be respected by all State parties. Choosing to politicize international courts and cherry-picking which legal obligations to follow renders international law meaningless and poses a serious threat to the international law-based order.
We call on Poland to reverse this decision to fully comply with its obligations under the Rome Statute, implement the arrest warrants issued by the ICC, and abide by the ICJ Advisory Opinion calling on all States to not recognize Israel’s unlawful presence in the occupied Palestinian territory and to not render aid or assistance in maintaining Israel’s illegal occupation, as well as as well as decisions and orders by other international courts and UN resolutions. We further call on the international community as a whole to support the ICC, the ICJ, and uphold the integrity of the international legal system by abiding by their rulings.
Signatories:
- The Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy - MIFTAH
- Al-Haq
- Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association
- The Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Center (JLAC)
- Defence for Children International - Palestine
- Union of Agricultural Work Committees (UAWC)
- Bisan Center for Research and Development
- Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR)
- Al Mezan Center for Human Rights
Urgent Appeal to stop the ongoing Israeli Genocide and Sexual Violence in Gaza
Date posted: March 26, 2024
By MIFTAH
This is an urgent and repeated appeal to the world to immediately intervene, in light of the recent stories of rape and sexual violence against Palestinian women by Israeli occupation forces during Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Palestinian women are being displaced, tortured, killed and forcibly disappeared, while the world sits idle. Silence and inaction in the wake of these horrifying crimes amount to complicity.
Over the past few days, more horrifying testimonies and stories have emerged from Gaza of sadistic acts by Israeli soldiers, including torture, rape, and mass field executions at hospitals where civilians are seeking shelter, medical treatment and refuge.
Palestinian civil society and UN experts have sounded the alarm multiple times and reported cases of rape and sexual violence before and during this genocide. These reports continue to be deliberately and inexcusably ignored, including by prominent and otherwise vocal feminist organizations and figures.
The deafening silence of “Western” feminists and mainstream media in particular is deliberate and inexcusable, as opposed to their earlier outrage over Israeli allegations and misinformation, used to justify this genocide.
Many Palestinian women and girls who are survivors of rape and sexual violence are hesitant to come forward, due to the social stigma in a conservative society and the belief that Israel will not be held accountable for such crimes.
Israel is committing the most horrific war crimes, and weaponizing rape and sexual violence against Palestinians as part of its genocide in Gaza and assault on the Palestinian people as a whole, throughout all of Palestine. This is the result of decades of impunity, preferential treatment and lack of international accountability by the international community. Words are not enough to describe or stop this horror; action is needed.
We conclude this SOS appeal by reminding our sisters and allies around the world that our rights, our dignity, and our humanity are indivisible. Forsaking Palestinian victims now for political convenience would be an unforgivable betrayal to decades of sacrifice and feminist struggle.
We call for:
- The international community must employ all available tools of international accountability, including political and economic sanctions, to bring an immediate and lasting ceasefire and provision of unconditional humanitarian aid.
- States must immediately impose an arms embargo on Israel and honor their moral and legal obligations, including those pronounced in the Genocide Convention.
- States need to investigate and prosecute Israeli soldiers with dual citizenship implicated in these atrocities.
- The Special Representative of the Secretary General on Sexual Violence in Conflict must honor her mandate and launch an immediate investigation into the ongoing atrocities.
- Feminists around the world must sound the alarm globally on the unspeakable human rights violations taking place in Gaza, namely the sexual abuse and rape of Palestinian women and girls.
- Journalists and media outlets must do their due diligence in reporting on these stories through fair and unbiased coverage.
Signatories:
- American Federation of Ramallah Palestine
- Association of women’s Action
- AWMR Italia - Donne della Regione Mediterranea
- Bisan Center for Research and Development
- Community Development and Media Center
- Cultura è libertà una campagna per la Palestina
- Enjaz Foundation for development
- Filastiniyat
- Human Rights and Democracy Media Center SHAMS
- Institute of Women's Studies
- Not to forget women society
- Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA)
- Palestinian Women's Action committee
- Rete Femminista Marche Molto+di194
- Rural Women Development Society
- Sinal do Vale
- Singola
- Teaching Palestine: Pedagogical Praxis and the Indivisibility of Justice
- The center for defense of liberties and civil rights “Hurryyat”
- The Palestinian Initiative for the Promotion of Global Dialogue and Democracy - MIFTAH
- The Palestinian Working Woman Society for Development-PWWSD
- The Regional Coalition for Women Human Rights Defenders in Southwest Asia and North Africa (WHRDMENA)
- Union of Palestinian Women Committees
- Wattan media network
- Women Media and Development
- Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
- رابطة المرأة العراقية
- شبكة المستقبل الديمقراطية العراقية
Where are the rights of Palestinian Women on International Women’s Day?
Date posted: March 07, 2024
By Palestinian NGO Forum to Combat Violence against Women
We, at the Palestinian NGO Forum to Combat Violence against Women and all Arab women’s and rights organizations raise our voices loud and clear on the eve of March 8, to say: “Stop the onslaught and crimes against women and children in Gaza. Stop the crime of genocide, the crime of starvation and forced displacement”. So far, this aggression has resulted in the killing of 31,000 Palestinians, over 70% of whom are women and children. Two women are killed every hour , in addition to many others still under the rubble. There are women whose fate is unknown, after being taken away by occupation forces.
Who will restore normalcy for us Palestinian women after these atrocities?
We have always held activities on March 8. We had a long list of rights we demanded and others we were able to achieve. However today, as the women of Gaza are being annihilated, we stand the length and breadth of our homeland and our Arab nations, angry, in a state of revolution and in deep mourning. Our demand today is to halt the genocide in the Gaza Strip and to halt the reproductive genocide against our women. We declare this day the day of Palestinian women, as they stand hungry in long queues, waiting for insufficient aid, terrified of the skies above them, filled with missiles of death. This is for the women whose bodies are exhausted, in camps for the displaced and in shelter centers, for those raped in prison and for their naked bodies stripped at checkpoints. It is for the menstruating women who cannot find sanitary products and for those with high-risk pregnancies who are starving, displaced and bombed. It is for the women whose wombs may be removed for the simplest of medical complications and those whose privacy has been violated because of overcrowded tents and displacement. It is for the mothers who could die at any moment and for all women whose Palestinianism has crucified humanity at the altar, amid deafening Arab silence, boundless American support and the complicity of several European countries.
Nevertheless, we continue to appreciate all forms of Arab and international support and solidarity with the Palestinian cause, which shows respect for our people’s dignity. Widening this solidarity will further reaffirm the justness of our cause. Hence, we await more action and movements in solidarity of our right to demand an immediate end to the genocide in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and Jerusalem, to forge our way forward towards freedom, self-determination and the establishment of an independent and fully-sovereign Palestinian state.
Today, we Palestinian and Arab women, reaffirm the following on March 8 and every day forward:
- To put pressure on Israel to immediately halt its aggression and to hold its leaders accountable for their crimes in violation of international law, the Fourth Geneva Convention and all international laws and treaties, towards delegitimizing this occupying entity.
- To open the Rafah Crossing and all crossings to allow aid in and the wounded out for treatment
- To dismantle the land corridor linking Israel with some Arab countries supplying it with goods
Long Live Palestinian Women, who stand steadfast and resistant in the face of the Zionist aggression We speak in the voices of Gaza’s women and say:
Halt the genocide…halt the onslaught immediately!
