Beating a woman denies her right to live as a human being
By Maysa Basharat
Palestinian society is described as a society with its own customs and traditions, such as protection, care and social solidarity, and it has religious customs and values that require a man to respect and protect a woman, whether she is a mother, a sister, a wife or a daughter…
These customs and values would have guaranteed women some protection and respect, but our society, like the rest of the world's societies, gave men a privileged place and made them feel superior, which made them look at women with a view of inferiority and permitted abusing them psychologically, socially, physically and even sexually, placing the blame on her as the victim for what happens to her and blaming her for this violence, exploiting those same customs and traditions to silence her and force her to accept this difficult situation in the name of the children, of shame, of reputation and of customs and traditions.
The shadow of a man rather than the shadow of a wall
In the past women used to say: the shadow of a man rather than the shadow of a wall, because a man's shadow in those days meant love, respect and an oasis of safety in which a woman sheltered, and a man was a homeland, a belonging and a refuge.
But today it seems the situation has changed with many men, so that a man means to a woman fear, domination, harshness and tyranny.
Umm Ahmed, 37, from one of the villages south of the city of Nablus, with a face on which time has drawn its traces, says: "Not a day of our married life passes without my husband beating me, whether we are alone or in front of the children, with cause or without cause or for the most trivial reasons. He comes home angry and vents his temper on me." She adds: "My children and I have come to see him as an ogre coming home to eat one of us. When he enters the house no one breathes; we hold our breath so that he does not hear a sound from any of us, otherwise he comes and rains blows on me." She goes on: "I have never thought of reporting him, knowing that the law sides with the man against the woman. Then if I wanted to complain against him in court, everyone would find fault with me and blame me because of the prevailing customs and traditions, for the good woman is the one who is patient with her husband and endures him. In addition there are my children: if I wanted to complain against him he would take the children from me and deprive me of seeing them, and they are my wealth, and for their sake I endure this humiliation, disgrace and beating."
Umm Ahmed goes on: "A man has the right to pronounce divorce on his wife for any reason and without any justification and without prior warning, and he also has the right to take her back during the waiting period without asking her permission or even telling her beforehand, and he has the right to insult her however he wishes, for the personal status law has not respected her humanity and has made her a servant to a merciless husband."
There are many like Umm Ahmed in our Palestinian society who are subjected to beating almost daily on flimsy pretexts and for the most trivial reasons, if a reason exists at all.
So how much of the man's shadow is left in this age, and is a man still that shadow that shelters us with compassion, mercy and humanity?
The occupation increases the intensity of violence
Faten Abu Zaarour, the social counsellor at An-Najah National University, says: "The wretched economic conditions and the pressures resulting from the occupation have made men more violent, for the loss of their ability to secure their family's life and to protect it from harm, coupled with rising rates of unemployment, poverty and humiliation at the hands of Israeli soldiers, has generated in many Palestinians a feeling of frustration and hopelessness. But this does not mean that if the occupation ended tomorrow, gender-based violence would cease to exist in Palestine, for the fact remains that the patriarchal factors rooted in Palestinian society lead to the continuation of gender-based violence."
Abu Zaarour goes on: "Violence against women denies them their right to live as human beings and their right to take decisions and to seize opportunities to fulfil themselves. Violence against women also works to marginalise their role, shakes their self-confidence, stands between them and effective participation in society, strips them of their humanity and strengthens the concepts of discrimination and male superiority."
Abu Zaarour attributes the reason women accept violence and do not disclose it to "their nature, which gives priority to family stability while avoiding clashes that may lead to divorce and to being deprived of caring for their children".
She adds: "The absence of family and social solidarity with a woman forces her to accept violence out of shame at facing accusations and fear of a law she does not know."
Does a husband have the right to dominate his wife and punish her with beating at the first mistake and for the most trivial reasons?
On this Dr. Alaa Maqbool, lecturer at the faculty of sharia at An-Najah National University, says: "Married life rests only on love and mercy, and a wife may not be punished for merely the first mistake she makes; rather there must be advice, counsel and reminding again and again. There is no doubt that a husband's beating of his wife is lawful, and beating is one of the means of discipline, but a husband may not begin by beating his wife straight away; he must first counsel her, and if the counsel benefits her, so much the better; and if counsel does not benefit her, he separates from her in bed; and if separation fails to bring her back to the right path, then he resorts to beating. What is meant by beating is not causing harm to the wife, such as breaking her teeth or disfiguring her face; rather what is meant by beating is putting the woman's situation right, and the beating is not severe. Likewise beating on the face and on sensitive parts of the body is not permitted. God Almighty says: 'And those from whom you fear disobedience, counsel them and forsake them in bed and strike them; but if they obey you, seek no means against them.' God the Great has spoken truly."
He adds: "The statement of the Qur'an that permits a man to strike a disobedient wife, which many insist on understanding wrongly in most cases, aims at preserving married life, protecting it and putting it right, as the preceding noble verse provides."
It is difficult to point to research and scientific statistics that reflect the rate and severity of the problem of violence against women in Palestinian society, but the social services such as helplines, social affairs offices, medical clinics, police stations and judicial records indicate that there are very difficult, numerous and repeated cases of various kinds of violence in which women suffer, whether physical, psychological or sexual violence, in the family, in the street or even in the workplace or in society as a whole.
