This comprehensive study, the first of its kind, shows, among other things, that customs and traditions, the patriarchal mindset, and women's lack of economic independence are considered by the community to be the most significant factors hindering gender equality.
A comprehensive study examining the views of the Palestinian community in Israel on the issues and rights of Palestinian women in the country and exploring the obstacles preventing significant change in their status and enjoyment of their rights, the results of which were recently published, shows that it is a complex community with varying and diverse viewpoints regarding the evaluation of women's status, their social role, the nature of gender relations, the best methods for improving their status, and the perception of methods of social control.
It became clear that attitudes toward women's rights are influenced by several unrelated factors such as educational level, geographical affiliation, economic status, and the respondent's gender. The quantitative research also revealed statistically significant differences indicating that attitudes toward women's rights are positively affected by higher levels of education and higher per capita income. The study also revealed more accepting and positive attitudes toward women's rights among residents of the north compared to the south and center, in addition to statistical and qualitative differences favoring more liberal attitudes among female participants compared to males.
Ghada Abu Jaber-Najm, the research supervisor, pointed out that the diversity of attitudes indicated by the results refutes the stereotypical view presented by research conducted by a number of Israeli researchers on the status of Palestinian women in Israel. This research presented an unrealistic picture of local Palestinian society, portraying it as characterized by a single, monolithic set of views and behaviors. She added that one of the most important findings of the research is that the majority of respondents believe that many changes have occurred in various aspects related to women's issues in recent decades, such as the increase in the number of educated and working women, and they expressed a high degree of satisfaction with these changes. However, the main differences among the respondents lie in their evaluation of these changes. Some consider them to reflect a fundamental improvement in women's status in general, while others consider them merely quantitative changes that do not affect the core of patriarchal power structures over women in society.
This research was initiated by the "Women Against Violence" association as part of the "Women's Rights" project. The research was prepared by Dr. Hanida Ghanem, while the survey was conducted by Nihad Ali from Ibn Khaldoun – Arab Society for Research and Development. The research was supervised and implemented by Ghada Abu Jaber-Najm, Director of the Women's Rights Project. The results of this research will be presented and discussed in a series of workshops organized by the project in the coming months.
Abu Jaber-Najm states that the importance of this research lies in its being the first of its kind in the country to explore societal perspectives on women's issues and to assess the general status of women within the community. This research is also distinguished by its attempt to identify the issues that society considers priorities for change in women's status and the means preferred by society to achieve this change. In this context, the research results form a fundamental basis for the Women's Rights Project in selecting a number of specific issues affecting women's status, which the project will address through a broad media campaign and advocacy activities to influence decision-makers and ensure the availability of policies and programs that meet the needs of the community.
Aida Touma-Suleiman, Director General of the Women Against Violence Association, says that the transformation the association has undergone in recent years—from an organization focused on providing services to victims of violence to one striving for comprehensive changes in the status of women—necessitated this study. The aim is to understand the full spectrum of women's issues as perceived and assessed by the Palestinian public in Israel. The association will then analyze these issues and develop its future plans and strategies accordingly, ensuring that its priorities and strategies are grounded in local perspectives and a holistic vision that integrates women's needs with the community's response to them.
Research Outlines and Key Findings
The research employed methodologies that included:
- Discussions in nine focus groups, each comprising 8-14 participants. These groups included politicians, religious figures, legal professionals, social workers, education specialists, factory workers, journalists, housewives, activists from women's and feminist organizations, and high school and university students.
- 36 open interviews with men and women from diverse social backgrounds, including Knesset members, religious figures representing the three denominations, activists in political and feminist civil society, academics, university students, self-employed professionals, workers, and housewives.
- A comprehensive national survey of 1,200 people aged 18 and over from approximately 30 Arab and mixed towns and villages. Several variables were considered when selecting residential areas, including geographic location, religious composition, size of the town, its proximity to non-Arab residential areas, and the town's socioeconomic status.
Specific Findings
Regarding attitudes towards the specific issues addressed in the research, the findings were as follows:
Conditional Rights: The research results showed that society is broadly willing to recognize women's specific rights, such as the right to education, work, and protection from violence. However, it remains unwilling to accept these rights without conditioning them on a set of demands that restrict their exercise, limit their implementation, and ultimately thwart them in many cases. Responses also frequently varied according to the respondent's gender, geographical location, and educational level. The most educated group and women were more likely to adopt positive attitudes towards women's rights.
Positive attitudes towards women's rights to education, work, and protection from assault and violence do not mean that Palestinian society in Israel has overcome all obstacles and beliefs related to gender roles. On the contrary, the research revealed the deep-rooted nature of a large set of social values and beliefs that are at the heart of depriving women of their full humanity or the enjoyment of their rights. The research showed that concepts related to behaviors such as honor, reputation, and dignity remain fundamental, enjoying strong support and considered inviolable red lines. Therefore, understanding societal acceptance of women's rights can only be grasped within the context of the established patriarchal ideology, not outside of it. It is a reformist and conciliatory approach within patriarchal boundaries, not against them. This is evident in the almost unanimous positive stance on women's right to education, contrasted with the division regarding granting them complete freedom.
Education is accepted, but it's a conditional right!
The research reveals that women's education is among the most agreed upon and enthusiastically supported rights. Over 95% of respondents expressed the necessity of granting women equality or full equality in education. Discussions held in focus groups and interviews indicated that education is considered a "weapon" for women, protecting them from the vicissitudes of time and guaranteeing them a respectable job that provides a future livelihood. These discussions also revealed that education is a conditional right, contingent upon girls maintaining "acceptable behavior" at university and returning home daily.
Work is acceptable provided it doesn't infringe upon traditional roles.
Women's right to work has gained significant legitimacy, with 82.6% of survey participants expressing their agreement with this right. Furthermore, 77.8% of respondents strongly agreed or agreed that married women working contributes to improving the family's situation. Some even considered women's employment a key to change that will lead to a transformation in the cultural and social values that discriminate against them. As with education, the initial acceptance of women's right to work, while seemingly unconditional, remains contingent upon a set of factors not always related to women or society, but rather to the state. These factors include providing nearby workplaces, childcare facilities, good working conditions, and even organized transportation to workplaces if they are located far away. Women's work is acceptable as long as it doesn't challenge the structural gender norms of the workplace. Jobs like truck driving or working in commerce and company management remain unsuitable for women. 84.7% of respondents considered driving public buses more suitable for men, and 48.9% considered company management more suitable for men, compared to only 1% who considered it more suitable for women. Women excelled in jobs and professions that don't require managerial or decision-making skills, such as working in garment factories and canning (39.4%). Teaching was considered more suitable for women (11.2%) than for men (5.7%), with 83% considering it equally suitable for both genders. 21.8% of survey participants considered nursing more suitable for women (21.8%) than for men (8.3%), while 69.7% considered it suitable for both genders.
Interviews and focus groups revealed that women working in freelance professions with unconventional hours, such as journalism or politics, face social pressures that stem from feelings of inadequacy in their primary role as mothers and homemakers. Furthermore, accepting domestic work outside the home does not automatically translate into a redistribution of roles. Tasks like cooking and cleaning are still often perceived as women's work, even when a woman is employed. This effectively means that a woman who works outside the home faces a double burden, as she is also a working woman in addition to being a homemaker.
Violence against women is an undesirable phenomenon, yet it is considered "legitimate"!
The research showed that the stance on violence against women is confused, indecisive, and even contradictory. On the one hand, 93.8% of respondents considered it important to address violence against girls and women, including physical and verbal abuse, as a social problem. More than 79% of respondents expressed understanding for a woman experiencing violence from her husband to seek a divorce. However, on the other hand, this stance contradicts the acceptance of violence against women in many other situations (such as if she fails to fulfill her domestic duties and raise children). Similarly, regarding honor killings, approximately 40% of respondents expressed understanding for murder committed in the name of "family honor," and 58.8% considered forcing a woman to have sexual relations with her husband not to be rape.
Confronting Violence
Opinions were divided regarding the methods women can use to deal with violence. Seeking help from family or a respected figure was the most supported approach (87.9%), while leaving home was the least supported (22.3%). Many respondents emphasized the importance of a gradual approach to addressing violence against women, clearly indicating that going to the police should be the last resort. However, the study revealed a disparity in support for the methods to be used in cases of physical versus sexual violence. Contrary to the reluctance respondents expressed to go to the police in cases of physical violence, they supported police intervention if a girl was sexually assaulted by a relative (53.6%), with a significant increase in support if the perpetrator was outside the family circle (70.9%).
Political activism is acceptable... as long as it doesn't threaten male dominance! 45.4% of survey participants agreed or strongly agreed with the necessity of keeping political leadership in the hands of men, even though 73.2% expressed their willingness to vote for a list headed by a woman. 85.2% of participants believed that allocating a certain number of guaranteed seats for women on each political list or party is a way to increase women's participation in local and national politics. Meanwhile, 37.5% considered women's threats to boycott elections a successful method, the least supported approach for increasing women's political representation.
In this context, the study's author, Dr. Hunaida Ghanem, stated: "Allocating a number of guaranteed seats for women within lists headed by men effectively means integrating women's activism into the existing system. However, a radical shift in the form of political leadership from male-dominated to a shared leadership of men and women is a different matter entirely, one that lies at the heart of the transition to an egalitarian, rather than patriarchal, society." She added: "The willingness to accept women's rights remains as long as these rights do not change male dominance."
Factors Negatively Affecting Women's Status
Research showed that society views customs and traditions (47.1%), the male mindset (47.7%), and women's lack of economic independence (37.1%) as the most significant obstacles to gender equality.
In other words, members of society consider customs and traditions the most important factors affecting women's status, while they viewed religious values (31.1%) and biological differences (32%) as less important factors. This means that society understands that the problem does not lie in the biological makeup of women, as traditional and Salafist thinkers suggest, nor in religious values, as some claim, but rather in culture, with its values and customs, and in the male mindset that is shaped by that culture. However, this recognition does not imply a rejection of this culture. This is clearly demonstrated in the positions expressed in focus groups and in-depth interviews, where the emphasis was on the importance of respecting culture on the one hand, and the necessity of adhering to its red lines on the other. This was expressed through stressing the unique nature of Arab culture in terms of its focus on honor, reputation, and behavioral discipline, and how this distinguishes it from other cultures.
State Policies
If we compare the initial societal acceptance of women working in research with the reality of women's employment, it becomes clear that a set of structural political factors does not consider Palestinian women a legitimate target in its programs. Palestinian women, as members of an oppressed minority, are primarily affected by the state's repressive policies and its unjust practices against the rights of this minority.
Arab women in Israel not only face the social legacy that treats them as inferior to men and necessitates monitoring their behavior and ensuring they do not deviate from their assigned gender role, but they also face the consequences of belonging to an oppressed Palestinian minority. They are denied work because the state does not create job opportunities in their country, and they are at risk of being denied education because they live in an unrecognized village that lacks a school, or even a book. Education, as an accepted right that enjoys fundamental importance from society, is not available to all women, which means depriving them of the opportunity for a serious transformation in the course of their lives. The state's reluctance to create job opportunities, its blatant interference in preventing the recognition of some villages, and its efforts to impoverish them of institutions, practically postpone opportunities to change the status of women and contribute to the spread of the phenomenon of early marriage. A woman who lives in the absence of educational opportunities finds herself confined between the choice of marriage or waiting for marriage. The absence of the state in this case is not passive but active, through the confiscation of opportunities to change women's social status. Denying women education is an active intervention aimed at blocking their path to higher education and pushing them towards early marriage. This active absence of the state perpetuates a cycle of women's oppression and reinforces factors that entrench their inferiority.
Women's Associations
Regarding women's associations and community awareness of available services to assist victims of violence, participants in focus groups and in-depth interviews proposed a range of suggestions that could contribute to improving the professional performance of women's centers and associations. These suggestions ranged from specific to structural. Specific suggestions included the need to raise community awareness among both genders. Some also suggested the necessity of conducting educational courses for men on women's rights, strengthening women's education, opening nurseries, and providing employment opportunities. On the structural side, participants emphasized the need for women's associations to distinguish between practical and strategic goals, and between feminist and women's goals, and to define a strategic vision for feminist movements and a division of labor between associations and centers. The survey showed that 62.6% of participants were aware of the existence of women's associations, while 53.8% indicated that these
