Search All

Palestinian women’s political participation is marked by the Israeli occupation and a volatile political situation. This chapter argues that the political chaos following the Oslo Agreement of 1993 has led to civil society fragmentation and the marginalisation of certain groups. However, women’s traditional involvement within the Palestinian national movement led to their assumption that society would adopt a non-gender biased perspective during elections. …

This paper examines the model of ethnographic framing of the self/other relationship, and how this framing contributes to de-essentialising the theorising of women's agency and subjectivity. The paper reflects on my own PhD field research experience conducted during 2007–2008 in the Gaza Strip. In a situation where the researcher and the research subject share the spatial history, as well as the multiple positionalities in their life cycle, the researcher's self inevitably becomes a subject of the ethnography. The analysis in this paper transcends the simplicity of the interactive relations between ‘researchers’ and ‘researched’. …

This case study examines the role of women in local councils in Palestine. It asks how in a context of continued occupation where most of the governance system is paralysed can women wield any real political power? …

Islah Jad's research examined the role of the newly elected local councils in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, elected in 2005-2006. The Islamic Resistance Movement - HAMAS - participated in this election for the first time and was supported by large numbers of women.  …

This pack of 20 vibrantly drawn cards provides a clear and very accessible entry into some of Pathways’ research findings and recommendations. The cards feature research from Bangladesh, Brazil, Egypt, Ghana, Pakistan, Palestine, and Sierra Leone, across the four Pathways themes of: conceptualising empowerment, empowering work, building constituencies and changing narratives of sexuality.  …

In this article for ‘the Commune’, Aitemad Muhanna from the Pathways Middle East Hub tracks the decline of the leftist movement in Palestinian society and how the rise of support for Hamas affected notions of gender in the Palestinian camps. …