Entering and Remaking Spaces: Young Palestinian Feminists in Jerusalem

On January 10, 2016, I conducted a lively one-hour group interview in a bookshop and café in Jerusalem with five Palestinian women activists in Lajnat al-Shabat, or the Young Women’s Committee of the Jerusalem District, which is affiliated with the Union of Palestinian Women’s Committees and is widely known for its energy and creative activities in Jerusalem despite its recent establishment. The women ranged from twenty-four to twenty-seven years of age, and all but one were single. Four of the five women worked in day jobs not connected to their activism, and one was unemployed. The core group comprises eight women and thirty to thirty-five “regulars” attend events and trainings.

I had met most of the women on January 7 at an evening sit-in held in a tent outside the East Jerusalem office of the Red Cross. Earlier that month two young male Palestinian activists had sought refuge in the Red Cross office, violating an Israeli restraining order based on the 1945 British Mandate Defence (Emergency) Regulations that barred them from Jerusalem,where they live. Israeli forces arrested the men at the Red Cross on January 6 (Hasson 2016). The January 7 sit-in was organized by members of the Young Women’s Committee, who invited family and friends of the young men to share their accounts, stories, and jokes during the event.

In the January 10 interview I asked the women about their priorities, their primary challenges, their ideological orientations, their views on men’s involvement and gender issues, and the impact of class differences on their work. Participants included Shahd Yaseen and her sister Yasmine Yaseen, both from Silwan; Ilham Shaheen from the Old City; Naheel Bazbazat from Wadi Joz; and ʿAhd Abu Khdair from the village of Shuʿfat. Ruba ʿOdeh could not attend the meeting but offered her insights later. For safety I have removed identities from quoted statements, which were edited. I consolidated statements when it was difficult to distinguish different voices in an argument or discussion on the audio recording. Suzan ʿAbdi translated and transcribed the interview. Before finalizing this account in August 2016, I shared it with members of the group for elaboration, fact-checking, and clarification.

Overall, a combination of direct Israeli control over most Palestinian institutions in the city, an active Jewish settler movement, and social conservatism make life more restrictive in Palestinian Jerusalem than in Ramallah and other West Bank cities. The women activists interviewed balance activism determined by emerging priorities in the community with work that transforms restrictive gender norms and practices. They allow and encourage girls and women in different parts of the community to determine their own priorities and cultivate their voices in response to local challenges. The activists illuminated tensions between men and women activists and noted how persistent crises make it difficult to make progress on longterm goals. Finally, they discussed tensions among Palestinian girls and women in Jerusalem, which they understood to be primarily linked to various family-based restrictions.

Foundations, Strategies, and Priorities

The Young Women’s Committee of Jerusalem was the brainchild of three Palestinian women from the city who call themselves Qudsiyyat. They established the committee during a three-day workshop in November 2013 under the guidance of the late Maha Nassar of the Union of Palestinian Women’s Committees in the village of Jifna (near Ramallah). They wanted to “try something different” to address generational tensions among Palestinian feminist activists. They were also motivated by a desire to support other young activists in Jerusalem,whose isolation from Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip had been reinforced by Israeli checkpoints and walls.

While only a few kilometers separate the center of Jerusalem from Ramallah and Bethlehem, crossing the border zones through authorized pathways is a timeconsuming and exhausting feat for Palestinians. Direct Israeli control means that Palestinian life is worse in Jerusalem than it is in most Palestinian cities in the West Bank. Because Palestinians fear violence by Jewish settlers and Israeli police, most Palestinian businesses in and near the Old City of Jerusalem close...