In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

7. The Debate on Islamism and Secularism The Case of Palestinian Women’s Movements Islah Jad The “Ideal Woman”: Between Secularism and Islamism Conflict over the construction of gender and the ideal woman is not a neutral or primarily religious concern. nationalists and Islamists alike seek to establish an ideal society that depends on a particular conception of womanhood .1 The difference between the two conceptions is that religious or Islamist groups seek to restore a mythical age in which women were guardians of tradition,2 whereas the nationalists tout the fertile, modest peasant as their epitome of the feminine. In both cases, the ideal woman embodies a past when “traditional family and moral values [built] ‘our nation.’”3 despite the similarities between them, the Islamist ideal woman is opposed to the “modern” ideal woman constructed by the secular nationalist discourse.4 While nationalists consider the society Islamists strive to build as reactionary and antimodern,5 Islamists view secularism as an unwanted colonial imposition, a worldview that gives precedence to the material over the spiritual, to a modern culture of alienation and unrestrained hedonism. The nationalists counter that secularism is central to universal humanism, a rational principle that calls for the suppression or restraint of religious passion so that intolerance and delusion can be controlled, and political unity, peace, and progress secured.6 In this essay, I aim to problematize the dichotomy that frames secularism and Islamism as opposing ideologies. By focusing on the Women’s ac- The Debate on Islamism and Secularism 143 tion department in the Khalas, or Islamic national salvation Party (InsP), which was announced in 1995 as the political and legal party of Hamas, I examine the formal gender ideology of Hamas and how it is reconstructed, renarrated , and practiced by Islamist women. I argue that this ideology largely stems not from religious texts, but from accommodations to contending positions. The “traditions” that the Islamists, like the modernist nationalists, seek to revive are “invented” and modern constructs.7 Furthermore, Hamas has generally become more like the nationalists by acquiring the political mission of national independence formerly dominated by Fatah, while Palestinian secularism, for its part, has historically invoked Islam as a means to propagate its legitimacy.8 Indeed, neither Islam nor nationalism is a fixed idiom, and the Islamist challenge to the Palestinian national movement is, to a great extent, a product of the failure of the secularists to deliver on their promises of independence and state building. as such, Hamas has identified itself with the struggle to gain Palestinian national rights. yet one can travel further back in time to encounter the links between Islamism and secularism. Some Definitional Issues: Who Are Islamist Women? I am reserving the term “Islamist women” for those who belong to the Islamic movement and who are actively engaged through their activism in the public sphere in promoting what Keddie has called an “Islamic state that would enforce at least some Islamic laws and customs.”9 The different forms of Islamic dress signal the heterogeneity of the Islamist groups and their political projects in the Palestinian context. Hamas advocates the gradual Islamic re-education of the masses through da"wa (proselytizing), until the masses themselves call for an Islamic government. The Islamic jihad and Liberation Party (Hizb al-tahrir) encourages the forceful seizure of state power as the main instrument of re-Islamization of the state and society.10 However, all are united and agree on some form of Islamization, defined here as increasing Islamic consciousness and practice, of people and government (Islamization here refers to increasing Islamic consciousness and practice). These processes range from giving classes in mosques, universities , and homes to demanding the application of the shari"a through various institutions.11 This movement has developed against and in relation to secular nationalism. 8.114.94] Project MUSE (2024-04-24 02:37 GMT) 144 islah jad The Shifting Nature of Palestinian Secularism: History and Theory Hajj amin al-Husseini, the leader of the national movement during the British Mandate, and shaykh "Izz al-din al-Qassam, a political exile from syria and the head of the arab Higher Committee (the national leadership for the Palestinian people during the 1930s and 1940s), were also religious authorities . The arab Higher Committee’s ideology, however, was nationalist and secularist in the sense that it aimed to establish an independent Palestinian state that would include arabs and jews. It was also driven by a strong desire to modernize society and spread...

Share