NEWS & ARTICLES

WOMEN’S RIGHTS ACTIVISM
Rights, citizenship, and Equality’s march took to the streets of Beirut
Sit-in against "fundamentalism and violence" in the center of Tunis
Petition to Algerian Government: Stop renewed attacks on women
Challenging decision to conduct virginity tests on girls inside Military prisons in Egypt

CALLS & STATEMENTS
A Call to Action from Indigenous and Women of Color Feminists in Palestine

GENDER & HUMAN RIGHTS
Roj Women lobbying on behalf of Kurdish women living in Turkey
Women of the Revolution
Violence against Women
Islamic Jurisprudence- Human Rights Norms

GENDER BASED VIOLENCE
In Sudan
Post-Split, Will North Sudan’s Women Be Left Behind?
In Lebanon
Hotchpotch of religious laws in Lebanon restricts basic rights
In Yemen
Women & Children Face Multiple Crises in Yemen
In Iran
Britain says Iran's government has recently arrested several female
UK condemns arrest of Iranian female activists
In Palestine
Palestinian Women cope with siege in Jordan Valley

… STEPS FORWARD
In Lebanon
Lebanese parliamentarian Committees study draft laws to help women in workplace 
In Tunisia
New Electoral Law Prescribes Gender Parity in Upcoming Constituent Assembly Elections in Tunisia

BOOKS & REPORTS

GENDER RIGHTS
Gender & Land Rights in Asia - Indigenous Women
Social Security for Social Justice
Women, Food Security & Peacebuilding
Will an Arab Spring Bloom in Palestine?

Gender and Development e-Brief receives material from various sources for its publication. Should you wish to refer to these sources/ sites directly, the list includes publications from: AVIVA, www.aviva.org, AWID: www.awid.org, Democracy Digest: www.freedomhouse.org, Development Gateway: www.developmentgatway.org, Dignity: www.dignity.org, e-Civicus: www.civicus.org, Eldis: www.eldis.org, ESCWA: www.escwa.org.lb, GDB: www.developmentex.com, Global Knowledge Partnership: www.globalknowledge.org, IGTN: www.IGTN.org, ILO: www.ilo.org One World: www.oneworld.net, Siyanda: www.siyanda.org, The Daily Star: www.dailystar.com.lb, The Drum Beat: www.comminit.com, The Soul Beat: www.comminit.com, The World Bank: www.worldbank.org, UNDP: www.undp.org, Wicejilist: www.wicej.addr.com, WLP: www.learningpartnership.org; WIDE: www.wide-network.org; IRIN News: www.irinnews.org, Women’s UN Report Network: www.wunrn.com, Women Living Under Muslim Laws: www.wluml.org

NEWS & ARTICLES
WOMEN’S RIGHTS ACTIVISM
Rights, citizenship, and Equality’s march took to the streets of Beirut
The Nationality is a Right for me and my Family Campaign mobilized women, and human rights activists from the civil society along with Lebanese women married to non-nationals, to the march “Rights, citizenship, and Equality” that took place Wednesday 27 of July 2011.
A law petition for a just and egalitarian law for the nationality was delivered, at the end of the march, to the Cabinet.
For more information about the campaign, the March and the pictures please follow the link http://nationalitycampaign.wordpress.com/

Sit-in against "fundamentalism and violence" in the center of Tunis
Dozens of people participated in a sit-in in the center of Tunis to warn against "fundamentalism, extremism and violence", AFP noted. Gathered on the steps of the City Theatre, the participants came following calls on social networks, waving placards saying "no to violence, yes to tolerance," "against any religious extremism", "No to Algeria of the 90s." For more information please follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7414

Petition to Algerian Government: Stop renewed attacks on women
Two more ’punitive’ actions against women have taken place in less than one month in the southern city of M’sila, Algeria (night of June 11 and July 2-3, 2011). Their houses were burnt down by hundreds of youth, and they barely escaped being lynched. The police did not intervene. This is not the first time similar events take place (see background information below). Since the 80s, there were not just attacks on individual women but real pogroms against working women, living with or without their children, but definitely without the male guardians (wali) that the Family Code still prescribes for women. To read the entire article please follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7420

Challenging decision to conduct virginity tests on girls inside military prisons in Egypt
No for Military Trials group, El Nadeem Center for Rehabilitation, the , Nazra for Feminist Studies, New Women Foundation and Hisham Mubarak Law Center filed a law suit before of the Administrative Court against the Commander in Chief of the Military Forces and the Minister of Defense and others appealing the decision of forcing women to examine their virginity in military prisons and detention places for Armed Forces. To read the entire article follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7437

CALLS & STATEMENTS
A Call to Action from Indigenous and Women of Color Feminists in Palestine
Between June 14 and June 23, 2011, a delegation of 11 scholars, activists, and artists visited occupied Palestine. As indigenous and women of color feminists involved in multiple social justice struggles, we sought to affirm our association with the growing international movement for a free Palestine. We wanted to see for ourselves the conditions under which Palestinian people live and struggle against what we can now confidently name as the Israeli project of apartheid and ethnic cleansing. Each and every one of us—including those members of our delegation who grew up in the Jim Crow South, in apartheid South Africa, and on Indian reservations in the U.S.—was shocked by what we saw. In this statement we describe some of our experiences and issue an urgent call to others who share our commitment to racial justice, equality, and freedom. For more information please follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7422

GENDER & HUMAN RIGHTS
Roj Women lobbying on behalf of Kurdish women living in Turkey
Roj Women’s Association has just published its last Annual Activities Report that maps out the organization’s campaigning and community work from April 2010 until March 2011. Field research in Kurdish regions of the world, community research among the Kurdish Diaspora, lobbying meetings at British, European and United Nations forums, grassroots groups capacity-building, seminars for university students and communities, to mention a few, are the activities that materialize a wider strategy that seeks to improve the lives of women in Kurdish regions and communities of the world. For more information please follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7395
Women of the Revolution
The enormous role of women in the uprisings in the MENA region is undisputed. They faced verbal and physical abuse, violence, arrest and death just as their male counterparts. The transformation of these countries has been groundbreaking, and their participation is as important as ever. After the dust of the battle settles, will Arab societies remember to include women in the rebuilding of their countries? For more information please follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7424

Violence Against Women
 Prevention of violence against women was the focus of a discussion on women’s human rights held last month at the UN in Geneva in the framework of the 17th session of the UN Human Rights Council.
“In the struggle to eradicate violence against women, we should all task ourselves to be leading voices and engines of action,” said UN Human Rights chief Navi Pillay.
“One third of women in the world have experienced or will experience some form of violence in their lives,” Pillay said. “In some contexts up to 60 per cent of women experience physical violence at least once in their lifetime,” she added.
She explained that the prevalence of violence against women was so high that no State had or would have the means to deal with the extent of the violations and the number of victims. For more information please follow this link http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/PreventionViolenceAgainstWomen....

Islamic Jurisprudence- Human Rights Norms
The concept of nondiscrimination and equal rights for both men and women in all spheres of their lives as enshrined in the CEDAW Convention (1979) and all other Human Rights Frameworks generated a new realization and discourse in the Islamic world. The Universal Declaration on human Rights (1948) states in Article one that ‘all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights’. By ratification of these International human rights frameworks States parties are in obligation to domesticate these human rights standard in their own legal system. At present about 187 states parties have ratified the CEDAW convention which is almost a universal ratification for the Convention. Except Iran, Sudan and Somalia all other Muslim countries have ratified or acceded to the CEDAW convention. Many of these  Muslim  countries  imposed reservations under Article 28 of the convention on certain core Articles, such as Article 2, 16, 9 etc of the convention in the name of Islamic Sharia law. To know more about those countries please follow the link: http://www.wunrn.com/news/2011/07_11/07_11/071111_islamic.htm

GENDER BASED VIOLENCE
In Sudan
Post-Split, Will North Sudan’s Women Be Left Behind?
The establishment of the Republic of South Sudan came with high hopes that it might improve the lives of women there. But women’s rights activists in the country left behind–the mostly Muslim Sudan–are bracing for a battle against an escalation of Islamic fundamentalist law. Following South Sudan’s independence, its neighbor to the north, Sudan, is left in the hands of the widely-acknowledged-to-be-corrupt National Congress Party. President Omar al-Bashir, who took power in a 1989 military coup, was criticized for introducing Sharia law (based upon patriarchal interpretations of the Koran) in 1991, in a move that was opposed by the country’s Christian and Animist population. To read the entire article please follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7450 

In Lebanon
Hotchpotch of religious laws in Lebanon  restricts basic rights
The demand for equal religious, gender and other treatment for all Lebanese citizens has gained pace with some saying the time has come to review laws that confer inequality, especially on women. “As a women, I am not equal to my brother, husband or male friend," Rita Chemaly, a researcher and women’s activist in the capital Beirut, said. "My state doesn’t guarantee my rights. The constitution says that all Lebanese are equal, yet the laws do not [guarantee this]." To read the entire article please follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7445

In Yemen
Women & Children Face Multiple Crises InYemen
Food insecurity is on the rise in parts of Yemen, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) reported today, adding that families are trying to cope by liquidating their assets, skipping meals and diverting funds from health care and education.
They were taking such desperate measures because the price of fuel in the black market has risen by 500 per cent since January 2011, WFP spokesperson Emilia Casella told a news briefing in Geneva. http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=39020&Cr=yemen&Cr1=

In Iran
UK condemns arrest of Iranian female activists
Britain says Iran's government has recently arrested several female activists as part of a campaign to stifle dissent. The U.K. Foreign Office named photographer Maryam Majd, filmmaker Mahnaz Mohammadi, journalist Zahra Yazdani and women's  rights advocate Maryam Bahrman as being among those who have been detained in the past weeks. http://www.wluml.org/node/7416
In Palestine
Palestinian Women cope with siege in Jordan Valley
Israeli military forces have demolished 27 houses in the Jordan Valley in the occupied West Bank over the last two weeks. More than 140 Palestinians have been rendered homeless by the demolitions, while Israeli settlement expansion continues to threaten more land and restrict water access — affecting the vitality of dozens of Palestinian villages in the area. According to the Jordan Valley Solidarity (JVS) campaign, an organi zation working with local communities, Israeli military and police jeeps and two bulldozers invaded the Bedouin community of al-Hadidya on 21 June. The bulldozers “demolished seven residential tents, 18 animal shelters and four kitchens, leaving 32 people homeless,” the group reports (“Big wave of demolitions in the Northern Jordan Valley,” 21 June 2011). For more information please follow the link http://www.wluml.org/node/7396

… STEPS FORWARD
In Lebanon
Lebanese parliamentarian Committee study draft laws to help women in workplace 
Parliamentary committees received three proposed draft laws on improving the condition of women in the workplace.
The first draft law calls for the amendment of article 28 and 29 of the Lebanse labor law to increase maternity leave from seven weeks to 10 weeks. The second bill seeks to boost the health benefits of women in public administrative jobs. The third seeks to amend the law governing social security so that women can cover their children under social security.
Contrary to other draft laws that focus on women and have caused controversy, such as the proposed law to protect women from domestic violence, the chances of the present bills being voted in are very good.
“There is no disagreement regarding these proposed laws as they are simply natural rights for women that had been delayed,” head of the human rights parliamentary committee MP Michel Moussa stated. to read the entire article please follow the link  http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Politics/2011/Jul-26/Committee-studies-...

In Tunis
New Electoral Law Prescribes Gender Parity In Upcoming Constituent Assembly Elections in Tunisia
On April 11, 2011 the Tunisian transitional authorities ruled on a gender parity law, requiring equal numbers of women and men as candidates in the upcoming Constituent Assembly  election. AWID interviewed Radhia Bel Hak Zekri, President of the Association of Tunisian Women for Research and Development (AFTURD), on the significance of this law for women and women’s rights in Tunisia. For more information http://www.wluml.org/node/7452

BOOKS & REPORTS
GENDER RIGHTS
Gender & Land Rights in Asia - Indigenous Women
The workshop was a collaborative effort of the Asian Indigenous Women’s Network (AIWN) and the Forest Peoples Programme (FPP). 29 participants from 10 countries in Asia and the Pacific met together for 2 days and shared case studies and experiences from their own communities and peoples. Direct Link to Full 26-Page 2010 Report:
http://www.forestpeoples.org/sites/fpp/files/publication/2011/02/gender-...

Social Security for Social Justice
In many parts of the world, social security coverage is limited, and only a minority of the population has access – both legally and in practice – to existing schemes. Also, in many places, the growing incidence of informal work led to stagnant or even declining rates of coverage. As a result, the great majority of the world population still lacks access to social security coverage. To read the entire article please follow the link below
 http://www.ilo.org/ilc/ILCSessions/100thSession/media-centre/articles/WCMS_156418/lang--en/index.htm
 
Women, Food Security & Peacebuilding
Is gender equality advocates' emphasis on women as agents of change helping to legitimize a neo-liberal vision of government, and working against women's engagement in promoting food security and peacebuilding, asks Rob Jenkins.
 That women’s engagement in resolving and recovering from conflict is crucial to sustainable peace has been an article of faith, and an element of international law, since the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1325 in 2000.  It took a decade of missed opportunities, however, for the UN to develop a systematic action plan for redeeming the promise of 1325. The September 2010 Report of the Secretary-General on Women's Participation in Peacebuilding contains a concrete set of commitments for UN actors working in post-conflict settings. http://www.opendemocracy.net/5050/rob-jenkins/women-food-security-and-pe...

Will an Arab Spring Bloom in Palestine?
This report is the first of a series to bring you the voices of Palestinians and Israelis during this time of dynamic confrontation. Hope and despair have taken turns in the Middle East through the Oslo Accords of 1993, two intifadas, the building of the separation wall, a blockade, the killing of more than 1300 Gazans in January 2009, and a financial upturn in Ramallah in the West Bank.
If you care and want hope, I encourage you to order read Sixty Years, Sixty Voices: Israeli and Palestinian Women, our Peace X Peace book of interviews, photos, and biographies.  You will hear from women from settlements to refugee camps and learn how they break stereotypes, heal their cultures, and live daily lives of courage. http://www.peacexpeace.org/2011/07/will-an-arab-spring-bloom-in palestine/?org=334&lvl=100&ite=274&lea=16012&ctr=0&par=1&org=334&lvl=100&ite=274&lea=16012&ctr=0&par=1