LONDON: Reforms came in quick succession across Middle East countries this summer, sparking renewed optimism in the women’s rights community after years of setbacks.
In July, Tunisia passed a landmark law criminalizing violence against women and soon afterward governments in Jordan and Lebanon abolished legal loopholes enabling rapists to escape punishment by marrying their victims.
In the Gulf, Saudi Arabia’s decisions to lift a longstanding ban on female drivers marked a turning point for women’s emancipation in one of the region’s most conservative countries.
For women’s rights activists, these reforms are a symbol of progress after decades of campaigns.
“It’s an indication that governments are changing their position toward women’s rights, albeit at a very moderate pace,” said Layla Naffa, director of projects at the Arab Women’s Organization in Jordan.
“After six years of closing the doors, a window of hope has opened and we will continue to fight the battle,” she said.
Speaking at a recent conference on violence against women in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, Sara Fallstrom, head of the international department at IM Swedish Development Partner, said while these “major steps forward” are to be celebrated, “legislation alone is not enough to end violence against women.”
In patriarchal societies where gender inequality is ingrained across all aspects of social, economic and political life, the greatest challenge comes with confronting cultural conceptions of women’s roles and responsibilities.
“The law has an important part to play in changing behaviors and attitudes, however, the law is not enough,” Elie Kayrouz, a Lebanese MP said.
The legal environment may criminalize certain forms of violence against women, but it does not eliminate these practices from people’s mindsets, he explained.
Even with the necessary laws in place, women face hurdles at every level when it comes to reporting violence. Fear of bringing shame on their family and community — potentially inciting further violence — is compounded by the frequent failure of authorities to take complaints of gender-based violence seriously.
“Shame culture and stigmatizing the victim is a very widely spread phenomenon which is preventing most victims from reporting or seeking help,” said Asma Khader, former minister of culture in Jordan and president of SIGI, a women’s rights NGO.
“It’s not enough to have a shelter or a policy slogan, you need to make sure that the people who are implementing the support services and upholding the laws really believe in the concepts behind them,” she added.
Discussing the comprehensive new Law on Eliminating Violence Against Women in Tunisia, Amal Amraoui from Chouf Organization, an NGO focusing on women’s issues, said the next step is to raise awareness among a population with limited knowledge of gender rights.
“It’s a law that can protect women against violence but now we have to work on explaining it to people.”
“Having this law doesn’t mean I can take a holiday now. We have to finish this.”
The new ruling, which criminalized all forms of violence against women, as well as introducing penalties for sexual harassment in public spaces and fines for wage discrimination, was greeted with cautious optimism by activists across the region.
“By enacting this new law, the Tunisian authorities have shown a commitment to the rights of women and are setting a standard that many others would do well to follow,” said Amna Guellali, Tunisia office director at Human Rights Watch.
“But other steps are needed for full equality. The government should now fund and support institutions to translate this law into genuine protection.”
Wafa Dikah Hamzeh, vice president of the National Commission for Lebanese Women and secretary general of the National Coalition Women for Politics, expressed hope that legal developments in Tunisia, Jordan and Lebanon would have a domino-effect across the region.
To date, only a handful of Arab countries have developed national strategies for tackling violence against women, including Jordan, Lebanon, Tunisia, Saudi Arabia and Morocco.
“In order to reach a comprehensive system of gender equality, we still have a lot to do,” Hamzeh said. “As long as there are discriminatory texts and legislation that consider women as second-degree citizens, there will always be violence.”
A big year for women in the Arab world
A big year for women in the Arab world
Gaza aid surge having an impact but challenges remain
- In final months before ceasefire, aid convoys were routinely looted by gangs, residents
- In central Gaza, residents say flow of aid has begun to take effect as prices normalize
JERUSALEM: Hundreds of truckloads of aid have entered Gaza since the Israel-Hamas ceasefire began last weekend, but its distribution inside the devastated territory remains an enormous challenge.
The destruction of the infrastructure that previously processed deliveries and the collapse of the structures that used to maintain law and order make the safe delivery of aid to the territory’s 2.4 million people a logistical and security nightmare.
In the final months before the ceasefire, the few aid convoys that managed to reach central and northern Gaza were routinely looted, either by desperate civilians or by criminal gangs.
Over the past week, UN officials have reported “minor incidents of looting” but they say they are hopeful that these will cease once the aid surge has worked its way through.
In Rafah, in the far south of Gaza, an AFP cameraman filmed two aid trucks passing down a dirt road lined with bombed out buildings.
At the first sight of the dust cloud kicked up by the convoy, residents began running after it.
Some jumped onto the truck’s rear platforms and cut through the packaging to reach the food parcels inside.
UN humanitarian coordinator for the Middle East Muhannad Hadi said: “It’s not organized crime. Some kids jump on some trucks trying to take food baskets.
“Hopefully, within a few days, this will all disappear, once the people of Gaza realize that we will have aid enough for everybody.”
central Gaza, residents said the aid surge was beginning to have an effect.
“Prices are affordable now,” said Hani Abu Al-Qambaz, a shopkeeper in Deir el-Balah. For 10 shekels ($2.80), “I can buy a bag of food for my son and I’m happy.”
The Gaza spokesperson of the Fatah movement of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said that while the humanitarian situation remained “alarming,” some food items had become available again.
The needs are enormous, though, particularly in the north, and it may take longer for the aid surge to have an impact in all parts of the territory.
In the hunger-stricken makeshift shelters set up in former schools, bombed-out houses and cemeteries, hundreds of thousands lack even plastic sheeting to protect themselves from winter rains and biting winds, aid workers say.
In northern Gaza, where Israel kept up a major operation right up to the eve of the ceasefire, tens of thousands had had no access to deliveries of food or drinking water for weeks before the ceasefire.
With Hamas’s leadership largely eliminated by Israel during the war, Gaza also lacks any political authority for aid agencies to work with.
In recent days, Hamas fighters have begun to resurface on Gaza’s streets. But the authority of the Islamist group which ruled the territory for nearly two decades has been severely dented, and no alternative administration is waiting in the wings.
That problem is likely to get worse over the coming week, as Israeli legislation targeting the lead UN aid agency in Gaza takes effect.
Despite repeated pleas from the international community for a rethink, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which has been coordinating aid deliveries into Gaza for decades, will be effectively barred from operating from Tuesday.
UNRWA spokesman Jonathan Fowler warned the effect would be “catastrophic” as other UN agencies lacked the staff and experience on the ground to replace it.
British Foreign Secretary David Lammy warned last week that the Israeli legislation risked undermining the fledgling ceasefire.
Brussels-based think tank the International Crisis Group said the Israeli legislation amounted to “robbing Gaza’s residents of their most capable aid provider, with no clear alternative.”
Israel claims that a dozen UNRWA employees were involved in the October 2023 attack by Hamas gunmen, which started the Gaza war.
A series of probes, including one led by France’s former foreign minister Catherine Colonna, found some “neutrality related issues” at UNRWA but stressed Israel had not provided evidence for its chief allegations.
Fighting in Sudan’s war sets ablaze the country’s largest oil refinery, satellite photos show
DUBAI: Fighting around Sudan ‘s largest oil refinery set the sprawling complex ablaze, satellite data analyzed by The Associated Press on Saturday shows, sending thick, black polluted smoke over the country’s capital.
The attacks around the refinery, owned by Sudan’s government and the state-run China National Petroleum Corp., represent the latest woe in a war between the rebel Rapid Support Force and Sudan’s military, who blamed each other for the blaze.
International mediation attempts and pressure tactics, including a US assessment that the RSF and its proxies are committing genocide, have not halted the fighting.
The Al-Jaili refinery sits some 60 kilometers (40 miles) north of Khartoum, the capital. The refinery has been subject to previous attacks as the RSF has claimed control of the facility since April 2023, as their forces had been guarding it. Local Sudanese media report the RSF also surrounded the refinery with fields of land mines to slow any advance.
But the facility, capable of handling 100,000 barrels of oil a day, remained broadly intact until Thursday.
An attack on Thursday at the oil field set fires across the complex, according to satellite data from NASA satellites that track wildfires worldwide.
Satellite images taken by Planet Labs PBC on Friday for the AP showed vast areas of the refinery ablaze. The images, shot just after 1200 GMT, showed flames shooting up into the sky in several spots. Oil tanks at the facility stood burned, covered in soot.
Thick plumes of black smoke towered over the site, carried south toward Khartoum by the wind. Exposure to that smoke can exacerbate respiratory problems and raise cancer risks.
In a statement released Thursday, the Sudanese military alleged the RSF was responsible for the fire at the refinery.
The RSF “deliberately set fire to the Khartoum refinery in Al-Jaili this morning in a desperate attempt to destroy the infrastructures of this country,” the statement read.
“This hateful behavior reveals the extent of the criminality and decadence of this militia ... (and) increases our determination to pursue it everywhere until we liberate every inch from their filth.”
The RSF for its part alleged Thursday night that Sudanese military aircraft dropped “barrel bombs” on the facility, “completely destroying it.” The RSF has claimed the Sudanese military uses old commercial cargo aircraft to drop barrel bombs, such as one that crashed under mysterious circumstances in October.
Neither the Sudanese military nor the RSF offered evidence to support their dueling allegations.
China, Sudan’s largest trading partner before the war, has not acknowledged the blaze at the refinery. The Chinese Foreign Ministry did not respond to a request for comment.
China moved into Sudan’s oil industry after Chevron Corp. left in 1992 amid violence targeting oil workers in another civil war. South Sudan broke away to become its own country in 2011, taking 75 percent of what had been Sudan’s oil reserves with it.
Sudan has been unstable since a popular uprising forced the removal of longtime dictator Omar Al-Bashir in 2019. A short-lived transition to democracy was derailed when army chief Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan and Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo of the RSF joined forces to lead a military coup in October 2021.
Al-Bashir faces charges at the International Criminal Court over carrying out a genocidal campaign in the early 2000s in the western Darfur region with the Janjaweed, the precursor to the RSF. Rights groups and the UN say the RSF and allied Arab militias are again attacking ethnic African groups in this war.
The RSF and Sudan’s military began fighting each other in April 2023. Their conflict has killed more than 28,000 people, forced millions to flee their homes and left some families eating grass in a desperate attempt to survive as famine sweeps parts of the country.
Other estimates suggest a far higher death toll in the civil war.
UN chief urges release of staff held by Yemen’s Houthi rebels
- “The United Nations will continue to work through all possible channels to secure the safe and immediate release of those arbitrarily detained,” the secretary-general said
UNITED NATIONS, United States: UN chief Antonio Guterres called Friday for the “immediate and unconditional” release of all humanitarian staff held by Yemen’s Houthis, saying the rebel group had detained seven United Nations workers.
The Iran-backed Houthis have held dozens of workers from the United Nations and other aid groups since the middle of last year, including 13 UN staff since last June.
“Their continued arbitrary detention is unacceptable,” Guterres said in a statement, adding that the “continued targeting of UN personnel and its partners negatively impacts our ability to assist millions of people in need in Yemen.”
“The United Nations will continue to work through all possible channels to secure the safe and immediate release of those arbitrarily detained,” the secretary-general said.
Reeling from a decade of war, Yemen is mired in a humanitarian catastrophe with more than 18 million people needing assistance and protection, according to the United Nations.
The latest detentions of UN staff come after United States President Donald Trump ordered the Houthis placed back on the US list of foreign terrorist organizations.
Re-listing the Houthis will trigger a review of UN agencies and other NGOs working in Yemen that receive US funding, according to the executive order signed on Wednesday.
Large drop in number of aid trucks entering Gaza on Friday
- The influx of aid this week compares with just 2,892 aid trucks entering Gaza for the whole of December, according to data from the UN Palestinian relief agency UNRWA
UNITED NATIONS: More than 4,200 aid trucks have entered the Gaza Strip in the six days since a ceasefire began between Israel and Palestinian militants Hamas, the United Nations said, although there was a large drop in the number of loads delivered on Friday.
The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said 339 aid trucks crossed into Gaza on Friday, citing information from Israeli authorities and the guarantors for the ceasefire agreement — the United States, Egypt and Qatar.
This compares with 630 on Sunday, 915 on Monday, 897 on Tuesday, 808 on Wednesday, and 653 on Thursday.
The truce deal requires at least 600 truckloads of aid to enter Gaza each day of the initial six-week ceasefire, including 50 carrying fuel. Half of those trucks are supposed to go to Gaza’s north, where experts have warned famine is imminent.
When asked why there was a large drop in the number of aid trucks on Friday, OCHA spokesperson Eri Kaneko said the UN and humanitarian partners “have been working as quickly as possible to dispatch and distribute this large volume of assistance” to some 2.1 million people across the devastated enclave.
The influx of aid this week compares with just 2,892 aid trucks entering Gaza for the whole of December, according to data from the UN Palestinian relief agency UNRWA.
Aid is dropped off on the Gaza side of the border, where it is picked up by the UN and distributed. Data from OCHA shows 2,230 aid truckloads — an average of 72 a day — were then picked up in December.
Throughout the 15-month war, the UN has described its humanitarian operation as opportunistic — facing problems with Israel’s military operation, access restrictions by Israel, and more recently looting by armed gangs.
The UN has said that there has been no apparent major law-and-order issues since the ceasefire came into effect.
“We are also scaling up the broader response, including by providing protection assistance, education activities and other essential support,” Kaneko said.
Gaza aid surge having an impact but challenges remain
- In the final months before the ceasefire, the few aid convoys that managed to reach central and northern Gaza were routinely looted
- Over the past week, UN officials have reported "minor incidents of looting"
JERUSALEM: Hundreds of truckloads of aid have entered Gaza since the Israel-Hamas ceasefire began last weekend, but its distribution inside the devastated territory remains an enormous challenge.
The destruction of the infrastructure that previously processed deliveries and the collapse of the structures that used to maintain law and order make the safe delivery of aid to the territory's 2.4 million people a logistical and security nightmare.
In the final months before the ceasefire, the few aid convoys that managed to reach central and northern Gaza were routinely looted, either by desperate civilians or by criminal gangs.
Over the past week, UN officials have reported "minor incidents of looting" but they say they are hopeful that these will cease once the aid surge has worked its way through.
In Rafah, in the far south of Gaza, an AFP cameraman filmed two aid trucks passing down a dirt road lined with bombed out buildings.
At the first sight of the dust cloud kicked up by the convoy, residents began running after it.
Some jumped onto the truck's rear platforms and cut through the packaging to reach the food parcels inside.
UN humanitarian coordinator for the Middle East Muhannad Hadi said: "It's not organised crime. Some kids jump on some trucks trying to take food baskets.
"Hopefully, within a few days, this will all disappear, once the people of Gaza realise that we will have aid enough for everybody."
central Gaza, residents said the aid surge was beginning to have an effect.
"Prices are affordable now," said Hani Abu al-Qambaz, a shopkeeper in Deir el-Balah. For 10 shekels ($2.80), "I can buy a bag of food for my son and I'm happy."
The Gaza spokesperson of the Fatah movement of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas said that while the humanitarian situation remained "alarming", some food items had become available again.
The needs are enormous, though, particularly in the north, and it may take longer for the aid surge to have an impact in all parts of the territory.
In the hunger-stricken makeshift shelters set up in former schools, bombed-out houses and cemeteries, hundreds of thousands lack even plastic sheeting to protect themselves from winter rains and biting winds, aid workers say.
In northern Gaza, where Israel kept up a major operation right up to the eve of the ceasefire, tens of thousands had had no access to deliveries of food or drinking water for weeks before the ceasefire.
With Hamas's leadership largely eliminated by Israel during the war, Gaza also lacks any political authority for aid agencies to work with.
In recent days, Hamas fighters have begun to resurface on Gaza's streets. But the authority of the Islamist group which ruled the territory for nearly two decades has been severely dented, and no alternative administration is waiting in the wings.
That problem is likely to get worse over the coming week, as Israeli legislation targeting the lead UN aid agency in Gaza takes effect.
Despite repeated pleas from the international community for a rethink, the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA), which has been coordinating aid deliveries into Gaza for decades, will be effectively barred from operating from Tuesday.
UNRWA spokesman Jonathan Fowler warned the effect would be "catastrophic" as other UN agencies lacked the staff and experience on the ground to replace it.
British Foreign Secretary David Lammy warned last week that the Israeli legislation risked undermining the fledgling ceasefire.
Brussels-based think tank the International Crisis Group said the Israeli legislation amounted to "robbing Gaza's residents of their most capable aid provider, with no clear alternative".
Israel claims that a dozen UNRWA employees were involved in the October 2023 attack by Hamas gunmen, which started the Gaza war.
A series of probes, including one led by France's former foreign minister Catherine Colonna, found some "neutrality related issues" at UNRWA but stressed Israel had not provided evidence for its chief allegations.
