Articles

Cairo 16 May 2001

About Racial Discrimination Amongst Feminists

by Nawal El Saadawi

During the month of July 1985 I was in Nairobi, Kenya attending the International UN Women`s Conference . I was getting ready to climb the steps up the platform and give my speech when a woman came up to me and whispered in my ear " Please do not bring up Palestine in your speech , this is a women`s conference not a political conference " . The woman was Betty Friedan one of the leading American feminists in the sixties of the last century .

Of course in my speech I did not heed what she had said to me since I believe that women`s issues cannot be dealt with in isolation from politics . The emancipation of women in the Arab region is closely linked to the regimes under which we live , regimes which are supported by the USA in most cases , and the struggle between Israel and Palestine has an important impact on the political situation . Besides how can we speak of liberation for Palestinian women without speaking of their right to have a land on which to live ? How can we speak about Arab women`s rights in Palestine and Israel without opposing the racial discrimination exercised against them by the Israeli regime ?

Betty Friedan and other Jewish feminists were angry with me because I insisted on bringing up the system of apartheid forced upon Arab women and men in Palestine by Israel and yet the same Betty Friedan and the same Jewish feminists had no hesitation in speaking about South African apartheid at the same conference . Nevetheless there were other Jewish women in the conference who refused to adopt these double racial standards and who stood up for the rights of both Palestinian and South African women.
On another occasion I was attending an international women`s conference in the city of Toronto , Canada . This was five years later in 1990 during the month of June . During my talk I mentioned that veiling of women had arisen before Islam , that women had been forced to wear the veil first in Judaism and then in Christianity . Some of the Jewish women in the conference were angry with what I said . One of them named Alice Shalvi who was a leading figure in what was called The Israeli Women`s Network protested and said : " I must protest there is no conception of the veil in Judaism . " An article by Gwynne Dyer in the Toronto Star issue of 3 July 1990 attributed such furious protests to the strong tendency in the West to scapegoat Islam for practices that are just as much a part of Jewish and Christian heritage .

In the Old Testament uncovering a woman`s head is considered a disgrace and that is why the priest had to uncover the suspected adultress in her trial by ordeal ( numbers 5 : 16 - 18 ) . Famous ancient Rabbis said , " It is not like the daughters of Israel to walk out with heads uncovered " and " Cursed be the man who lets the hair of his wife be seen " .

During the nineteenth century in Europe some Jewish women found it more convenient to replace their traditional veil with a wig as another form of hair covering . In the New Testament ST. Paul said " If a woman does not cover her head she should have her hair cut off . Catholic nuns have been covering their heads for hundreds of years .

Despite these historical facts the racism still prevalent in Western societies continues to link veiling of women with Islam alone . This is an integral part of the anti - Arab policies followed by Western ruling circles . It is one of the many arguments used to depict the Arabs and Islam as being the only religion which oppresses women and to justify pro - Israeli policies in the eyes of the public .

Israel is a fundamentalist state built on the biblical argument that the Jews are the chosen people of Jehovah ( God ) and that Palestine is their promised chosen land where they were led by Moses three thousand years ago . Religious fundamentalism is the same whether Jewish , Christian or Islamic and they are all racist in nature since they consider people who belong to a certain religion as superior and so justify discrimination against others .

The Zionist fundamentalist state of Israel backed by the USA has built up an arsenal of modern weapons including hundreds of atomic bombs and uses Phantom at 16 planes provided by US to attack unarmed civilian populations , to destroy homes , occupy the land of Palestinians and kill women and children . When the Palestinians fight back with stones they are called terrorists . When in desperation a small number of them throw bombs or plant dynamite the organized massive state terrorism of Israel is concealed by the media mobilized to depict the Palestinians as being fanatical aggressors.For in the world of today double standards prevail,and the powerful are able to conceal the truth,that Zionist Israel is a racist state,and that racism breeds racism in others wherever it goes.

Nawal El Saadawi
Cairo 16 May 2001