"Honor Killing" Of Women Returns To Middle East

by Walid Batrawi

(IPS) RAMALLAH -- In a village on the outskirts of the West Bank city of Ramallah, residents take good care of the cemetery in memory of their loved ones. They plant flowers and put up marble tombstones marked with names and dates.

But in one corner of the cemetery lies an unattended grave with no name or dates, and no flowers. It is the grave of a 17-year-old girl no one in the village wants to talk about, though everyone knows her story.

For years before she was murdered, the girl had been raped by her two brothers. Once she became pregnant she had to speak out. Her mother did not believe her; instead she accused her of affairs with other men in the village.

The girl ran away and took refuge in Ramallah city, where she terminated her pregnancy after reporting her case to the police with the support of a women's organization.

A few months later, the two brothers were arrested. The family swore on oath not to harm the girl. But in March last year, just hours after she returned home, her mother strangled her with a laundry rope.

The mother was arrested. But today the two bothers and the mother are all set free; none of them was convicted.

She was the 33rd woman killed in 2002 and 2003 for "so-called honor killing in which none of the murderers was convicted," says a study conducted by the Women's Center for Legal Aid and Counseling (WCLAC).

More women have been killed since then, but there are "no police records because people prefer not to report such cases and usually announce it as suicide," says Suheir Oder, coordinator of WCLAC's advocacy and networking unit.

"We find it very hard to document cases because of social and religious restrictions," she says. "In 2003, after this girl's death, five more women were killed in similar cases."

In all cases, the convicted were given the minimum sentence. "There is no law that prohibits 'honor killing', but on the contrary those who rape the women and kill them are given a reduced sentence," Oder says.

The reduced sentence is based on a Jordanian law, says member of the Palestinian Legislative Council Dr. Azmi Shuaibi. "This law allows any judge to reduce the sentence for those who committed a crime related to 'honor killing'," she says. "We as law-makers are working now on reviewing this law and ratifying a Palestinian penal law to guarantee a proper sentence to those criminals similar to any other criminal act."

The Jordanian law reduces the sentence of the killer "only if he or she commits the crime while witnessing the adultery act," says Dr. Bassam Jarar, lecturer in Islamic Studiesin Ramallah. "Otherwise the law deals with the killing as any other murder."

Women's organizations are exaggerating the problem, Jarar says. "Honor killing is not an urgent issue and can't be considered as a phenomena; it is the general situation that has raised the level of violence in the area."

The absence of a Palestinian penal law that deals with 'honor killing' is only one factor, says Odeh. She says the conditions under which Palestinians live make their work difficult.

"The political, social and economic difficulties do not permit civil society organizations to place this issue as a top priority," she says. "Work must be done on a number of levels including social education and the implantation of the rule of law in general."

Since September 2000 when the Intifadah erupted, the Palestinian territories are witnessing an absence of the rule of law. WACLAC records show a 12 percent increase in crimes related to 'honor killing'.

In many cases, the police and the judiciary take no action. "We know of many criminal cases, and especially 'honor killings,'" said a police official speaking on condition of anonymity. "But due to the political and security situations we can't function."

The officer says Israelis have tied the hands of the police. "All our security installations were destroyed, our policemen can't appear in uniform, and most of all we can't arrest anyone for any reason because what is left standing of our police stations could be attacked by the Israelis any time, so we prefer that families solve their own problems."

Shuaibi agrees that the security situation does not allow full implementation of the law but argues that "issues like 'honor killing' were there before the Intifadah and before the security forces were destroyed."

The police and the judiciary are "always put under social pressure in relation to 'honor killing' or violence against women, let alone the pressure of the religious institutions," Shuaibi says. "We as law-makers are also faced by the religious figures and institutions that are terrorizing us by misleading the public about our intentions with accusations that we are legitimizing taboo issues."

Jarar says "women's organizations want to modify the law towards an extreme sentence for those involved in 'honor killing' in order to legitimize marriage betrayal and adultery." But Shuaibi says 'honor killing' should be dealt with as a "double crime" because "the women are double victims when they are raped or abused in the first place and when they are killed."