"It's Israeli After All: A Survey of Israeli Womens Movement Volunteers" by Patricia Woods

2008

Feminism is first and foremost personal. It becomes political as the person experiences a consciousness change. A person becomes feminist when understanding that what seemed personal concerns in fact many. Feminism is a personal experience that captures the individual's awareness, one by one. A first move of agency from a state of subordination toward freedom must start at consciousness transformation. Women may capture new ideas of liberation but do nothing to change their lives. The strategies that the first feminist activists in the women's liberation movement in the Anglo-Saxon world employed, such as open rebellions and demonstrations, did not always seem appropriate for feminists in other parts of the world or other cultural or religious communities. Differences in social structures, ethnicity, race, and many more parameters determine how women react to the experience of feminist awakening. How they respond to the promise of liberation and what possible strategies they may employ to make a change depends not only on the personal consciousness change, but also on the strategies available within the political, economic , cultural, religious and other conditions. Women bring about change not only in democracies and liberal communities. In secret societies, such as the Bedouin or the Sub-Saharan society, bargaining strategies are employed and prove to be more effective in the balance of power that involves gender relations. 1 As the very feminist idea of liberation of women captures the minds of women one by one, women crossing the lines of conformism with the dominating patriarchal order and moving to the feminist zone are lonely. Their decision involves considerations on the price they might pay and on what they might lose if they stand up for their rights. Then, if they cross the line and manage to be followed by small groups, they find themselves in the new and unfamiliar zone of an " in-between " sphere, neither private nor public. 2 They are engaged in forming a new language, inventing new strategies and constructing new patterns of behavior. In other times feminists may stay put and docilely remain at home or pave their own new ways on a personal basis, at home with their spouses. Even when it is not observable, it does not mean that women do not experience consciousness change to feminism. It may simply mean that they do not become political activists. The essence of feminist consciousness

Politikologija religije, 2024

Die Welt des Islams, 2017

Radical History Review, 2024

Highlighting twenty-first-century Palestinian feminist formations, this essay chronicles a trajectory of over a century of women’s organizing that led to the contemporary moment. The essay argues that women and feminist praxis have been exemplified in each moment of Palestinian intifada, though national anticolonial liberation politics did not always accommodate feminist language or ideas. Palestinian women have played an instrumental role in each phase of contestation and community organizing against colonial, military, and state formations. Whether creating a women’s front, making space for women within the national movement, or developing a communal politics of care from within, the labor women have performed for the Palestinian liberation struggle can be read through a feminist ethos. The essay argues that feminist praxis was always present and that, while the language of feminism is contested in Palestinian social and political spheres, Palestinian feminist trajectories are compatible with and necessary for the actualization of Palestinian liberation and freedom from Zionist rule.

This article appeared in a journal published by Elsevier. The attached copy is furnished to the author for internal non-commercial research and education use, including for instruction at the authors institution and sharing with colleagues. Other uses, including reproduction and distribution, or selling or licensing copies, or posting to personal, institutional or third party websites are prohibited. In most cases authors are permitted to post their version of the article (e.g. in Word or Tex form) to their personal website or institutional repository. Authors requiring further information regarding Elsevier's archiving and manuscript policies are encouraged to visit: http://www.elsevier.com/copyright This article on young feminist activists in Israel explores the formation of feminist subjectivities using in-depth interviews and focus groups. Findings reveal identifications with, alongside re-articulations of, existing feminist norms and values, exposing a productive tension between " the personal " and " the political ". Beside decisive motivation to act for social change, women use the movement as a supportive setting for identity work. This entails a fair amount of emotional boundary maintenance to mitigate out-group hostility to feminism, and in-group expectations to toe the collective line. The article outlines issues that preoccupy young activists and puts them in a broader context of Israeli feminism and of local cultural expectations regarding the management of forbidden emotions. We argue that the process of boundary maintenance that is implied in the activists' standpoints and experiences has a paradoxical effect of reinforcing feminism's attachment to the cultural surroundings that the movement is initially set to oppose.

This is an old piece I wrote for Middle East Report (MERIP) in 1988 but most of the information and the need to challenge the myth of gender equality in Israel are still relevant today.

Karazi-Presler, T. & Sasson-Levy, O. (2022). One Step Forward Two Steps Back: Gender Relations in Contemporary Israel. Invited chapter, In Guy Ben-Porat, Yariv Feniger, Dani Filc, Paula Kabalo, Julia Mirsky (Eds.), Routledge Handbook of Modern Israel, 2022

European Journal of Women's Studies, 2012