Global girl power

Israel leads by example at the 59th UN Commission on the Status of Women.

By STEPHANIE GRANOT
Hanna Azoulay Hasfari (photo credit: THE PERMANENT MISSION OF ISRAEL TO THE UN)
Hanna Azoulay Hasfari
(photo credit: THE PERMANENT MISSION OF ISRAEL TO THE UN)
A hush fell over UN conference room 8. Every woman in the room, whether clad in a short skirt or burka, watched transfixed as 13-year-old Zohara stood under the hot sun, waves gently lapping at her long cotton dress. She closed her eyes and inhaled her baby daughter’s scent in a last gentle hug, and held the baby out to her own mother.
But her mother stood stone-faced, still as a statue, while the boy on the raft shouted at them to hurry up. Zohara looked up at her mother’s cold face, knowing she would never see her mother or her daughter again. She was being sent away by her husband, a man old enough to be her grandfather, who lost interest in his child bride after she became pregnant.
“Mother?” Zohara couldn’t choke back the tears.
Mother kept her hands at her sides, her kohl-lined eyes staring into the distance.
Zohara slowly placed her daughter on the hard ground at her mother’s feet and climbed onto the raft, searching for some sign in her mother’s face as the raft bobbled down the river. She watched the spot where they had stood until the motionless form that was her mother was just a speck, and then was gone.
The lights came on and Israeli filmmaker and activist Hana Azoulay Hasfari, one of the Jewish state’s representatives at the 59th Session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW59), explained why she had chosen to show part of her film, Orange People, which tackles the subject of child marriage. It is based on the story of her own mother, forced into marriage at age 12 in Morocco, then banished by her elderly husband – who tired of her pregnancies and then forced her to leave, in actuality, not one but three children to be raised by her own already overwhelmed mother.
This week, CSW59 brought together women as well as men from around the globe in a display of solidarity made all the more astonishing by its unfolding against the backdrop of today’s international conflicts. Representatives from member countries heard UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and former US secretary of state Hillary Clinton’s opening remarks calling for women’s economic empowerment and rights, then set aside cultural and theological differences to listen intently to each other’s statements and national-level reports.
“As women thrive, so will we all. If girls are held back, the whole world feels the pain,” said Ban, observing that women suffer disproportionately from the impacts of climate change, economic crises and displacement caused by armed conflict.
The meetings of the CSW, where progress on the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action was being evaluated, ran alongside parallel official UN events offered by countries and NGOs as well as a few unofficial sessions held offsite by groups that hadn’t met eligibility requirements. Discussions spilled over into hallways and lounges as women in African dress, business suits, chadors and skinny jeans shared stories and exchanged ideas on promoting gender equality and reducing violence against women. Their stories, some heartbreaking, some heartwarming, eclipsed cultural, economic and geographic borders and bore a startling similarity to one another.
Of course, you cannot get 10,000 women together under one roof and not find a few differences of opinion.
The most contentious encounter at this week’s CSW59 occurred when proponents of legalized prostitution clashed with anti-human trafficking activists, many of whom had themselves been victims.
Autumn – not her real name – is a former victim of human trafficking who now volunteers to help other survivors.
She shared her story to emphasize the point that kidnapping and forced prostitution isn’t solely a third-world problem.
Autumn was 19 when she answered an ad in her local Idaho newspaper seeking to employ young women as au pairs.
The ad promised life in a big city, eighthour workdays and pocket money; the “family” Autumn was matched with even sent an airline ticket to New York.
When Autumn landed at LaGuardia Airport in Queens, New York, she was picked up not by the father of a family but by a man who forced her to have sex with him that night, then threatened to break her arms if she did not reimburse him for the cost of the ticket.
When Autumn told him she was broke, he “allowed” her to work off the debt by selling sex acts to clients he supplied, meanwhile feeding her “medicine” to make her experience less painful.
As Autumn became dependent on the drugs, her debt only increased. She was sold to traffickers and spent the next eight years working in the underground world of forced prostitution, until she was finally liberated in a police raid.
“Human traffickers prey on people who are hoping for a better life, lack job opportunities, or have an unstable home life or a history of sexual or physical abuse,” explained Autumn. “They lure and ensnare them into forced labor and sex by manipulating and exploiting their fears and vulnerabilities.”
A key factor in promoting the equality and safety of women is education, so it was not surprising that the session given by Israel, “Education – The Power Behind Empowering Women,” was standing- room only – despite being presented in the same time slot as Thailand, Finland and Iran.
Along with Azoulay Hasfari, the Israeli delegation included Ambassador Ron Prosor, Israel’s permanent representative to the UN; Ambassador David Roet, Israel’s deputy permanent representative to the UN; Knesset Secretary-General Yardena Meller-Horovitz; Hava Karrie, acting director of the Golda Meir Mount Carmel International Training Center; and Jean Judes, executive director of Beit Issie Schapiro.
Roet and Meller-Horovitz delivered opening remarks, discussing how Israel leads by example when it comes to women’s rights. Meller-Horovitz cited some of the ways the Jewish state strives to make economic independence a viable option for women: “In Israel, we have subsidized daycare, mandatory free education from age three, paid 12- week maternity leave and laws preventing child marriage.”
After she presented parts of her film, Azoulay Hasfari finished by reminding the audience that although many women today have options her mother did not, too many still opt to let others decide their destiny. “There is no reason we cannot be free,” she insisted.
Karrie spoke about the Golda Meir Mount Carmel Training Center, which brings men and women alike to Israel from countries like Ghana and the Philippines for gender equality seminars.
Many present were not aware that Meir, known for being Israel’s “Iron Lady” and first female prime minister, had run away from her Milwaukee home at age 14 to escape a prearranged marriage. Judes, for her part, spoke about the need for increased cooperation between activists for women’s rights and those supporting people with disabilities.
The panel then took questions from interested attendees hailing from Kenya and Ghana among others, and ended to a round of noisy applause from its diverse audience.
As the week progressed and delegates from around the world continued to exchange reports, ideas and presentations, a painful fact revealed itself. Not that it came as a surprise to anyone, but despite the universal nature of so many of the issues being grappled with, it became clear that women from certain countries are up against a whole other set of odds. In places where the subjugation of women and violence towards them is condoned and even sponsored by their governments, a sense of hopelessness prevails.
The inescapable reality dampened the optimistic mood of the week, and brought home the fact that there can be no women’s rights where there are no human rights.
Prosor seemed to say it best when he addressed the commission in the General Assembly: “Make no mistake: A community that is not safe for women is not safe for anyone. It is no coincidence that so many of the countries which threaten global security are the very places where women are deprived of dignity and opportunity.”