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Sara Bannach HNRS 110, Prof. Manuel-Scott 8 December 2011 Research paper The Impact of American-Israeli Relations on Palestinian Women One of the most prevalent global issues in the world today is the unremitting conflict between Israel and Palestine. The modern dispute began after 1948 when the government of Israel was partitioned by the United Nations. Violence erupted shortly thereafter in the 1949 Arab-Israel War and has continued ever since in varying degrees despite multiple attempts by the international community to facilitate peace. Though the violence has been detrimental to the lives of thousands, women in particular have especially suffered due to the loss of many rights and freedoms that were gained through their involvement in the Palestinian Liberation Organization between 1948-1982. Due to their close allegiance with Israel and powerful position in the United Nations Security Council, the United States has been a central figure throughout the entirety of the conflict, particularly with regards to the plight of Palestinian women. Though the Israel-Palestine struggle has been examined from scores of perspectives, a key question still remains: how did U.S.-Israeli relations impact Palestinian women during the critical time period between 1948-1982? The answer lies in the United States blatant favoritism for Israel and its continued monetary and military support for the nation. Without the aid of the United States, Israel would never have been able to launch the attacks on Palestine that effectively ended the advancement of Palestinian women. The establishment of Israel and subsequent Arab exodus upturned the traditional gender structure of the Palestinian culture. For years, the Palestinian economy had been

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mainly agrarian; indeed, sharecroppers accounted for around 75% of the population (Pateet 20). Women were an integral, albeit plebian, part of the familial labor system. They quite commonly spent long hours in the fields cultivating tobacco and olive crops in addition to their traditional roles as housewives and mothers (21). However, after the war of 1948, this structure was effectively eliminated by the resulting refugee situation. The camps established in Lebanon to house the thousands of exiled Palestinians did not contain the means to continue this agricultural lifestyle. Instead, families had to find different ways to support themselves. Women in particular began to branch out from their customary roles as homemakers and entered into the work force in neighboring factories and hotels as laborers and maids. In her article The Struggle for Survival, Palestine expert Rosemary Sayigh claims that by 1970, females accounted for 6.7% of the total Palestinian workforce in Lebanon, a greater proportion than ever seen before (110). Palestinian women were slowly becoming breadwinners for their families, thusly altering the patriarchal system of old. Palestinian women were also able to advance themselves in terms of education with assistance from the international community. In 1949, the United Nations passed General Assembly Resolution 302, which established the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees, or UNWAR (Hadi 195). This agencys primary purpose was to provide humanitarian aid to registered Palestinian refugees in the camps spread throughout the Middle East. UNWAR grew to become one of the main providers of sustenance for the Palestinians, especially for women. For example, UNWAR instituted public schools in order to increase literacy amongst the refugees, as they were not allowed to enroll in Lebanese institutions. Women seized the opportunity to obtain an education. Female enrollment in elementary school increased from 26.5% in 1950 to 43.3% in 1960, and by 1970 the enrollment rate for

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girls was 46.6%, almost equal to that of boys (Sirhan 96). According to some, this newly educated population of women began to break free from the restraint of illiteracy that once held them. Author Sarah G. Brown writes, Some of these [educated] women now participate in active attempts to bring changes to the lives of other women, especially those who have not had access to an education (32). Many Palestinian women, now educated and employed with the help of international organizations, began to challenge the archaic gender system of their culture. Despite their increased role as workers and booming literacy rates, some scholars do not believe this lead to an expansion of rights or equality. Anthropologist Nahla Abdo, for instance, contends that the refugee camps actually hurt the role of women in Palestinian society. One of the primary roles camp women have played is that of reproducers and transmitters of the old culture and the lost national identity. This role has strengthened Palestinian national identity and opened further spaces for male public/political participation. Yet, at the same time, it has led to the further marginalization of refugee women as it has prioritized national concerns over gender rights, pushing women further away from the public productive sphere and into the domestic realm. (Endangering Compensation) Julie M. Peteet, a fellow anthropologist, agrees with Adbo, and claims that womens desperation to find work outside of the camps was exploited by Lebanese employers. It was fairly easy, she writes, to pay Palestinian women substantially less than Palestinian men (26). Although the role of refugee camps in helping improve womens place in Palestinian society is often disputed, many scholars agree that the rapid propagation of the Palestinian

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Nationalist Movement in the 1960s was the catalyst for a period of proliferation of womens rights. After the overwhelming defeat of the Arab armies in the Six Day War of 1967, the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) began to gain strength in the occupied territories. The newly revived nationalist spirit spread like wildfire in the many refugee camps. In The Palestinian National Movement, scholar Amal Jamal explains: Faced with the new reality in which they were exposed to the oppressive hand of the Israeli Military Government, they began consolidating new patterns of political behavior (34). Included in these new patterns was the mass recruitment and mobilization of Palestinian women. The political sentiments of the women began to grow stronger due to their peoples oppression at the hand of the Israelis. PLO leaders realized that the duty of keeping the Palestinian idea alive had fallen to the women in their struggle to maintain their families in the camps (Women in Struggle 881). Thus, women found themselves in a situation that was ripe for revolution, and the Palestinian Liberation Organization seized the opportunity to further increase their growing numbers and strengthen the spirit of rebellion that kept their members unified. Subsequent to their recruitment, female involvement in the PLO afforded Palestinian women a multitude of opportunities that resulted in educational and political advancement in womens lives. Though UNWAR had already been providing refugees with basic education, the PLO established secondary institutions offering vocational programs in areas such as nursing and teaching; still others were trained militarily and took up arms and joined in combat (885). Now armed with marketable set of skills, women once again set out into the private sector to procure employment. In addition to supplemental income for their families, the access to higher training also gave Palestinian women a sense of independence.

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Geographer Souad Dai'ani contends in the book Women and the Israeli Occupation that this newfound autonomy caused many women to challenge their cultures traditional gender system and seek a higher place in Palestinian society. Daiani argues, Increasingly, Palestinian women began to take upon themselves the task of defining their roles as productive members of Palestinian society under occupation and of developing avenues through which they would contribute to the struggle against Israeli rule (32). The idea that women could participate in and contribute to the colossal political struggle between Israel and Palestine was exceedingly revolutionary for the time; it had not been but 20 years prior that women were still believed to be better off as wives in the home. However, PLO women were not met with hostility by their male comrades but rather welcomed into their ranks as fellow members of the movement (Women in Struggle 886). Palestinian women were finally beginning to enter into the modern age and make positive strides towards full equality that had never been witnessed before. Many academics agree that female PLO involvement was the impetus for real change in the lives Palestinian women. In Gender in Crisis, Julie M. Peteet argues that women have garnered international attention for their role in the Israel-Palestine struggle: it has gained the attention and respect of large segments of Western public opinion (218). Certainly, the issue of womens rights has remained extremely prevalent and is still an important issue in the global consciousness. Other scholars believe the PLO simply allowed women to step into the limelight within their own culture. Amal Kawar contends in his book Daughters of Palestine that female involvement has gained in strength and that women have proven themselves in their quest for political equality (132). However, there still is contention amongst scholarly opinion. For instance, in her article Palestinian Women, Violence, and the Peace Process,

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Dr. Maria Holt claims that despite the obvious advancement of women during this time, women did not make any long-term achievements. Certainly there was some shift in attitudes towards honor and, as a result, some women were able to participate in the resistance, Holt asserts, but enlightened attitudes on the part of a few male leaders failed to transform the status of women substantially (119). Although the debate on the effects of female involvement in the Palestinian Liberation Organization will surely wage on, the positive implications of their participation are certainly undeniable. Despite all of the strides women in the PLO made between 1965-1980, their advancement came to an premature end in June of 1982. The Israeli military invaded Lebanon and eventually launched a full-scale attack on the PLO and its allies. The First Lebanon War (as it would later be called) eventually lead to the mass evacuation and subsequent dissolution of the Palestinian Labor Organization (Brynen 52). The attack devastated the thousands of women who had been recruited by the movement. No longer were they active and valued members of a single-minded faction; rather, they were now forced back into a state of constant struggle for survival. Rosemary Sayigh muses about implications of the attack in her article Women in Struggle: Palestine: The Israeli invasion of 1982 cut short this critical trend, and set back the Resistance from an 'advanced defensive' stage where institutional change could be debated to a zero of struggle for survival. Few Palestinian institutions now remain in Lebanon, and ordinary women face enormous problems, with the PRM expelled, so many of their menfolk dead or in prison, so many homes destroyed, and so few jobs (886). The absolute chaos that now surrounded the Palestinians was enough to drive the majority of women to seek safety and put the lives of their families ahead of their own. Though assuredly

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few singular women have tried to subsequently break into politics, the Israeli invasion of 1982 signaled the end of an era for PLO women, and it has not returned since. The history between the United States and Israel is indicative of how its actions would eventually impact Palestinian women. Although the United States and Israel enjoy a committed alliance today, the partnership was not always so. The U.S. signed the United Nations General Assembly Resolution 181 in 1947, which partitioned the state of Israel (Hadi 172). Despite initial sympathy for the Jewish Holocaust refugee situation, the United States was at first hesitant to provide the fledgling country with aid. This stance was primarily due to the limited amount of military and economic interests in Israel at the time. As historian Samuel E. Markey writes, Indeed, as late as 1953, the U.S. still considered the Middle East to be a primarily British responsibility (2). After much lobbying from Zionist leaders, the U.S. signed the Mutual Defense Assistance Agreement in 1952; this act provided Israel with small amounts of arms so long as they agreed to use them solely for defense (Israeli-United States 2). Regardless, the alliance between the two countries was still minimal, and the United States tried to maintain a relatively neutral position that would not outright favor Israel. However, this was merely the beginning of a series of decisions that would eventually indirectly cause the Palestinian womens loss of rights. The United States shifted its stance to wholehearted support for Israel during the presidency of Lyndon Johnson after tensions with the Soviet Union peaked in the 1960s. Throughout the 1950s, the United States had been mulling over the idea of forming a strategic alliance somewhere in the Middle East so as to address fears of possible Soviet expansion into the area (1). Disillusioned with Western powers, few Arab countries sought to ally themselves with the Americans, much to the chagrin of Washington. However, the U.S.

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found the solution in Israel after its surprising defeat of the Arab armies in 1967 (United States Aid 4). They thusly began to support Israel economically in order to strengthen Israels military. In fact, the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise reports that between 1967-1982, the U.S. directly gave Israel over $170 million dollars in aid (US Assistance), though some scholars contend the actual amount was millions higher (Aruri 22). The generosity was such that Israel was able to greatly expand their already large military to a level at which former National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger believed they could defeat the Soviet-supplied Arab armies (Feith). Thus, the American-Israeli partnership was partly borne out of Cold War fears and has unrelentingly continued ever since. The influence of the Jewish vote has also weighed heavily on the United States decisions regarding Israel. As scholar Alan M. Fisher claims in his article Realignment of the Jewish Vote?, Jewish voters have long been a concern for politicians due to the strategic location of Jews in metropolitan areas of states with considerable electoral impact and because of high electoral participation (1). After the Holocaust and partition of the state of Israel, however, American Jews became even more politically active, now voting primarily based on the idealistic notion that Israel could preserve the Jewish identity and act as repayment for the horrors of the Holocaust (Novick 375). American presidents thusly became wary of disillusioning this significant voting bloc by advocating partnership or aid for Palestine. In contrast, the Arab vote has historically been significantly less influential; in fact, Harry S. Truman once said, In all of my political experience I dont ever recall the Arab swinging a close election (Sarsar 462). Additionally, Jewish activist and lobbying organizations have been extremely vocal about their support for Israel. Groups such as Bnai Brith and the Anti-Defamation League have actively lobbied Congress for Israeli support

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since the nations inception (Moore 220). In order to appease Jewish voters and activists, American policy makers have repeatedly shied away from implementing foreign policy that could be misconstrued as alienating American Jews. While the alliance with Israel was growing, the relationship between the U.S. and Palestine was rapidly worsening in both the economic and diplomatic arenas. According to the Clyde Mark, a member of the Congressional Research Service, the Unites States little to no money has ever been directly given to the Palestinians; rather, 80% of aid has been channeled through government contractors and the remaining 20% has been funneled through organizations under the watch of USAID (United States Aid 7). Furthermore, the same report states that aid for Palestinians has not been earmarked in Congressional appropriations bills since 1975, a stark contrast with the perpetual flow of money Israel has received. Additionally, many political science scholars believe the United States have purposely antagonized the Palestinian crisis in the past and into the present. In his work Dishonest Broker, Naseer H. Aruri writes, A striking feature of U.S. policy towards the Arab-Israeli conflict since the 1967 occupation was the insistence of the U.S. government that it play chief arbitrator, if not sole peacemaker, when it has in fact been co-belligerent (3). He supports his argument by citing several U.N. resolutions regarding Palestine that the United States voted against in order to shield Israel from international scrutiny (53). Though the U.S. never vocalized its apparent opposition to Palestine, their actions clearly indicate that the Palestinians have been effectively ignored since 1970 while all of its attention and most of its money has been directed towards Israel. The relations between the United States and Israel have had an enormous impact on Palestinian women. Contrary to their lifestyles before the partition of Israel, life in refugee

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camps in surrounding countries such as Lebanon was such that many women had to seek supplemental incomes in order to support their families. The Palestinian Liberation Organization took advantage of the newly established female working population in order to increase their rapidly growing numbers. The PLO thusly recruited women in huge numbers and trained them vocationally and militarily. Meanwhile, the United States, desperate to find a strategic stronghold in the Middle East to deflect Soviet encroachment, formed an alliance with Israel. They began to provide Israel with immense amounts of aid money while simultaneously turning a blind eye to the Palestinian refugee crisis. Furthermore, American presidents have continually buckled under the pressure to support Israel exerted by Jewish Americans and Jewish lobbying organizations. The consequence of these actions from both sides culminated in Israel launching an attack on the PLO, which resulted in the loss of the many gains women had made between 1948-1981 in terms of rights and freedoms. The United States was indirectly responsible for the loss of womens rights in 1982. Although the Americans certainly did not come forward outright to prevent the spread of the PLOs female recruitment, they essentially put an end to it via their funding for Israel. Without the influx of aid from the United States after 1967, Israel arguably would not have been able to launch their devastating attack on the PLO during the First Lebanon War. The U.S.s repeated refusal to support Palestine in the U.N. also serves to exemplify their unwillingness to relent in their support for Israel, which has undeniably lead to the peace process being interrupted and thus a perpetuation of the violent situation that Palestinian women face today and have faced for decades. The United States blatant favoritism for Israel has in essence helped maintain the patriarchal family system in Palestine under which women face severe loss of independence and rights. In order to remedy this disconnect, the

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United States must cease its politically-fueled support and reconsider its stance on Israel. As Saliba Sarsar claims, US economic and military assistance must be tied not only to each country's support for American interests, but also to its respect for international conventions, resolutions, and the rule of law (468). Unfortunately, this shift in policy is unlikely to happen anytime soon, as the United States is eager to impose its hegemony on the Middle East (Aruri 6). The case of the Palestinian women between 1948-1982, then, will remain as a testament to the tragic ramifications of the United States bigoted and partisan attitude towards Palestine.

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Works Cited Abdo, Nahla. Endangering Compensation: Making Refugee Women Count! Palestinian Refugee ResearchNet. McGill University Interuniversity Consortium for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies, March 2000. <http://prrn.mcgill.ca/research/papers/abdo_06.htm>. Aruri, Naseer H. Dishonest Broker: The U.S. Role in Israel and Palestine. Cambridge, MA: South End Press, 2003. Brynen, Rex. PLO Policy in Lebanon: Legacies and Lessons. Journal of Palestine Studies, 18.2 (1989): 48-70. Daiani, Souad. Between National and Social Liberation: The Palestinian Womens Movement in the Israeli Occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip. Women and the Israeli Occupation: the Politics of Change. Ed. Tamar Mayer. London: Routledge, 1994. Feith, Daniel. The Costs of U.S. Aid to Israel. Harvard Israel Review [Cambridge, MA] Spring 2004. <http://www.hcs.harvard.edu/~hireview/content.php?type=article &issue=spring04/&name=feith>. Fisher, Alan M. Realignment of the Jewish Vote? Political Science Quarterly, 94.1 (1979): 97-116. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/2150158>. Grahm-Brown, Sarah. The Education of Palestinian Women on the West Bank. Images and Reality: Palestinian Women Under Occupation and in the Diaspora. Eds. Ghada Talhami and Suha Sabbagh. Washington, D.C.: Institute of Arab Womens Studies, 1991.

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Holt, Maria. Palestinian Women, Violence, and the Peace Process. Development, Women, and War: Feminist Perspectives. Eds. Haleh Afshar and Deborah Eade. Oxford: Information Press, 2004. Jamal, Amal. The Palestinian National Movement: Politics of Contention, 1967-2005. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2005. Kawar, Amal. Daughters of Palestine: Leading Women of the Palestinian National Movement. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1996. Mark, Clyde R. United States Aid to the Palestinians [Washington, DC]: Congressional Research Service [4 March 2005]. <http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/45198.pdf>. Mark, Clyde R. Israeli-United States Relations [Washington, DC]: Congressional Research Service [21 December 2001]. <http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/7933.pdf>. Markey, Samuel E. The US-Israel Partnership & Americas Search for Strategy in the Middle East, 1945-1974. PhD thesis, University of Birmingham, 2005. University of Birmingham Research Archive. <http://etheses.bham.ac.uk/61/1/Markey07MPhil.pdf>. Moore, Deborah. Bnai Brith and the Challenge of Ethnic Leadership. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1981. Novick, Peter. The Holocaust and Collective Memory: the American Experience. London: Bloomsbury Press, 2000. Pateet, Julie M. Gender in Crisis: Women and the Palestinian Resistance Movement. New York: Colombia University Press, 1991.

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Saliba, Sarsar. The Question of Palestine and United States Behavior at the United Nations. International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, 17.3 (2004): 457-470. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/20007691>. Sayigh, Rosemary. The Struggle for Survival: The Economic Conditions of Palestinian Camp Residents in Lebanon. Journal of Palestine Studies. 7.2 (1978): 101-119. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/2536441>. Sayigh, Rosemary. Women in Struggle: Palestine. Third World Quarterly, 5.4 (1983): 880886. Sirhan, Bassem. Palestinian Refugee Camp Life in Lebanon. Journal of Palestine Studies, 4.2 (1975): 91-107. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/2535839>. U.S. Assistance to Israel. Jewish Virtual Library. American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise, 2011. <http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/USIsrael/U.S._Assistance_to_Israel1.html>. UN General Assembly 302 (IV): Assistance to Palestinian Refugees, 8 December 1949. Documents on Palestine Volume I. Ed. Mahdi F. Adbul Hadi. Jerusalem: The Palestinian Academic Society for the Study of International Affairs, 1997. 195-196.