Key Issues Facing Women and Children:

• Unemployment
• Occupation
• Legal disparities

Home to Jews, Arab Muslims, Christians, Druze and Samaritans, Israel is the world’s only Jewish state. Following World War I, the League of Nations supported the creation of a national home for the Jewish people, approving the partition of the Mandate of Palestine into two states, one Jewish and one Arab. In the face of ardent disapproval from the Arab League, the Arab-Israeli War resulted in the expansion of Israel’s borders beyond the original United Nations Partition Plan. Since this time Israel has experienced a history of conflict with its Arab neighbors. Our partner collective works in both the Galilee region of Israel and the Palestinian commercial hub of Nablus.

Galilee, a large region in northern Israel has a long history of being home to a variety of peoples and religions. Christians believe this to be the location where Jesus cured a blind man. The Arab caliphate conquered the area in 638, only to be followed by a take over of the region by the Shia Fatimids, an Islamic breakaway group practicing the Druze religion. Despite these periods, the Galilee region has had a Jewish majority for most of its history. Located between Lebanon, Syria and southern Israel, Galilee has endured continual bouts of violence between Israeli forces, the Palestine Liberation Organization and Hezbollah. Today the non-Jewish population continues to grow.

Major local industries in Galilee today are tourism and agriculture. However, Palestinians are restricted from taking full advantage of potential agricultural opportunities through restrictions on their ability to move freely about the country and access markets. The labor force participation rate among Palestinians in Israel is 43.6%, as compared to 57.1% among the Jewish population. The World Bank identified that freer access to markets and movement is crucial to reviving the area’s depressed economy.

Nablus is located in the northern West Bank, north of Jerusalem. The population is predominately Muslim and the entrances and exits of the city are controlled by Israel. These tight restrictions are attributed to huge rates of unemployment and a devastated local economy. The city’s unemployment rate rose from 14.2% in 1997 to 60% in 2004. The city is surrounded by three refugee camps; from 2000 to 2005, 522 citizens of Nablus are thought to have been killed in violence between Israeli and Palestinian groups during the Second Infitada. Despite a depressed economy, Nablus is known for the making quality crafts and soaps that are considered an important part of the city’s cultural heritage.

While Israel had one of the first Constitutions supporting the equal treatment of women, women’s rights activists have battled the traditional dominance of religious courts. These courts maintained dominance on issues regarding marriage, divorce, child custody and alimony and largely viewed women as occupying a subordinate role. Thus, even if religious beliefs discriminating against women conflicted with the state’s Constitution, religious courts had the right do disregard the Constitution. Secular court opportunities are now increasingly available to women, but activists argue that these are more available to Jewish women than their Palestinian counterparts. Coalitions between Jewish and Palestinian women within Israel have continually worked for peace within Israel.