North Africa and Middle East

Women lost out big time in the elections in Lebanon in June. There were a mere six women MPs out of 128 in the Lebanese parliament. Now there are only four. Lina Abou-Habib, director of the Centre for Research and Training on Development Action, says: “It was a major, major setback for women, in terms of representation. But also because the women who do enter parliament do so through patriarchal channels.”With only 3.1% of seats now occupied by women, Lebanon is at the bottom of the table of parliamentary representation of women in the Middle East.

The Young Women Leaders Academy (YWLA), a year-long program that aims to inspire and empower young Middle Eastern women to pursue political careers in their home countries, culminated in a two-week retreat in Madison, Wisconsin, last month, where participants met with elected women leaders from across the state and honed their leadership skills and political aspirations.The participants are now back in their home countries, where they are pursuing a range of options, from starting their own advocacy organizations to running for elective office.

Among the most prevalent Western stereotypes about Muslim countries are those concerning Muslim women: doe-eyed, veiled and submissive, exotically silent, gauzy inhabitants of imagined harems, closeted behind rigid gender roles. So where were these women in Tunisia and Egypt? In both countries, women protesters were nothing like the Western stereotype: They were front and centre, in news clips and on Facebook forums, and even in the leadership.

Azza Kamel, a women’s rights advocate in Egypt, said the popular uprisings in her country and its neighbors are creating new opportunities for women. 

“There was no difference between women who were veiled or not veiled,” Kamel said at the United Nations in New York, referring to the protests that ended Hosni Mubarak’s 30-year rule last month. “The revolution created a land as free for women as for men.”

Egyptians gathered in Cairo's Tahrir Square, in a victory celebration, after their revolution unseated president Hosni Mubarak. Tunisians have also been sampling new freedoms of speech and press. But even as the exultation lingers, women in both countries have launched new protests. They want to make sure that democracy does not erode their rights.

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Jane Martinson reports from the Women in the World summit, where campaigners are drawing attention to the internet as a tool to aid women in the Middle East.

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When the stories and images of these thousands of diverse and complex Muslim women hit the airwaves, they not only shattered stereotypes, they also revealed the fallacy of focusing solely on the veil. These discussions have been counter-productive, divisive, and have perpetuated an understanding of Muslim women as exotic and different from non-Muslim women.

The Executive Director of UN Women, Ms. Michelle Bachelet, on Friday commended women for their role in the pro-democracy protest movements that have swept across North Africa and the Middle East. She, however, said their rights and leadership potential must continue to be encouraged.

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From hunger fasts in Bahrain, to women’s only marches in Yemen, to Asmaa Mahfouz (known as “a woman worth 100 men”), whose anti-Mubarak video helped trigger the revolution against autocratic rule, to the defiant Iman Al-Obeidi in Libya, women are playing as important role in the political and social transformations reshaping the Arab world.