In this case, you can read about: The Palestinian writer and activist Wesam Almadani traveled to Norway with his four children in 2018, and was granted asylum as a free city writer. She experienced a total of three wars in the Gaza Strip, but it was not a war Wesam fled from. – I fled from Hamas and social control. It was the darkest time of my life. It was not easy being a woman in Gaza, neither with nor without Hamas. Wesam Almadani came to Norway in 2018 as the first free-town writer in Larvik. Photo: Marcus Støren For over 20 years, Wesam offered services in a town south of the Gaza Strip. She depicts a society with strong social control. Wesam said that she had to get permission from her former husband to work and study, that her husband had to approve her friends and decide when she could leave the house. – As a woman, you have no control over your own life and your own future. It is the men in your family who decide, Wesam tells us. For many years, one of Wesam’s greatest wishes was to play the lute, an Arabic guitar. It took a long time to persuade her husband. – I managed to persuade him in the end, but under two conditions. I wasn’t allowed to tell anyone, and he had to be hidden in a garbage bag. Wesam Almadani, here with an Arab lute while still living in Gaza. Photo: Privat Before and after Hamas Wesam depicts a Gaza before Hamas came to power, and one after. As part of the Oslo Accords, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) gained control of the Gaza Strip. Fatah, the largest party in the PLO, won the election in 1996. Wesam calls Fatah’s rule “a peace that did not lead to peace”. According to Dag Tuastad, professor and Hamas expert at the University of Oslo, this is about the fact that large parts of society in the Gaza Strip are conservative. Their values are closer to Hamas’ values than Fatah’s. In 2006, it was therefore Hamas that won the election. – Then the social control quickly became stronger. The social conservative norms became more important, says Wesam. In 2021, Hamas introduced a defense system. Girls and women must now obtain consent from a male guardian if they want to leave the Gaza Strip. Hamas won the elections in the Gaza Strip in 2006. Support was also great among women. Photo: Suhaib Salem / REUTERS Tuastad says that Gaza has never been a strong state with legitimate laws, and tells of a “kinship organization” in society. Committees and councils around the Gaza Strip were tasked with maintaining social order and peace between families. When Hamas took over power in 2007, they set up these informal “courts”. It is to these Hamas-approved councils that one must go if there is a conflict in the family, and here it is often the husband’s word that carries the most weight. Freedom through resistance Although Wesam depicts a difficult situation for women, she is clear that the criticism must not come at the expense of the fight that Hamas is fighting against Israeli occupation. She is concerned with nuances. – All this does not mean that the Palestinians do not have the right to defend themselves against Israel. Although I can never live there, I want Palestine to exist. Wesam does not think he will ever be able to return to Gaza, but wants Palestine to become its own state. Photo: Private Wesam believes that the resistance struggle against Israeli occupation is the only thing that can lead to women getting their rights in Gaza. – If women are to be free, Gaza must get its rights, Palestine must become its own state. The area must be given peace and time to develop into an open society. But Gaza has never had the chance. – Think about women in Norway in the 50s and today. Society opens up, with time, at its own pace and in its own way, says Wesam. The role of women under Hamas Hamas’s ideology is entirely based on Islamist resistance against Israeli occupation, and Wesam supports this struggle. In the program from 2017, it is stated that women have “a decisive role in the liberation and resistance project”. Islah Jad, professor of gender studies at Birzeit University in West Breidda, has researched the role of women in Hamas. She believes that Hamas has managed to establish an Islamist women’s movement in the resistance struggle. Islah Jad, professor of gender studies at Birzeit University, has researched women’s movements in Hamas. Photo: Private Jad says that women are particularly important in the civil part of society, which Hamas controls. Women have historically taken part in the resistance through social and cultural work, by supporting Palestinian prisoners and by being active in refugee camps. – Today, women are also active by working in various civil institutions, such as hospitals, schools, and they get to be political when they preach in mosques, says Jad. Room for action in terms of decency – When women dress “Muslim” and wear a hijab, they will have greater room for action than if they break with social norms, Tuastad at UiO says. According to him, it will be a bigger problem for the family sphere if the daughters in the family get a reputation as indecent, than if the women get an education and earn an income. This was also the case for Wesam. If he followed the social norms otherwise, he was allowed to both get an education and work outside the home. Hamas still has great support among both women and men in the West Bank and in Gaza. The picture was taken during a demonstration on Vestbreidda in October last year. Photo: HAZEM BADER / AFP Justice, not equality Islah Jad sees no differences between the secular and Islamist resistance. According to him, the differences lie in the social. Hamas has its own vision when it comes to the women’s issue. They want justice between women and men, not equality: – They are pushing for women’s and men’s roles in society to complement each other. They do not want total equality based on Western liberal principles. For Wesam, this was not a female role she was neither able nor willing to fill. – But I must add that everything that is happening now is a consequence of the fact that the Palestinians never got their rights. The Palestinians are completely isolated. One forgets that there is value out there, says Wesam. That is why he believes that the resistance struggle is so important. Despite the fact that Wesam can never live under Hamas’ rule, she does not want to judge Hamas as either evil or good. – Life is not black and white.
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