Iraqi Women Under Siege: A Report by CODEPINK and Global Exchange

Yet, women suffer, as all Iraqis do, not only the complete
absence of security, irregular electricity, insufficient clean
water, minimal sewerage system, no adequate healthcare
and few jobs in the context of an ongoing economic crisis.
They are also exposed to gender-based violence and
an increased social conservatism that is largely the result
of the way political leaders manipulate women’s issues for
their own purposes.

Everywhere in the world, women and gender ideologies
are used to show the difference between ‘us and them’: ‘our
women are liberated while your women are oppressed’.
Or, the other way around: ‘your women are morally loose
while our women are honourable’. Right now Iraqi
women are squeezed between the White House’s rhetoric
of women’s liberation and conservative Islamist calls for a
return to so-called tradition. The salient point here is that
the occupation of Iraq has not resulted in greater equality
and freedom for women. On the contrary it has strengthened
the forces that try to curb women’s rights.

Symbolically, the images of female soldiers torturing and
abusing male prisoners in Abu Ghraib prison might,
in the long run, negatively affect Iraqis’ perceptions about
the substance of women’s rights in the West. And, unfortunately,
the more vigorously U.S. women promote
women’s rights for Iraq and Iraqis perceive that call as also
a part of the occupation’s agenda, the greater the backlash
against women in Iraq may be.

But let there be no doubt: Iraqi women are not mere victims,
passively watching what is happening to their
country, their families, their children and to themselves.
Iraqi women have long played significant roles in society;
they are educated, they work and they organize politically.
Iraqi women were the first to mobilize after
Hussein’s regime fell, coming together as women, as professionals,
as activists, trying to improve living conditions
as well as advocating for their rights. In spite of the way
that chaos and violence restrict their activities and mobility,
they struggle on, meeting in each other’s houses,
establishing refuges where women can learn skills to
make a living, providing free health care, legal advice,
and literacy and computer classes. Iraqi women also
organize workshops, conferences, sit-ins and demonstrations
to get their voices heard and to influence the political
process.

This carefully researched report tries to tackle some of
the myths, misconceptions and even outright lies about
Iraqi women’s roles and rights. Despite the undeniable
and systematic oppression of Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship,
Iraqi women were once among the most educated
in the region, participating in all sectors of the labour
force and playing an important role in public life. They
were not simply oppressed creatures without agency, sitting
at home, heavily veiled and secluded. If anything,
this image better describes their current plight.

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