Abstract :
Women living in the Gaza Strip face unique challenges. There is a problem of child marriages, in which girls as young as 12 are compelled to marry men in their twenties to reduce the family’s financial burden. Honor killings, though rare, do occur in some isolated villages. If a woman is suspected of having an extramarital affair or an indecent relationship with someone outside of marriage, a member of her family will kill her in the name of “family honor.” In the most extreme cases, even if a woman is raped, her brother or father will kill her, rather than seek punishment for the perpetrator. “Many men who commit honor killings cite the Qur’an, but most scholars say there is no justification in Islam for these crimes. They are a manifestation of the social pressures of traditional societies, which hold that women are the property of the family, whose honor rests on their obedience and virginity” (New York Times, November 12, 2000)
