On November 18th the Swedish Dialogue Institute for the Middle East and North Africa held a digital workshop on women peace building in Palestine for participants in a Folke Bernadotte Academy led leadership programme for women peacebuilders. The event was arranged in cooperation with the Folke Bernadotte Academy (FBA) and the Kvinna till Kvinna Foundation and aimed at advancing the Women, Peace and Security Agenda, in the context of Palestine.
During the workshop the Kvinna till Kvinna Foundation’s regional manager Marie Wikström and Rana Khoury, senior programme officer at the office in Palestine, presented a recent study/ report called A right not a gift.
The presentation was followed by participants exchanging views, thoughts and experiences on challenges and opportunities, and discussing ideas on how to contribute to advancing the WPS agenda in Palestine. They talked about spaces in which they can recognize their power (formal or informal) and how theses spaces could be expanded. They also discussed prospects for building alliances between different actors (officials, politicians, civil society, private sector, etc.) to realise a feminist peace.
Among the challenges they in particular identified the effects of the occupation; patriarchal norms in society and threats from extremist groups. They made recommendations on stronger inclusion (pushing for women’s participation and inclusion in reconciliation processes and at policy making and decision-making tables); on broadening the agenda (dealing also with more socially sensitive topics and addressing not only women’s empowerment but also the role of men and masculinity); on advocacy (further work needed on raising awareness on women’s rights and on the WPS agenda is needed at all levels); on collaboration and alliance building (working more together to advance the WPS agenda and develop skills to foster contacts and dialogue not only with like-minded, but in a manner that allows for different opinions and views); and on funding and other support (funding to local women movements is instrumental to make real change and platforms to meet/facilitate contacts between different groups/movements are needed).
There was also a strong recognition of the need to work on intergerenational dialogue and of including more young women in peace building. “We need a drastic change, to get away from the old and give way for something new and we should give the young generation a chance”, one participant summed up the discussion.
