The model parliament

From the outset of the interim period, women’s groups and activists launched a series of activities reviewing existing legislation and proposing amended or new legislation on principles of equality between men and women, culminating in a year-long initiative for a model parliament in 1998, coordinated by a committee representing various women’s institutions and powered by a specialized women’s non-governmental organization, the Women’s Committee for Legal Aid and Counselling (WCLAC).

The stated aim of the model parliament was to discuss, draft and have a symbolic vote on ‘Palestinian legislation that ensures equality and women’s human rights for Palestinian women, as well as their participation in building a civil society based on justice, equality, respect for human rights and rule of law’ (Othman 1998: 63). While the real parliament was locked in conflict with the Executive over the Basic Law (see Chapter 7), in the regional workshops leading up to the model parliament, women and men - community activists as well as women’s movement cadre - reviewed existing labour, social welfare and educa­tion, personal status, criminal and public law legislation, among others, and explicitly used the principle of equality to uncover and address gender inequities, as well as recommending special provisions for women’s rights in such issues as maternity leave and violence against women. In general, regional groups working on ‘benign’ issues such as labour, social welfare or education were able easily to reach consensus over changes in line with the principle of equality (Hammami and Johnson 1999: 329).

Applying the principle of equality in personal status laws was more difficult, sharing with other attempts at reform in the Arab and Muslim world the problem of addressing the legally defined model of family and gender relations in shari'a based on complementarity between male and female roles, rather than equality. As Hammami and Johnson note: ^ς[t]his “gender contract” - the exchange of male maintenance {nafaqd) for female obedience (ta'd} — is fundamental to women’s status as “protected dependants” under Islamic law, and to a degree in social relations’ (Hammami and Johnson 1999: 129, citing Moors 1996). For reformers, however, understanding the relation of this legal model with social practices and with a social gender contract that can vary in different societies according to their political, social and economic circumstances is key to identifying impulses and need for change. Thus, prior to examining the events of the model parliament and its conclusions, it is worth examining both how the model parliament attempted to reformulate this contract, and how gender interests and needs in Palestinian social life bear on such attempts to change the balance of gender rights and duties m shari 'ÿ-based law. Below we will briefly discuss maintenance and inheritance in this context.