A Syrian Woman.

By rising up against the injustices of Assad and his regime, the Syrian Woman challenged all the ideas and stereotypes that were casted on her by minds claiming wisdom and global leadership while being stagnant in international circles, such as feminists and human rights organisations, as well as [Syrian] compatriots who have blindly adopted the slogans of those organisations.

Throughout the years, we have read hundreds of news articles and reports published online focusing on the future of the Arab Woman and her right to Freedom and rebellion against traditions and the status quo, and even go further and be liberated from religion, and focusing on equal marriage rights for homosexuals, as well as the calls by international feminists movements to defend women and their liberties! On top of that we hear every now and then some Western and Arab voices – organizations, feminist movements, and individuals – calling to defend the right of Saudi women to drive cars!

The Syrian revolution has shamed those organisations and uncovered their existential crisis. They were completely paralysed when it came to influencing the international community or taking concrete actions to alleviate the suffering of the Syrian Woman. Their true face was unmasked when it became clear that their utmost influence cannot go beyond documenting and collecting statistics about detainees (in Assad’s prisons), as well as martyrs and victims of Assad’s violent and brutal war on his own people.

In light of the Syrian revolution and the suffering of Syrian women, we ask ourselves, how realistic are the goals and mission statements of those organisations? Ideas like the advocacy campaigns about reinforcing women’s skills in all fields in order for her to participate in the development alongside her partner, while everyday she is subjected to the most horrifying physical, emotional and spiritual violence! Human history has yet to record an entity that has stripped women off of their freedom, rights and dignity as has the Syrian regime and its regional and international allies.

The Syrian revolution is a revolution against the stereotypical understanding of equality between women and men, which the regime has left us with. The clearest manifestation of this understanding being that – with rare exceptions – women were assigned positions in universities, research fellowships abroad, and positions in the largest of public institutions on the basis of either ideological affiliation or moral corruption.

Not any woman can be an idol figure on Women’s Day, and not any woman deserves recognition, respect or awards on the Syrian revolution’s fifth anniversary. Those women whose news and activities filled traditional and online media, do not deserve to be considered true revolutionaries or rebels. During revolutions, the only woman that deserves respect is that legendary woman who has lost a son, a husband, a father or a brother. A woman who has been displaced from her home and country, and forced walk to the four corners of the Earth. The one who suffered the horrors of siege, starvation, and shelling, with her life and honour threatened all the time. She is the nurse on frontlines with rebels tending to their wounds, or the young lady who’s put her life on the line to carry food and medicine to the rebels. Last but not least she is the activist who works in silence, and honestly expects no reward but that from God the Almighty.