Women, Girls Play Key Role in Arab Unrest

The young Palestinian mother stood with her 2-year-old son in her arms on the rooftop of her apartment building here Sunday, watching the girls and women of Beit Sahur do their part for Al Intifadheh-- “the uprising.”

An athletic-looking high school girl with a grapefruit-sized rock in her throwing hand bounded like a young deer toward the stone and scrap-metal barricade blocking the village’s main road and shouted encouragement to her fellow demonstrators: “There’s only one jeep full of soldiers! Don’t worry!”

At the roadblock, the high-schooler joined a woman old enough to be her grandmother, whose underhand rock-throwing style was not nearly as effective as the youth’s but who exhibited no less enthusiasm.

Anti-Israel Chants

Fifty yards behind the barricade, a knot of about 30 more women chanted and sang, like cheerleaders at a college football game. “Israel, No! Palestine, Yes!” they shouted in unison. “A stone has become a Kalashnikov!”

About then, the young mother, who identified herself only as Thuria, leaned close to her son and made her contribution to the cause. “Listen to these songs,” she instructed the toddler. “You have to learn them.”

The demonstration in Beit Sahur on Sunday was one of unknown scores of protests that occur every day on the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip but that aren’t publicized either by the Israeli army or the media because nobody gets seriously hurt.

It was particularly instructive for two reasons. First, it was one of those relatively rare occasions when a Western correspondent was on hand to observe the demonstration from start to finish. And second, it was a case study in the various roles that girls and women have come to play in the unrest which has rocked the occupied territories since Dec. 9.

As evidenced in this mostly Christian Arab village of 6,000 people just east of Bethlehem, intelligence, morale, harassment, and diversion are the women’s primary specialties in the uprising, with direct combat a secondary concern.

A correspondent arrived at the town’s Greek Catholic church shortly after 9 Sunday morning. As worshipers sang hymns inside, several dozen local high school boys and girls gathered in the church courtyard.

The youths were outwardly calm. “We used to be afraid in the beginning,” one conceded. “But not any more.”

“Every Sunday, we have like this,” a middle-aged Beit Sahur woman explained later. “And also on Friday,” the Muslim Sabbath.

U.S. Peace Effort Scorned

As services ended at about 9:30, a dozen women, mostly in their teens and 20s, started chanting in the street just outside. One of the ringleaders--a short, English-speaking brunette--had told the correspondent moments before that Palestinians aren’t interested in the latest U.S. attempt to mediate some kind of Middle East peace settlement.

“We won’t take anything from the United States,” she said scornfully. “We want our land. We want all Palestine.”

“Gather around! Gather around!” the women sang, clapping in cadence. “Don’t be afraid! Men of Beit Sahur: Come to the square!” The crowd built slowly, and a tall, thin youth with a kaffiyeh masking his face emerged from an alley carrying an outlawed Palestinian flag on the end of a bamboo stick. Shouting “Glory to our martyrs!” the crowd, now numbering about 100 and still predominantly female, followed the tall youth through the narrow streets of the village toward the main road.

Girls Act as Scouts

As they marched, other masked youths blocked side roads with stones and scrap metal, and several girls went ahead to act as scouts.

By the time they reached the main road, about 30 young men were in the lead. They picked up stones as they approached a spot near the entrance to town marked by sooty stains on the pavement as the site of several previous demonstrations.

Two or three had slingshots they used for increased range, but still their stones fell short of a squad of Israeli soldiers that had taken up positions behind an old blue Volkswagen at a nearby intersection.

Whenever the youths seemed to tire of the standoff, the women behind them would start shouting again, inspiring a new fusillade of stones.

Learned as Schoolgirl

Watching from her rooftop, Thuria recalled that she had learned many of the same songs and chants used by the demonstrators when she was a schoolgirl. She escaped the nearby Dahaisha refugee camp where most of her family still lives when she married, she said. Two of her three brothers are in prison for anti-Israeli activity and another was expelled by the military authorities several years ago, she said.

Finally, the army had enough. Reinforcements arrived, one squad began a flanking maneuver and another started walking, rifles at the ready, toward the demonstrators.

“Come here! Come here!” a few of the teen-age girls taunted in Hebrew. But they quickly disappeared into the narrow village side streets, just like the stone-throwing boys before them.

“We’re trying to keep them busy so the young men can get away,” explained one girl.

When the troops ventured into the side streets, more women converged on them.

Israeli Troops Taunted

One, who identified herself as 66-year-old Jamila, taunted the troops by shouting repeatedly into their faces: “God is great! God is great!”

Another chimed in: “Palestine is our land, and Jews are dogs!”

The clearly frustrated soldiers would start to walk away, inspiring even more taunting until they would return, trying to push the women into their houses and getting into loud shouting matches with them. Both the soldiers and the women knew the Israelis would not use real force against them, particularly with several photographers on hand recording the incident.

“You’re having a really good time, I suppose!” one angry soldier yelled at a cameraman.

Another soldier cocked his automatic rifle menacingly, and a third fired one shot in the air when women surrounded him. But that was all, and the women were not deterred.

Girl Sounds the Alarm

When another squad a few blocks away started taking away a young man, a girl of about 10 sounded the alarm. “Come on women!” she cried. “Relieve the shebab (youth)! They’ve caught some of them!”

The women all rushed to the scene and another shouting match ensued.

When it was all over and the soldiers were leaving at about 10:30, girls and women alike broke into broad smiles and chattered excitedly among themselves, celebrating like a football team that has just scored the go-ahead touchdown.

“This is the beginning only,” said a matron in a blue suit who had been in an angry shoving match with a soldier just a few minutes before. “The beginning of success.”