“In this macho society is frowned upon for men to stick to women in public, so that we use it to our advantage to create barriers to and prevent the violence deslegitime our demands,” account Leya Awadat, a student of mechanical engineering. Speaking at the gates of the American University of Beirut (AUB), the most prestigious in the region and where you go to every day reduced elite that can afford the 27,000 per year in tuition fees. Just turned 18 and every evening flying a speaker, through which, in full voice, hums the slogans that will repeat other university.
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The lebanese, threaten to return to the streets if there are no substantial changes to The lebanese prime minister, Saad Hariri, announced his resignation after two weeks of protests
“it Is impressive to see all those young people with the microphone in hand and a guy to follow them to attach the speakers. This revolution is the of the of the generation of ‘ 99,” he says in a barricade on the ring road of Beirut Zeina Halabi, professor of Arabic literature at AUB. “When these girls met the 10 syrian troops left the country [after 29 years in Lebanon], and adolescents had been involved in protests against racism, domestic violence, poor management of wastes or for the inclusion of women in Government.” Those of my generation, the 40, born with the civil war and grew up under the occupation by syria and israel.
In the squares of Beirut have risen up shops and within them are constructed small agoras where university professors are sharing their knowledge with the protesters. The teachers have united in a newly created union of women for the fight on campus against wage inequality, and gender. The chants of “revolution” and “down with the regime” are repeated from north to south and from east to west of the country in an unprecedented show of unity transectaria despite the fact that in Lebanon, the power is apportioned according to the demographic weight of the 18 confessions officially recognized. This unit has played this Sunday with a demonstration feminist inside of the nationwide protest.
There converged the heterogeneous beirutíes, to the women of countries of the region are referred to as “the most presumed among the arabs.” “The political leaders have given them the key of the society to religious men, all men, and women it remains for us to emigrate to escape from a social system in which already a long time ago that we’re not reflected”, says Frog you Have, a dance teacher exiled to Paris and temporarily visit in Lebanon. Walk lively tree-lined veils, dreadlocks, perms just come out of the hairdresser’s, mini-skirts, handbags of Gucci or noses with piercings while hands with red manicure will rise into the sky. Nor missed this Sunday, inconsistencies in internal when a handful of ladies retouched noses were presented at the event, with a maid that was holding the flag of lebanon.
they All require that the parents may not marry their daughters in nine years, as permitted by law; to confer nationality to their children if they marry foreign men, and a civil marriage with equal rights of inheritance, divorce or custody of children. They are also demanding a quota for women in Government, aware that it is the only way to break through the steel ceiling imposed by the patriarchy is a political-religious. In this fight they have a new ally, Raya el Hassan, minister of Interior and a pioneer in the arab world in this position. “We are on the right path and we have gone from one to two and then from two to four ministers”, had to THE COUNTRY, The Hassan in January, after taking possession. “But the access of women to positions of responsibility in patriarchal societies takes time so there’s that to do with intelligence, without forcing the discourses, but without a decline in progress,” he adds.
The chain of women at the forefront of the barricades was effective even when the Army chose to bring uniformed personnel to evict the protesters from roads and highways. The experiment ended with the withdrawal of the military, who were fired by their conciudadanas with flowers, applause and the already everlasting soundtrack revolutionary, the national anthem. In the summer of 2015, the police response to such a mobilization left hundreds of people injured only in Beirut.
For many twenty year old girls the massive protests of 2015 accounted for an experiment of the civil society. Then, the corruptela and the poor management of the wastes in the country ended up burying the streets lebanese among tons of debris, and sparked the popular indignation over the class and the confession. For the first time in decades, the lebanese people took to the streets under a single flag, the national, finishing with the traditional tide of pennants and caps-partisan protesters arrived at the capital in buses paid for by the zaim (leader feudal). Among the rubbish was born Beirut Medinati, a platform of secular political and national that if he got 40% of the votes in the local elections of 2016 only achieved a seat —a woman— in the parliamentary elections of 2018, the first in nearly a decade. Today it is an integral part of the protests that they claim they have a defined leadership.
Sara Raed, student of public relations 21 years of age who ensures that most of her friends have emigrated to study abroad, was the first to put along with your partner a tent at the iconic Martyrs ‘ Square in Beirut on the 17th of October. It was the day that the announcement of a rate of 18 cents of euros to the calls of WhatsApp, opened the spigot of discontent. Today there are more than a hundred people camped out on the place. “2015 was a push, very important to arrive here, and there is no turning back for my generation,” says Raed.
The ‘queen’ that kicked the patriarchy
it Is called Malak Alaywe, but it is known as the kick queen (the queen of the kick) and has become the icon women’s struggle against patriarchy is a political-confessional. Did the first day of protests, when a video surfaced in which it appears delivered a kick in the testicles of a man armed with a Kaláshnikov.
The victim turned out to be the bodyguard of a minister who allegedly was preparing to shoot in the air to disperse the demonstrators gathered in a neighbourhood of Beirut. The kick has been immortalized on posters hanging on the walls of the social networks as a contrataque direct to the patriarchate in Arabic. So much success has had that several NGOS offer these days self-defense classes for the protesters. Alaywe he refuses to reveal his age, but it was during the protests of 2015 —the so-called crisis of waste— when, between tear gas, knew that a week ago became her husband.
