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A R a B I a N S LEBANON SYRIA ISRAEL/Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) EGYPT JORDAN IRAQ KUWAIT IRAN SAUDI ARABIA BAHRAIN QATAR U.A.E . OMAN YEMEN ARABIAN SEA Middle East and North Africa Preti Taneja n 2010, religious and ethnic minorities across Right: A woman cries over a coffin during the the Middle East and North Africa remained funeral for two Christian brothers killed in Mosul, I disproportionately affected by ongoing con- November 2010. Khalid al-Mousuly/Reuters. flict, political turmoil and state-sanctioned repres- sion of their rights. country widely regarded as one of the most stable Though Iraqi parliamentary elections were held in the region. In November 2009, King Abdullah in March 2010, the government was not formed II dissolved a parliament that had only served until November. In this political vacuum, which two years of its four-year term. Elections were also saw the end of US combat operations in the due to follow swiftly, but were postponed for the country, violence against minority groups escalated. drafting of a new electoral law, and the country In February, attacks in Mosul over ten days left reverted to direct royal rule for a year-long period. eight Christians dead, according to Human Rights Despite protests that the new electoral law further Watch (HRW). In October, militants laid siege to marginalizes the country’s Palestinian population, Our Lady of Salvation Syriac Catholic Church in elections were finally held in November 2010, Baghdad, taking over 100 people hostage. Numbers but were boycotted by the country’s main Islamist of reported casualties vary. Amnesty International opposition group. reported over 40 people killed while the BBC In addition to ongoing marginalization and reported more than 50 fatalities in the ensuing discrimination, Palestinian Arabs in Israel bore the violence. brunt of controversial new legislation considered The politically motivated violence contributed by many to be discriminatory, as it requires all to the flight of traumatized minorities and others new non-Jewish citizens to pledge allegiance to from Iraq, and this exodus continues to affect the Israel as a ‘Jewish and democratic State’. Israeli whole region. The United Nations (UN) refugee Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu later agency, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees announced that the proposal would apply to all (UNHCR) placed the number of Iraqi refugees, new citizens; however, the disproportionate impact most of whom are in neighbouring countries, at on Palestinians remained the same. Meanwhile, one 1.8 million in a 2010 report. Of these, a large year after the Israeli military’s Operation Cast Lead proportion is from religious and ethnic minority claimed the lives of countless Palestinian civilians communities, who are increasingly targeted in Iraq in Gaza, both Hamas and the Israeli government for various reasons that are rooted in their minority issued rebuttals of the 2009 UN investigation status. In December 2010, UNHCR country headed by Justice Richard Goldstone, which found offices in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria reported that that both sides had committed war crimes. In following the October church siege, increasing May, Israeli naval commanders stormed a flotilla numbers of Iraqi Christians were arriving and of ships carrying pro-Palestinian activists who were registering for assistance. Some had fled before and attempting to carry tonnes of aid to the people of had been forcibly returned to Iraq by third countries Gaza, which has been subject to an Israeli blockade in Europe, only to flee again. since 2006. At least 10 civilians were killed and The threat of civil unrest in Lebanon was also many were wounded in the raid, according to a a matter of regional and international concern in formal statement by the UN Security Council. 2010. Tensions over the as yet unreleased findings International condemnation followed, and the of a UN investigation into the 2005 assassination of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon ordered an Prime Minister Rafik Hariri – which is expected to impartial inquiry into Israel’s actions. In early implicate leaders of the country’s Hezbollah party 2011, Israel issued a report saying its actions – led eventually to the resignation of Hezbollah were legal under international law. In July 2010, members of the coalition cabinet in January 2011. the Knesset stripped Israeli Arab MK Hanin At the time of writing, Lebanon remained without Zuabi – the first female Israeli Arab to be elected a government, and there were fears that tension to the Knesset on an Arab party list – of three between the two sides could erupt into violence that parliamentary privileges because she had taken part would affect the whole region. in the Gaza-bound flotilla. Political controversy also rocked Jordan, a At the time of writing, there was deepening 210 Middle East and State of the World’s Minorities North Africa and Indigenous Peoples 2011 international concern over the increasing instability with thousands taking to the streets in January 2011 in Yemen and serious questions over the future to demand the resignation of Ali Abdullah Saleh, well-being of its people. Since 2006, the country has who has been president for 30 years. been engaged in a six-year sectarian conflict that has As MRG has noted in its reports, minority displaced more than 250,000 people. The instability women across the region are subject to intersectional has led to rising lawlessness, and the country has discrimination because of both their sex and their emerged as a base for attacks on civilians elsewhere, minority status. They can also suffer gender-based including attempted bombings of commercial and repression within their own communities. They are cargo flights bound for Germany, the USA and the particularly vulnerable to certain forms of violence UK. Over the course of last year, the situation of in conflicts. Across the region, they continue to be the Yemeni people became increasingly desperate, subject to varying degrees to personal status laws State of the World’s Minorities Middle East and 211 and Indigenous Peoples 2011 North Africa that are based on Sharia law. Such laws privilege Rights Network (EMHRN – a network of more Muslims over non-Muslims, and Muslim men over than 80 human rights organizations across the Muslim and non-Muslim women, for example in region) in 2010 a march was planned in the small marriage and inheritance. city of Aïn Benin to ‘demand respect for human Increased legal discrimination and conservatism rights and commemorate the “Berber Spring”’, but is not always tolerated or enforced, however. was met with force. The report states that although A campaign in 2009 against a revised personal permission to hold the event was formally requested, status law in Syria was begun by women’s groups a response was never given. Police were deployed in Damascus. Using social media and email, the on the day of the march and around 30 people campaign found support throughout the Middle were arrested. They were held for several hours, East and was also backed by international non- questioned and made to sign statements before government organizations (NGOs). This resulted in being released. the law being ‘shelved’ by the Ministry of Justice, The Christian and Jewish minorities in Algeria according to the NGO, Women Living Under each make up 1 per cent of the total population. Muslim Laws (WLUML). WLUML reported that Sunni Islam is the official religion of the state, and the law would have made it easier for a man to non-Muslim religions are subject to restrictions that divorce his wife and nearly impossible for her to do affect their ability to meet in public to worship. the same, and would have allowed Christian men to Non-Muslim groups are required to register with marry more than one woman. the government, and the state also controls the This regional update focuses as much as possible importing of religious texts. Proselytizing has on specific incidents and issues faced by women historically been dealt with particularly harshly. from minorities; however, disaggregated data by Relations between Christian and Muslim sex and religion/ethnicity is very difficult to access, communities were difficult in 2010. The US State particularly in such a volatile area. Department Report on International Religious Freedom 2010 (IRFR 2010) reported that in Algeria January, protesters disrupted a Protestant service According to MRG, about a quarter of the Algerian being held on the first-floor of an apartment population self-identifies as Berber. The year 2010 building in Kabylie. A week later, they ‘vandalized was the 30th anniversary of the ‘Berber Spring’ the building and burned Bibles, hymnbooks, a cross, in 1980, when students took to the streets to furniture, and appliances’. The attack took place demonstrate against the repression of Berber culture amid local fears that the Protestant group was trying and to demand language rights. Algerian state to convert Muslim children, and concerns that men forces crushed the peaceful protests. Since then, and women are permitted to worship together in the sometimes violent demonstrations have continued house, according to the pastor. to mark relations between Berber communities and In August, two Christian men were arrested for the state, and, despite some concessions, the issues eating and drinking while at work on a building are ongoing. For instance, while the Constitution site during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. holds that Islam is the state religion and Arabic They were charged and detained under a law that the official language, the state declared the Berber bans Algerian citizens from ‘causing offence to the language Tamazigh a ‘national language’ in 2002 Prophet … or denigrating the dogma of Islam’. The and has permitted it to be taught in schools. But a trial of the two attracted dozens of protesters, media 2010 report from a German NGO, the Society for reports said, with the public prosecutor calling for Threatened Peoples (GFvB) said that, despite this, a three-year jail sentence.
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