When Marcia Freedman arrived in Israel in the late '60s, the women's rights movement was in its nascent stage and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was just about to explode. Freedman, a housewife, mother and Ph.D. in philosophy jumped right into the turmoil. She was elected to the Israeli Parliament and passed landmark legislation promoting women's issues. She is currently president of Brit Tzedek v'Shalom, an American-based movement for peace in the Middle East.
Freedman recently talked to The Daily Cardinal about being a maverick advocate in a region full of hostility on issues from women's rights to the peace process. She will be speaking today on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict at Hillel, 611 Langdon St., at 7:30 p.m.
In Israel during 1967, what was the prevailing attitude toward women's issues?
At that time it was assumed women in Israel were ... already liberated with the establishment of the state of Israel, which was a very strong myth that had been created by the ... male leaders of the early Zionist movement, and perpetuated in particular by [feminist author] Betty Friedan.
So, when you got into the Israeli parliament were the people there open to [the feminist movement]?
Not at all. It was, \How do you define yourself?"" I said ""A feminist."" And they would say more often than not, ""What is that?"" There was absolutely no knowledge of feminism in the country. ... Rape, wife-beating was not supposed to be happening at all in Israel. Child pornography and prostitution were not supposed to be happening-but it was. And so I really began to uncover the facts. That was what I was doing during that whole period of time when I was in the Knesset [The Israeli parliament].
So how has it changed, how is it different now in Israel?
There is ... a huge amount of awareness of the inequality of women's rights in Israel. ... There have been a number of laws that have been revised. ...But they are not enforced. So Israel, from the point of view of the laws on its books, it has a very progressive record on women's rights issues today. ... But they still are not enforced and there are still many, many issues there.
Someone described the period of time when you first came to Israel as a ""heady, optimistic period."" Did you sense that?
By the early 1970s the first of the fanatic settlers had already begun ... setting up these maverick settlements on the West Bank. ... I wouldn't say that was a period of great optimism at all.
What did you think at the time about the growing settlements?
I was one of the very earliest people saying this was a disaster waiting to happen. ... I advocated that the settlements be made illegal and dismantled. ... I wasn't listened to. And I was a very early advocate for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
So what is the attitude right now in Israel?
Today 60 to 70 percent of the Israeli population consistently supports a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with evacuation of settlements and a return to something more or less along the lines of the 1967 border. It's not the position of the government of Israel.
In light of the United States' reluctance to criticize the Israeli army's attack on the alleged training camp in Syria, how likely do you think it is the United States will heed your campaign [to persuade Israelis to move out of settlements]?
Within the Bush administration there is, I think, a very strong two-way battle going on internally between ... the State Department and Colin Powell on one side who ... see that a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is very important to stability in the region, and the unilateralists like the Defense Department, Rumsfeld, etc. who want to see the United States be a world power and therefore are willing to have an aggressive Israel as an ally in the Middle East.
You said the policies Bush is taking right now are not really conducive to the peace process. How helpful do you think Sharon and Arafat have been to the peace process?
[Arafat] ... is in his own way standing in the way of the process [in not letting new leadership come forward.] And I think that the result is on the Palestinian side there is a vacuum of power and the extremists are taking over. On the Israeli side the extremists are in power. ... So, we're not in a very good situation at the moment.
