Wife-Beating Debated on Lebanese TV Channels

The following are excerpts from a debate about wife-beating on the Arab Woman TV Channel - Heya TV. In this debate participated Lebanese women's rights activist Zaynab Gheith, Lebanese cleric Zakariya Ghandour and Algerian author Fadhila Al-Farouq. Heya TV aired this debate on December 30, 2004:

Lebanese cleric, Zakariya Ghandour: Disciplining by beating occurs as a reprimand - not brutal beating. Brutal beating is forbidden. Use of a ruler or, as you mentioned, beating on the hand, the shoulder, the buttocks, or anything like that – as a reprimand of a woman when all methods of guidance have failed. Like a mother or father who beat their son or daughter to prevent them from wrongdoing, and not out of hatred or animosity.

Interviewer: Can she too discipline him when he strays? Can she too take a ruler, beat him and reprimand him, if he, for example... Is there equality in this?

Zakariya Ghandour: No, we give leadership to the man. She can also refrain form intimacy with him. Just like he can leave her bed, she can leave his. There is a parallel here.

Algerian author Fadhila Al-Farouk: Whenever I talk on TV, I infuriate the Algerian press because I am candid. I lived in a common neighborhood, and heard the cries of women who were beaten almost every night. I know what it means for a woman to be beaten. I know what it means for a woman to be beaten merely because a man stared at her. She is innocent, but nevertheless she is beaten. Why is she beaten? I don't know. We are talking about brutal beatings, not a slap or two...

Zakariya Ghandour: Breaking of limbs? Breaking an arm or a leg, for instance?

Presenter: Obviously, after all they get to the hospital...

Fadhila Al-Farouk: They use rods, they use belts, they use iron chains. We are talking about violent beating...

Zakariya Ghandour: I am getting a very ugly picture of the Algerian people.

Fadhila Al-Farouk:No, this is not restricted to the Algerian people. It occurs throughout the Arab world. These statistics are from emergency wards in Algerian hospitals, this occurs throughout the Arab world. I talked to the Algerian consul in Lebanon, who told me about the suffering of Algerian women married to men in Egypt and other Arab countries, and the beatings they suffered.

Presenter: They are married to foreign men?

Fadhila Al-Farouk: Yes. These are Algerian women who are suffering. I know, for example, that two million women in France, the country of law and liberties, are victims of brutal beatings. Two million women in a country that protects the woman through legislation and other means.

Presenter: But we are talking about Arab women...

Fadhila Al-Farouk: No, French women. So imagine what goes on in the Arab world, if this is what happens in France.

Presenter: Mrs. Fadhila, do you think there is a difference between a woman suffering from violence in the Arab world or in another society?

Fadhila Al-Farouk: Of course.

Presenter: Is there a difference in the feelings, the causes, the environment, and the results?

Fadhila Al-Farouk: First of all, the Western woman differs from the woman in Arab countries. The Western woman has her own personality and is aware of her basic rights. She knows who she should turn to, how to report it to the police, the neighbors are involved in reporting it to the police. In our case, a neighbor cannot call the police, and the police cannot be involved. We have never heard of... It is very rare for the police to intervene between a husband and wife.

Woman's right activist Zaynab Gheith: If I may just mention an example. I have a neighbor, living right next to me, whose husband beat her when she was in her third month of pregnancy. He beat her and locked her inside the house. She called her father, who came to open the door. Her father called the police, who came and prevented him from opening the door, claiming it was a crime. If your son-in-law files a complaint, you will go to jail. And he couldn't open the door. The woman began to throw her clothes, jewelry and belongings from the balcony, pleading with her father, while the police were standing below, and could do nothing to help her. According to the law, if he were to file a complaint against the father, the father would go to jail for breaking into the house. There can be nothing worse than this.

Fadhila Al-Farouk: In the West there are a million that can support women. But in Arab societies there is no one... The woman is isolated. She has no other weapon… She has no weapon except for her shouting and crying.