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Abstract
Many studies have broadly addressed the status of the Naqab/Negev Bedouins in Israel, particularly the status of women. However, women from the West Bank and the Gaza Strip who are married to male Bedouin citizens of Israel in the Naqab face a particular experience of vulnerability that has not been sufficiently explored. Based on 26 semi-structured interviews with women from the West Bank and Gaza who are married and living in the Naqab, as well as additional interviews with six psychosocial and legal professionals working with these women, this article describes the vulnerability and precarity of these women within the precarious context of the Naqab. Drawing on Judith Butler’s concept of precarity as a heightened risk of disease, poverty, starvation, displacement and exposure to violence without protection, this study examines layers of precarity in these women’s lives. These layers are described through an examination of the intersections between Israel’s settler colonial management of Palestinians’ lives and the Palestinian patriarchal management of women’s lives, thereby uncovering how both these controlling structures intensify women’s precariousness and make them the precariat of the Naqab. Further, the study addresses women’s performativity through their self-erasure and creation of invisible communities as a way to survive.
Acknowledgements
The author thanks Safa Shehada for her valuable support throughout the different stages of the study.
Disclosure statement
The author has no conflict of interest or disclosure in relation to this article.
Notes
1 Naqab/Nagev is a desert region in southern Israel.
2 The Green Line is a term that emerged in the wake of Israel’s establishment in 1948, for a division whose proper name is the 1949 Armistice Line. It refers to the border separating pre-1967 Israel from the Occupied Palestinian Territories and constitutes an internationally recognised border.
3 I refer only to Bedouins who live in the Naqab area (of whom there are roughly 230,000). Bedouins in Israel also live in Northern areas (roughly 60,000). There are differences between the two groups in terms of socio-economic status, nationalism and relationship with the Israeli state.
4 Nakba refers to the historical catastrophe that befell Palestinians when the Israeli state was established and more than 700,000 Palestinians were expelled from their homes and lands, becoming refugees in neighbouring Arab countries until today.
5 The time frame of the study was decided by UN Women, which funded the study.
6 This broadened scope aims to include those who have done recent work and who are aware of recent experiences, legal changes and regulations.
7 The study follows the American Sociological Association Code of Ethics (1999).
8 Palestinian city in the southern West Bank.
9 A village in Hebron.
10 The Palestinian law that allows polygamy from 1967 was modified in 2011 to include informing the first wife before marrying the second.
11 In this study, 46% of the husbands in this study were employed and 54% were unemployed.
12 A city in Hebron.
13 The security coordination between the PNA and the Israeli military system began after the Oslo Accords and was one of the Israeli conditions to recognise self-rule for Palestinians. The coordination is for Israel’s security needs only (Dana Citation2014).
14 Sayigh (Citation2008) asserts that the hostility between peasants and Bedouins has ancient origins. She notes that ‘In times of drought, the Bedouin were likely to raid the fellaheen [peasants] for grain or, alternatively, to guard client fellaheen against other Bedouin in return for protection money’. She found that even though Bedouins were as poor as peasants, or even poorer, they enjoyed a higher status partly through their historical connection with the Islamic empire and partly because, unlike the peasants, they were mounted and armed. Furthermore, there tribal leaders often formed part of the ruling class.
15 Which means ‘enough’.
16 Compulsory alms given to the poor and needy; one of the Five Pillars of Islam.
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Suhad Daher-Nashif
Suhad Daher-Nashif is Assistant Professor of behavioural and social sciences in the Population Medicine Department of the College of Medicine at Qatar University. Her academic and professional backgrounds involve medical and social disciplines. She holds an MSc in occupational therapy and a PhD in sociology and anthropology, with a major in anthropology of medicine and culture. Her main research work dismantles the intersectionality between science, society, politics and bureaucracy within the modern health systems in the MENA region. Forensic medicine, mental health and medical education settings are her main fields of research. Among her most recent publications are: ‘Intersectionality and Femicide: Palestinian Women’s Experiences with the Murders of Their Beloved Female Relatives’ (2021) and ‘Women’s Health and Well-Being in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: A Narrative Review of Achievements and Gaps in the Gulf States’ (2020).