"HONOR KILLINGS" OF PALESTINIAN WOMEN WIDESPREAD

Murdered in Name of Family Honor - Chris McGreal
The murders of Faten Habash and the Shakirat sisters last month in Ramallah and eastern Jerusalem were the latest in a series of brutal "honor killings" that have shaken the Palestinian community. The deaths have prompted demands for a change to laws inherited from the days of Jordanian rule that deem all women to be "minors" under the authority of male relatives and that provide a maximum of six months in prison for killings in defense of "family honor." Those calls have met with resistance in parliament where religious Palestinian MPs argue that reform will lead to a collapse in the moral fabric of society.

According to the Palestinian women's affairs ministry, 20 girls and women were murdered in honor killings last year and about 50 committed suicide - often under coercion - for "shaming" the family. Another 15 women survived attempts to kill them. Dozens of other killings are covered up each year. "Putting 'falling into well' on the death certificate is very common," said Maha Abu Dayyeh Shamas, director of the Women's Center for Legal Aid and Counselling. "We find that the women were strangled and then dumped in the well." (Guardian-UK)