The Group

In 2006 Aswat made many changes in its organizational structure, which have directly influenced the leadership of the organization and the Group’s involvement.
The Group is now responsible for establishing the needs, vision and the ideology of the organization; in addition, the Group members attend the organizational meetings with Shatil - the organization that gives Aswat organizational advice since 2005.
Every Project run by Aswat has a correspondent Focus group formed by two women from the Group. There also three committees, one for the Advocacy Outreach and Education Project, one for the Information & Publication Project and one Committee that, together with the Group coordinator,  runs the Group's meetings.

Main Activities of the Group

• The Support Group - The women members of the Group meet once a month, every time in a different city - Haifa, Tel-Aviv and Jerusalem - where they discuss several issues. These face to face meetings have great effect over their participants; indeed they give them a sense of belonging and strength to continue fighting for their basic rights as human beings.
• The Virtual Forum - provides a safe space that enables its participants to keep their anonymous identities; it is used for peer support and for the dissemination of information on issues considered relevant by the members. So far there are over 50 women participating in the conversations and dialogues.
• The Empowerment and Awareness Raising Program - has been created to answer the pressing need of Palestinian gay women to voice their feelings, frustrations and fears. Through the Program they can acquire knowledge about lesbianism by accessing literature in Arabic. Most importantly, the project aims to empower and strengthen the leadership skills of Palestinian gay women by raising awareness about their gender and sexual identities.

Aswat’s activities in 2006: National Achievements

Aswat places strong emphasis on peer support and addresses the direct and most urgent needs of Palestinian gay women: education, empowerment, advocacy and outreach. We place special emphasis on the importance of providing materials in Arabic and establishing a center for information and publications. This will enable us to best serve our needs. We believe that through all our ongoing projects, we are genuinely promoting gay women rights, hence, advocating for one of the most disadvantaged groups in the Israeli and Palestinian societies.

1) Advocacy, Outreach and Education Project

In 2006, Aswat broadened this project to include Educational and Awareness Raising Workshops. This is a remarkable improvement for two reasons: on the one hand, the issues of women’s sexuality and lesbianism are explored from a feminist and Palestinian perspective; on the other hand, they are entirely planned and implemented by Arab women and conducted in Arabic.
For us, this is an important leap because in this way Palestinian gay women can relate to their own needs and express their most intimate feelings, with a familiar terminology that relates to their cultural backgrounds.
In addition, by developing theses workshops, Aswat has gained independence: we can now successfully organize and conduct our own workshops, having the freedom and flexibility to answer the very needs of Palestinian gay women and educate the public about the importance of those needs and rights.

During the first half of 2006 we delivered four lectures and twenty workshops for service providers in Israel and the Palestinian Territories.
The project also includes media outreach at the local, national and international level, as the media have become increasingly interested in Aswat's ground-breaking work.

Through these workshops Aswat:

• Outreached to 300 service providers all over the country and in the Palestinian Territories
• Expanded its activity to target a wider variety of audiences in many Arab localities
• Created alliances with organizations in the local community, raising awareness and creating public debate on women's sexuality and the connections between gender, sexuality and nationalism through media interviews and lectures to academics, NGOs and the general public. Such partnerships allow Aswat to play a key role in coordinating, planning and implementing workshops, hence, expanding its influence in changing the discourse on gay women rights
• Began to run an independent Workshop Program, managed by Aswat's General Coordinator, which has given Aswat recognition in the Palestinian society.

It is worthwhile mentioning that Aswat's Education, Outreach and Awareness Raising Project achieved international recognition as Aswat's coordinator conducted a series of lectures in public gatherings targeting LGBTQ organizations and other audiences in the US and Europe.

2) Information and Publications Project

This year, Aswat managed to further develop the Information Project by publishing a booklet, brochures and a Glossary of Terms in Arabic and by editing several translations into Arabic.  All publications aim to provide a discourse in Arabic that relates to women’s sexuality and lesbianism.
The lack of material in Arabic resulted in a distortion of some basic facts about women’s sexuality and lesbianism. For this reason, Aswat felt an urgent need and an obligation to provide material in Arabic to provide both gay women and the general Arabic-speaking public with a reliable source of information.
We have also received requests to disseminate our booklet to our international gay contact network of individuals and organizations.
These publications will appear on Aswat's website, and will be used in our Education and Awareness Raising Workshops. Aswat will generously distribute its publications in public gatherings, fundraising tours, and other LGBTQI events. Our publications are regularly updated on our website.

Aswat's achievements in the information and publication project in 2006:

• Launched Aswat's Website. In April 2006, Aswat formally launched its website. The event gathered activists and supporters from numerous human rights and gay organizations and hosted representatives from foundations and friends of Aswat. Aswat's website serves to publish Aswat's activities, programs and initiatives; it provides a safe space for gay women to contact Aswat, to learn more about the issue of gender and sexuality; it also has many links to gay  women’s writings and other gay organizations.
• Developed a Glossary of LGBTQI terms in Arabic. Aswat published a LGBTQI glossary of terms in Arabic, which is the first of its kind. This glossary allows Arab women to relate to their sexuality in non-derogatory terms, with emphasis on an alternative, resisting 'mother-tongue'. The terms are being introduced and used regularly in Aswat's education and awareness raising workshops, as well as by many workshop coordinators and in gay women’s writings.
• Published four Information Papers
  Issue 1: The History of Sexuality in the Arab World
  Issue 2: Lesbianism and Health
  Issue 3: World Pride
  Issue 4: Homosexuality and Lesbianism.
• Published a Booklet in Arabic language:"Home and Exile in Queer Experience: collection of articles about lesbians and  homosexual identity" is published and will be delivered after its launching on March 28th, 2007.

3) Empowerment and Awareness-Raising Project 

The main aim of the project is to answer a pressing need among us and other Palestinian gay women: the need of a safe place where we can voice our feelings, frustrations and fears; a place where we can acquire knowledge about lesbianism through literature in Arabic. Most importantly, the project aims to support Palestinian gay women by raising our awareness to our gender and sexual identity. This will help us develop positive attitudes towards our gender and sexuality, hence, enable us to relate to other LGBTQI women, and allow/encourage us to express our sexuality, rather than repressing it.
In 2006, Aswat aimed to empower its members to become agents for social change. We strongly believe that when women have the adequate tools, they will be able to improve their status and bring about desirable changes in their homes, with their families, at their the work place and in the larger community.
 

4) Peace and Justice Advocacy

As Aswat has grown and achieved recognition in Israel and Palestine, it has often been called upon to join and contribute with its analyses and political insights in a number of social and political coalitions.  This past year we introduced Aswat positions and/or provided Aswat leadership during the International Women in Black conference held in East Jerusalem and in local and international discussions regarding the International Gay Pride held in Jerusalem in 2006.

5) Building the Group's Organizational Capacity

Aswat continues the ongoing development of its organizational infrastructure and highlights the importance of carefully developing, planning, implementing and evaluating its activities. Aswat's staff, coordinators and members closely follow up every project’s progress report and evaluate the outcome of each project, drawing conclusions for improvements and introducing changes when needed. In addition, Aswat continues its efforts to raise sustainable resources to support its activities.
The Group works with an organizational consultant (Ms. Shahira Shalabi) to further develop our work strategies, build our organizational structure and define the roles of the various organizational committees operating within Aswat. The process has greatly contributed and continues to contribute to Aswat's growth as an organization and enables us to have a clear vision, goals and strategies. The organizational consultant is a service provided by Shatil, Organization for Social Change.

6) Aswat in the Media

Arabic and International Media have become increasingly interested in Aswat’s activism. Aswat continues its keen efforts to raise public awareness and debate surrounding the issue of women sexuality and lesbianism through Arabic media exposure.

On the national level, as for June 2006, Aswat's General Coordinator was interviewed by seven radio programs including 'Radio El-Shams', 'Radio El-Salam', 'Monte Carlo Radio' and 'The Voice of the North Radio'. Aswat's coordinator also gave two Television interviews, one with Channel 10, and the other with HOT's local TV channel.
On the international level, our General Coordinator was widely interviewed by the International media.
This massive exposure has contributed to bring the issue of women rights and gender equality to public awareness and debate.

In addition, Aswat issued a press release inviting all committees of Arab students at universities all over the country to dedicate the IDAHO - International Day Against Homophobia - to educate, advocate and raise public awareness regarding the issue of homophobia and gay rights. This is an important step and a great responsibility as it gives Aswat the possibility to educate all members of the community about gay issues, break stereotypes and engage in ongoing dialogues about gay women rights in the Arab-Palestinian society. 

7) Crisis Fund

Palestinian society is not yet open to the subject of homosexuality and can often be very violent towards gays, especially gay women. We often have to face serious consequences for just being who we are, for example:

• Having to leave our homes and to find a safe place where to stay for a few months until we can get back on our feet
• Having to deal with damage done to our property. For example our cars being damaged by somebody who knows it belongs to a gay or a lesbian; our mobile phones taken away from us when our parents are suspicious about our sexual orientation
• Having to endure economic hardship when financial support from our parents ends as a consequence of their discovery about our sexual orientation
• Facing discrimination: being fired from our jobs and and/or not being able to get a job after we have been affiliated with the gay community
• Risking our lives. The danger is verbal mental, physical and sexual.

For all the above reasons we need to be able to support women who are facing these problems and to answer their immediate survival needs.

Major Events- International Achievements

• In March 2006, Aswat hosted a mini conference with Helem - Lebanese Protection for Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgenders. This was the first formal meeting for Arab Lesbians in the Middle East region. The objective of the meeting was to exchange information, to define common goals and to develop a program for future action; to discuss ways to protect the activists of the groups from hatred crimes in our communities and to initiate a regional networking for advancing Arab gay women politics and inputs. It helped us both to explore the concept of the “gay deviant” in the Arabic cultural context and develop a resisting discourse to the hegemonic derogatory and discriminating one; Supported by Astraea and Urgent Action Fund.
• In June 2006, Aswat's general coordinator and public face of the organization, Ms. Rauda Morcos won the Felipa de Souza Award for her extensive efforts, leadership and  accomplishments at Aswat. Ms. Morcos was nominated by several NGOs and activists from national and international human rights, women's and gay organizations, who recognized her immense contribution to Palestinian gay women on the national and international level. The Felipa de Souza is awarded by the International Lesbian and Human Rights Association. Such international exposure has greatly contributed to Aswat, as we further seized this opportunity to raise funds to support our ongoing projects and deepen alliances with supporters and similar groups. Supported by IGLHRC, Global Fund for Women, Astraea and many other Group and Individuals.
• In September 2006 Ms. Morcos attended the Faslane 365 by Women in Black- UK, and conducted public events at Gay’s the Word - Lesbian Gay Bookstore, Palestinian Solidarity Campaign, and Kent University. Supported by Women in Black-UK
• On November 1st, one of Aswat Board members represented Aswat at the Astraea Foundation Retreat for Women and Trans People in Texas, US. Her contribution to the Retreat was to connect issues of homosexuality and lesbianism to the broader questions of gender and sexuality.
• From November 1st to November 24th, Ms. Rauda Morcos together with Aswat Chair of the Board of Directors, conducted a Speaking Tour in Belgium and Holland - hosted by Women in Black Leuven - organized to support Aswat’s activities and to connect with similar groups.

Difficulties faced by Aswat in 2006

At the break of the war on Lebanon on July 14th 2006 an emergency situation was declared in all cities in the North. Businesses were closed and citizens were ordered to remain in shelters or safe spaces. Hence, Aswat’s staff and members were unable to attend the office. As a consequence, all activities, workshops and projects were put to an halt. Though expenditures continued, our funding process and all activities that allow income were stopped. This has negatively affected the planning of our projects.
The war directly affected the planning of our Education and Awareness Raising Project as four lectures and fifteen workshops were cancelled due to the emergency situation. Publications for the Information Center Project were delayed as a consequence of businesses closures.
Despite the many challenges we had to face, Aswat was able to resume its full activity as indicated below:

• Advocacy, Outreach and Education Project: most of the cancelled workshops were postponed and held in December 2006 and in January and February 2007
• Information Project: all the publications that were postponed were published in September, followed by Aswat’s booklet "Home and Exile in Queer Experience
• Board & Group Meetings: were held as planned, only shifted during the war time to safer areas.