Contribution short abstract:

In the Occupied Palestinian Territories, feminist activists and researchers often identify 3 main causes of their sufferings: (1) the Israeli occupation, (2) patriarchy, and (3) the NGO system. I'l explore the tal'3at movement, a feminist, decolonial, critical movement that started in September 2019

Contribution long abstract:

While conducting fieldwork in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) and Palestinian refugee camps inside them, Palestinian feminist activists and researchers would often identify the main causes of their sufferings as a three-headed Cerberus: (1) the Israeli occupation, (2) patriarchy, and (3) the NGO system. Those oppressions are intertwined turning life for Palestinians (and more so for Palestinian women) almost unbearable.

After the Oslo Accords, the OPT became more and more dependent on external aid, usually delivered through different ramifications of International Cooperation. The NGOification of Palestine has been described and denounced by Palestinian activists and scholars as an imposed restructuring of women’s activism through a Western agenda lens, its main consequence being the continuous shrinking of Palestinian civil society.

This paper draws from ethnographic and netographic research conducted in the OPT from September 2019 to May 2022, following the surge and development of the movement Tal’3at: a feminist, anti-colonial, political movement that achieved mobilizations and repercussions all through the WANA region’s main cities and Palestinian refugee camps. The movement was born in September 2019 in response to a gender-based violence murder and pushed over hundreds of women to the streets to chant against patriarchy while centering Palestinian liberation and questioning the NGOs and researchers role and positionality in the struggle.

The main objective is understanding and learning from the Tala’3at experience focusing on the anticolonial feminist critique of the International Cooperation and Humanitarian Aid system, holding a candle to its methodological and theoretical proposals, achievements, and shortcomings.