A Feminist News Service Is Reaching Out in Arabic

By Sam Felder on April 22, 2003 9:21 AM | | Comments (1)

According to this article from the New York Times, the three-year old Women's E-News site (of which I am long time subscriber) discovered that Saudi Arabia was the fifth largest source of viewers for the site. There were also a large numbers of visitors from neighboring Qatar. Women's E-News, as you might guess, provides news about abortion rights, domestic violence, single motherhood, women in athletics, and women's rights movements around the world.

Both Saudi Arabia and Qatar have stringent web censorship policies, akin to those we hear so much about in China, that block sites about women in history, Planned Parenthood's TeenWire, and iVillage.

In response to increased viewing from the Arab world, Women's E-News is creating an Arabic language version of the site and news feed.
The most prominent article for the site describes efforts by Israeli and Palestinian women to encourage their peers to discuss peace and coexistence issues they believe male negotiators have neglected. Another article examines Egyptian women's efforts to win divorce rights. And a third is on the sewing workshops where Palestinian women earn a living in the absence of male breadwinners.
I am glad to see this outreach occurring and hope that English versions of those articles are available, they sound very interesting!

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1 Comments

Julie said:

Oh yeay, oh yeay, oh yeay! I am so so happy for these women! They are finding feminism in their own way and making it truly their own. I am so proud of all of them for seeking out others like themselves! Wow!

June 16, 2003 2:26 AM

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Sam Felder is a web designer and occasional writer in Los Angeles, CA.

Born in Washington, DC, Sam and his family moved to Peoria, IL, where he grew up and went to school. He returned to DC in 2003 and left for the west coast in late 2005.

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