Rania Abouzeid in the Afghan capital of Kabul, 2018.
Rania Abouzeid in the Afghan capital of Kabul, 2018.
Born in Wellington and now based in Beirut, international correspondent, author and documentary film-maker Rania Abouzeid challenges Western perceptions of female oppression in the Arab world. As told to Joanna Wane
I became a journalist because I'm curious about the world and intrigued by politics and its impact on people'slives. From a very young age, I was also aware of how Lebanon in particular, and the Middle East more generally, are portrayed in the Western media. The reports didn't always gel with my own experiences — we visited Lebanon several times when I was a kid during its civil war.
I learned that wars generally happen in pockets and that life can carry on and seem quite normal just a few kilometres away from a killing zone. I learned to zoom out, to understand the bigger picture, the context, to see the pockets that don't always make the news but are still part of the story, while also zooming in to focus on the details that can be powerfully telling.
According to family lore, in the late 1800s four brothers went to the Port of Beirut hoping to escape poverty and hardships in their native Lebanon by making new lives in America. One brother got on a boat, but his 3 siblings were prevented from joining him. The boat was apparently full.
The brothers yelled out their goodbyes, certain they'd meet on the other side of the seas in the US. They got on another boat which, unknown to them, docked in Australia. They stayed for a while but one of the brothers sadly drowned in the Yarra River and the other two decided to cross the Tasman, lured by a gold rush in New Zealand. They didn't find gold. One of the brothers was murdered in Gisborne in a dispute over a poker game. The other survived and his descendants remain in New Zealand today.
I was born in Wellington and was about 7 years old when my family moved to Melbourne. So I am Eastern (by blood) and Western (by upbringing), which means I don't experience culture shock moving between my two worlds and can hopefully help translate one place for the other.
I think there's a grave misperception about women in the Arab world. To start with, the situation for women is different in every country. Iran is not Lebanon is not Tunisia is not Syria is not Saudi Arabia.
In Lebanon, women gained suffrage in 1952 and today there are women in every facet of society, including Parliament. Sadly, the prevalent view in Hollywood and in some media is of the repressed, oppressed Arab woman, as if miniskirts mean freedom. Plenty of women in Lebanon wear miniskirts and plenty also wear the loose cloaks known as abayas.
Yes, there are very real legal and political challenges in many states in the Middle East and the fight for women's rights is nowhere near over, but too often progress and freedom seem to be measured by superficial markers like what a woman wears (including on her head) rather than her ability to control and make choices about her life.
Abouzeid with US troops in Mosul during the Iraq War, 2009. Photo / AP
In Iran, for instance, where hijab is mandatory, women can pass on their nationality to children born to foreign fathers. In Lebanon, where women can wear as much or as little clothing as they want, women don't have that right. Saudi women were only allowed to drive a few years ago, whereas there have long been female pilots in many countries in the Middle East. So the opportunities and challenges vary.
Lebanon is experiencing an unprecedented financial and economic collapse, a disaster so severe the World Bank ranks it as one of the world's worst since the mid-1800s. The currency has lost more than 90 per cent of its value. There are shortages of medications in a country that was once known as the Hospital of the East for its top-notch medical services. There is perhaps one hour of state electricity every day or few days depending on where you live.
Here, the main issues women face are concerns that affect everyone, namely trying to survive in what has become a failed state. Still, when states fail, their institutions hollowed, and with poverty deepening and crime on the rise, safety for women is a critical concern.
Abouzeid has spent the past two decades covering the Middle East, South Asia and North Africa, including conflict zones in Syria and Iraq. A regular contributor to US-based publications including National Geographic, The Atlantic and The New York Times Magazine, Abouzeid is one of 29 women correspondents profiled in "Through Her Eyes" , edited by Melissa Roberts and Trevor Watson (Hardie Grant, $40)
