Gendered Disinformation Risks Women Human Rights Defenders’ Lives And Advocacy: #DefeatDeceit

Every year, the world celebrates International Human Rights Day on 10 December. This annual celebration commemorates resilience and the day when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights came into effect. It paved the way for international human rights instruments, and was an important document in the modern journey to uphold human rights globally.

The introduction in  the United Nations’ website has the following introductory excerpt: “The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) is a milestone document in the history of human rights. Drafted by representatives with different legal and cultural backgrounds from all regions of the world, the Declaration was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in Paris on 10 December 1948 (General Assembly resolution 217 A) as a common standard of achievements for all peoples and all nations. It sets out, for the first time, fundamental human rights to be universally protected and it has been translated into over 500 languages. The UDHR is widely recognized as having inspired, and paved the way for, the adoption of more than seventy human rights treaties, applied today on a permanent basis at global and regional levels (all containing references to it in their preambles).”^[1]

It is usually supposed to be a day of joy, but many human rights defenders and collectives in 2023 were rightfully observing the loss of life in ongoing conflicts, such as in Palestine, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, instead. In the Israel-Palestine genocidal war especially, many of the UDHR articles were violated in both military and civilian contexts — even before 7 October 2023, notably the following (and many more):

Article 5: “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”

Article 9: “No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.”

Article 10: ”Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.”

Activists, collectives, human rights defenders, and entire nations were collectively asking for a ceasefire in the horrific Israel-Palestine attacks. Set in the background of an occupation that has been going on for decades, violations of Palestinian human rights and human rights defenders have been recorded going much further back than 7 October 2023.

These attacks against Palestinian human rights defenders took place online and offline, with misinformation and disinformation being important tools in the arsenal.

Palestinian women human rights defenders have historically been detained for their advocacy as Israel routinely designates Palestinian human rights and humanitarian organisations "terrorist" or “unlawful,” without providing any evidence to substantiate their claims.

According to ohchr.org^[2], three out of seven organisations targeted by Israel in a 2021 crackdown and declared “unlawful” were headed by women or provided specific services to women and girls, which otherwise would not be available to them in occupied Palestinian territories.

Shatha Odeh, 60, is a woman human rights defender who was in an Israeli prison for a year due to being the head of an organisation that Israel claims is illegal in occupied Palestinian territory. However, Odeh said she was arrested because she was the Director of Health Work Committees (HWC), a civil society organisation that provides health care to people living in the occupied West Bank, including women and girls in remote areas. After her release, she was ordered by Israeli authorities to stop working for HWC.

According to UN Human Rights in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt Office), Israel labeled her organisation, alongside other leading Palestinian human rights and humanitarian organisations "terrorist" or “unlawful,” without any evidence to substantiate this claim.

#FreeShathaOdeh was a social media campaign that had support from almost 130 organisations in more than forty countries supporting a letter requesting that the World Health Organisation intervene for her release.

According to the same ohchr.org source, while being imprisoned by Israeli forces, Shatha “was interrogated without having access to legal counsel and subjected to harsh treatment. The oPt Office documented other cases of women who had senior positions in the organizations who were also arbitrarily detained and subjected to ill-treatment by Israeli forces in the same period. Women staff and volunteers working for one of the organisations have been summoned and threatened by Israeli forces to stop their work or they would face detention and other consequences for themselves and their children.

In addition to being prosecuted and imprisoned by Israel for her humanitarian and civil society work, Odeh and other Palestinian women defenders face threats, intimidation, and attacks by Palestinian individuals and groups for her activism. Many of the threats Odeh has faced for her advocacy work on women’s right to health by individuals and groups have also been online, she said.

“There is a shrinking space for women expressing their opinion or ideas in the media and on social media,” Odeh said. “We feel that there is nobody supporting or protecting us. So, yes, sometimes we will keep silent because maybe I will be threatened, or my family, or my daughters.”

The oPt Office reports that women human rights defenders and journalists and women’s rights organisations face threats, intimidation and hate both online and offline.

Palestinian women working to end gender-based discrimination in the occupied Palestinian territory are singled out and targeted online with hate speech and threats. These threats also extend to death threats against them and their families, as well as threats of rape and other sexual violence.

There have also been instances in which women human rights defenders have been met with physical attacks and gender-based targeting at demonstrations. According to a UN Human Rights report^[3], during a wave of protests against Palestinian authorities in the West Bank after the killing of political opponent and activist Nizar Banat, women who were at the forefront of the protests were specifically targeted by Palestinian security forces and private individuals. These actors seemed to be working in coordination with law enforcement officers and physically attacked the women, while also seizing their phones and sharing their private pictures, as a punishment for participating and a deterrent from taking part in future protests. 

These strategies can be effective in halting many WHRDs and their activism, which undermines free expression and exchange. However, many human rights defenders also do not let it undermine their efforts and persevere despite it all. As Shatha herself says, “I’m a human rights fighter. If we lose hope, nothing will change.”